Shrouded by Mystery: The First Selfie

by Joe Masterleo

“Common sense and a sense of humor are the same thing, moving at different speeds. A sense of humor is just common sense, dancing” (William James).

The eco-spirituality of Jesuit-scientists Teilhard de Chardin (synthesis), and Thomas Berry (The Universe Story), envisioned a new Science of Humanity grounding educational curricula and religion within a single coherent story of the cosmos. Fully realized, this mythical synthesis would enlarge religion, spirituality, science, and Christ to cosmic proportions. Said synthesis would do for cosmology what Edison did for lighting, Ford for transportation, and Jung for enlarging the unconscious to include spirituality – updating them for the times. Freeing humanity from its many limitations, be they oil lamps, buggy whips, or a Freudian psyche reduced to instinctual determinates and their mortal conflicts, are significant strides in the evolution of thought and technology.

Being set free from the vestigial shackles of separation consciousness (dualistic thinking) that continue to hamper the siloed disciplines of science and religion, and further divide global tribes, tongues, creeds, and disciplines, would be the greatest evolutionary milestone of them all.

Teilhard often spoke of a “greater Christ” and a “better Christianity” (Christology), having once asked a colleague, “Can you tell me who will at last give us the meta-Christianity we are all waiting for?” Advancing Teilhard’s work, Berry called for a “functional cosmology” that would integrate inner and outer worlds. Such a universal cosmotheology would at last merge religio-scientific realities by identifying their common Source in the singularity. Such would catalyze the evolution of a new human phylum, marked by a unitive consciousness and Spirit-Science convergence inclined toward restoring a degraded biosphere. When it comes to identifying origins and Source, there can no more be multiple universe stories than there can be two or more sets of biological parents for a newborn. At its core, there can be only one Big Story with many diverse branches stemming from a single Source, energy, and substance in the implicate order.

The Teilhard-Berry synthesis gauntlets have long since been thrown down, with major current and future challenges on adding details toward a plenary model. Further, the singularity (universal constant) satisfying all disciplines and religions, as always, is on standby in the liminal wings, awaiting human thought and perception to identify, download and explain it. The future is now, ready for a new generation to set everything aflame with its renewing inspirations, energy, and purpose on the road to kingdom come (Omega). With the Teilhard-Berry synthesis directives in place, it’s refreshing to see many at work contributing to its integral foundation and superstructure, via other synergy groups, including the DTN. The quantum vacuum is in major flux, and via morphogenic resonance the noosphere is experiencing ongoing updates from many fronts.

Once defined and embraced, the sheer number of dedicated light workers required to operationalize such a vision is formidable. Yet the vision itself, in the words of Teilhard, needs only a single spark to ignite it, one that “has to appear only once in a single mind .  .  . setting everything ablaze universally.” The stakes are high, and lamentably, the laborers relatively few. And with only a few minutes to go on the global game clock, time is fast running out. Some declare that we’ve already passed the tipping point, now into damage control phase, too late to stem the global uninhabitability tide, to say nothing of reversing it.  

Yet the eternal God is our refuge and primary informing constant in the midst of change.  A small power wisely and steadily directed can achieve critical mass quickly. Of divine origin, Spirit is the real essence and law of creation and individual being, the invisible substance of all material form. Divinity now and then appears in whatever providential form(s) necessary to resolve dilemmas, awaiting humanity to relinquish its siloed perspectives, binary thinking, and exclusive empirical means and methods of approaching mystery. Unfortunately, this mystery has yet to be defined along traditional academic or scientific lines with any significant unanimity, save as “dark matter” and “dark energy.” Uninformed by the kind of synergy necessary to connect the synthesis dots, theologians haven’t done much better, satisfied to accept mystery for what it is, known globally as “God” or “Spirit,” themselves non-explanatory catch-all words consigning their nature and substance to the unknowable. In science, the terms dark matter and dark energy are wastebasket terms, akin to the colloquial terms “thingamajig” or “whatchamacallit” when blanks occur in otherwise intelligent dialogue, here meaning “we have no idea what (or who) that is.” In the post-modern era, with the sheer wealth of data and information at hand in all fields, enough to patch together a working synthesis, intelligent beings can and must do better than that.

It’s time for scientists to stop playing empirical word games, and for tribal religionists to earnestly join the synergy party with serious intentions to resolve sectarian differences among themselves, and with modern science, teaming up to create a more inclusive knowledge base. Along with buggy whips and oil lamps, binary thinking belongs in the Smithsonian of ancient thought and archaic ways of arriving at universal truths.

For sure, progress has been made, however inchmeal, but over the long haul falling further behind the pace needed to put it all together, sell it to the public, and join forces in executing a viable global plan toward saving the species and planet. Only a fiery synergy of unitive consciousness can do so, offered Teilhard, “setting everything ablaze.” No synergy, no blaze. No unifying blaze, no viable future. Education, after all, is not the filling of a pail, but the lighting of a fire. Light the fire, and the pail fills itself.

For the spiritually conscious, there is only One power in the universe with many apps, known by as many names, disciplines, religions, and sciences as human intellect can develop befuddling nomenclature for. For the data obsessed, perhaps what Jesus declared is altogether too simple.

“All power is given unto me in heaven and earth” (Matt. 18:20).

Note: the words “All power” are unequivocally inclusive, with no asterisks or exceptions. Along scientific lines, the question lingers, what exactly is that mysterious unifying power? Says here, it’s a universal constant hiding in plain sight.

While imperial Nero (a.k.a. science, philosophy, and theology) fiddles with abstractions, Rome (a.k.a Earth) is burning-up in global warming. To say nothing of the imminent threat of nuclear annihilation. Something has to give, and soon. Perhaps an ancient relic might spark a graphic wake-up call, providing an integral clue to solving the biggest mystery of the universe, one involving THE universal constant (singularity) that religion calls “God,” and science terms “fundamental forces and elementary particles,” distinctions this author declares are without a significant difference.

As categories, science and religion are mere abstractions, threads plucked from a unified tapestry that enfolds them both without distinction. Their apparent difference is no difference at all, merely the result of two disciplines viewing the same cross-over element from different access points, using different words to describe it. By illustration, one camp argues that its Uncle Sam who requires its citizens to pay taxes, while another insists that it’s the U.S. government behind it all. Same difference. And so it goes ad nauseum on the dualistic-thinking side as siloed disciplines create their own separation dilemmas on whose horns they forever self-immolate. And that, without integral understanding, or future hope in telling a coherent universe story with significant impact on human thought, global unity, and/or evolutionary momentum.

The best of human intelligence has taken a hearty swing at solving this very solvable conundrum,  yet mainly by attempting to define the whole via one or several of its individual parts, not from a more inclusive viewpoint. That is, from a common center (singularity) which all the parts derive from as Source and orient to in essence — as spokes to central hub, or spiraling galaxies to their central black holes. Seeking further and more substantive meat in the direction of synthesis, headway must begin by both sides working in earnest resolve to bridge this age-old divide.

Lectures and/or conferences often begin with a keynote speaker who begins with levity to crack the ice. Perhaps a tongue-in-cheek opener might assist here in relaxing the tension between these more exclusively left and right brain objective/subjective parties. Two brains are better than one, after all, particularly with they’re unreconciled halves of the same brain. When effective, creativity and playful imagination can be useful in making a cardinal point, even on the most reverent subjects. So here goes:

True to form, millennials credit themselves with being the first “selfie generation.”  Actually, the first “selfie” was taken early in the first century, and ironically, in the most unlikely of places. As word pictures often work best, perhaps an ancient selfie (of sorts) is a fitting place to begin. The Shroud of Turin, the purported burial cloth of Jesus, has attracted more public attention, scientific interest, and research than any religious relic in human history. The two-part, herringbone-weave burial cloth contains a faint sepia colored outline with dark brown stains bearing the image of a first century crucified man. After decades of rigorous scientific scrutiny, research has confirmed that the relic is from the same era and provincial location where Jesus lived and died, containing blood particles in anatomically correct locations matching descriptions of his scourging and crucifixion found in the gospels.

It is presented here owing to key scientific findings on the Shroud that bear on a proposed transdisciplinary and trans-religious synthesis model, much larger in scope along evidentiary lines that can be conveyed here. Namely, that all things began as one in an undifferentiated state before evolving into multiple differentiated states and stages like a zygote (fertilizing egg), an undivided whole that likewise splits into separate parts in development. That undifferentiated state is a singularity, a unified energy field of uncreated light that incarnates and interprets (shape-shifts) into a variety of material space-time forms, images, sounds, colors, and expressions with infinite evolutionary potential. And unfortunately, with many diverse and contentious viewpoints as to its nature and origin.

Which begs the question, if God be One and undivided in essence, shapeshifting into many forms and disciplines while still maintaining unity within and among in all things, how can that One, in essence, be truly denominated? If any species can divide, denominate, and splinter a unified field, humanity can do so with specialized ease. If making change for a penny is at all possible, the scientific community in particular will find a way. Instead, a deft combination of analysis and synthesis is in order, replacing the “paralysis by analysis” dilemmas that typically occur in thought and language. Left brain (empirical) binary thinking is a cutting tool, splitting and dividing a cosmic field already unified, useful in some instances, inadequate in others. Past a certain point, it’s by itself useless in synthesis endeavors, which require equal measures of rational, transrational, intuitive, and imaginative ways of apprehending and knowing reality. Perhaps deferring to a higher order process, authority, (and resonant vibe) might help with traction here:

“And he made from one [common origin, one source, one blood], all nations of men to settle on the face of the earth .  .  . so that they should seek God, in the hope that they might feel after him and find Him, although he is not far from each one of us.” (Acts 17: 25-26, AMP).

Not exactly gender neutral, or empirically crisp, but not bad for starters. We can work with that, if only because of its language, being revelatory, is inclusive. And please note carefully, the revealed Word states that the synthesis investigation is to begin, not with replicable research methods under rigorous and controlled laboratory conditions, but with an EXPERIENCE, the felt sense of divine presence in its investigative subjects. Said realized presence is the requisite perceptual tool that makes unitive consciousness possible. Do hard scientists have “soft” (and deep) all-inclusive hearts to get there? And can religionists set aside their sectarian traditions, distinctive doctrines, and tribal ways on the road in searching for common ground in a science-based singularity?

From a synthesis standpoint one need look no further for the mysterious “common origin, one source, and one blood” factor than electromagnetism (light energy), the very definition of Spirit (consciousness), and the resident animating substance of all material form, referenced ten times in Gen. 1 alone. And a good (God) place to start, as in developing any viable synthesis, one must have divinity at its center, plausibly demonstrating how such can be so at the nano-molecular or quantum levels. According to the biblical record, it begins with light, “Let light be” (Gen.1:3). The greater cannot come from the lesser, nor can the higher from the lower principle. As above, so below, outermost and innermost. Starting with light (stardust), the most common metaphor for divinity among the world’s three monotheistic religions, the rest of the created order unfolds (evolves), including the creation of our sun, which the record declares came some days (time) later. That the Scripture record and Big Bang cosmology have something in common is an intelligent way to begin the conversation re: a universal synthesis paradigm.

The author proposes that said singularity (ethereal substance) candidates for having electrogravitic qualities/vectors, a synthesis cocktail with seamless, co-existing electromagnetic, gravitational, and consciousness properties rolled into one. And with all of them co-existing on a continuum (holarchy) of vibrating frequencies that creates everything visible and invisible, while holding them to their center. That means that scientists best look to harmonize their theoretical differences between general relativity and quantum physics, even if they haven’t yet proven, or will ever prove, how gravity and electromagnetism can be two peas in a pod. Science can’t explain the mystery of either, which is of no consequence in accepting them as real in our daily lives. After all, big things (like quasars) do come from little things (like quarks and Plancks) in creation and owe their existence to them. And with the right synthesis approach, should be hypothesized as such, even if yet empirically unproven. (Hint: said synthesis model has already been proposed at least twice, by Nikola Tesla back in 1938. And more recently, by physicist Nassim Haramein. The author’s book explains same in detail.)

“Everything is the light. If you want to know the secrets of the universe, study energy, frequency, and vibration” (Nikola Tesla).

“The concepts of spirituality are basically the physics we haven’t understood yet” (Nassim Haramein).

Like Teilhard in his day, such geniuses are routinely deemed heretics, mavericks, or crackpots, shunned for thinking outside traditional boxes. Unfortunately, having an ample coterie of enemies is the story of every innovator ahead of his/her time attempting to blaze a new trail. Case in point? Teilhard. Let us remember, Christ-like, the price he and others have paid, that we might today freely draw on their contributions, unscathed by scandal, censorship, and/or persecution from modern-day imperial (empirical) authorities, mainly the Scientific Vatican.

“Colleges hate geniuses just as convents hate saints” (Ralph Waldo Emerson).

Besides, as Teilhard has duly noted, such has already been organically defined by the apostle Paul in his epistles as the so-called “third nature” of Christ, referring to him as “he in whom all things consist and are held together” (Col. 1:17), and “he fills all things” (Col.2:10), and “Christ is all and in all” (Eph. 4:9). Note, the inclusivity of “is all and in all” does not mean “all in some.”

Owing to the psycho-spiritual tendency to centrally congeal in human development and evolution, referred to as convergence, centration, and interiorization phenomena by Teilhard, identifying such an integral in-cohering energy (a) acknowledges God as cosmically embedded (incarnated) in the heart of matter universally, (b) lends clarity the very definition, identity, and substance of Christ, (c) defines the substance of the spirit-soul, (d) characterizes the nature and substance of every atom and all things, micro to macro, and (d) names the energy that transforms itself in both inner and outer worlds, and (e) the Source fueling the evolutionary carousel forward toward the Omega Point of history. Thus far, such has been the sought after holy grail of understanding, vainly pursued in exoteric form (as an object) by many a quixotic, romantic, and religious knight. Such has been otherwise hidden in plain sight, within and all around them, like leaven in bread, exactly where the Christ declared it to be.

Said Jesus, “The kingdom of heaven is already spread upon the face of the earth, and men do not see it” (Gospel of Thomas, saying 113).

Consider the fact that Einstein had major regrets attempting to solve the unified field conundrum in the unsuccessful manner that he did, wishing instead he had turned his attention more exclusively to the study of light (electromagnetism). Perhaps we’re on to something here.

Further, the author maintains that any universe story (new or old) absenting these primary elements (gravity and electromagnetism) as the implicate Source, energy, and substance of matter would be hard pressed to explain their exclusion along scientific lines, in the process further identifying what alternative vector(s) their religio-scientific foundation (synthesis) might instead pivot on. According to science, aside from gravity, light is the only constant in the universe. For religions, God or Spirit is the universal constant. But of what substance and nature is God? It is entirely conceivable that light and God are one and the same in nature and substance, varying only in frequency vibration, at a given moment appearing in either wave or particle form. At minimum, it is plausible that God and light (electromagnetism) are kissing cousins (entangled), comprising the irreducible interbeing element of a God-made material world, of humanity’s God-identity, as THE standard (universal) measure of equality among humans, and that which makes sacred and one all manner of being.

Divinity is always found where least expected. The stone scientific investigators habitually overlook, reject, minimize, and/or stumble over, is invariably the chief cornerstone of the whole unified superstructure, including the human spirit-soul. Such is the Christ position throughout history in many fields of endeavor, hiding in plain sight. A three-piece puzzle, any three-piece puzzle – one consisting of God, light energy (electromagnetism), and gravity is a lot easier to ponder, comprehend, or creatively accept as an idea, even if it hasn’t been theoretically explained, or empirically proven.

Pancakes, flapjacks, or hot cakes by any other name still look and taste the same. Their molecular ingredients are of little importance to those eating and enjoying them.

Even so, one need not fully understand the “how” of their synthesis in order to fully appreciate that such may be so. To wit, a novice pilot learning how to land a single engine plane at night, or in dense fog, needn’t know the details of how the plane’s altimeter is assembled. S/he just needs to know what it’s for, and how utilize and trust it.

The Shroud and scientific explanations as to the nature and cause of the imprints on its fibers are but one piece (among many) of compelling “evidence” presented in the author’s proposed thesis for light being THE essential energic (etheric) trans-religious, transdisciplinary basis, not only for the resurrection, and life after death, but as the heart of the new universe story as well. All things consist of it, vibrating at different frequencies, appearing in tornadic (spiraling) fashion from what only looks like empty space.

“Concerning matter, we have all been wrong. What we have called matter is really energy, whose vibration has been lowered as to be perceptible to the senses. There is no matter, there is only light and sound” (Albert Einstein).

One must ask, in complementing the moral, judicial, and redemptive aspects of the revelation (sin and judgement) by presenting its organic element along psycho-physical lines, is there a more inclusive way or apropos time to celebrate the pioneering labors of Teilhard and Berry in presenting the “better Christ,” “greater Christianity,” and/or “functional cosmology” that they’ve jointly asked of us? Given the invaluable contributions of these synthesis luminaries, who, in any historical epoch, has it better than we do as their benefactors re: the current wealth of interdisciplinary ingredients at our disposal to connect the interbeing dots?

Other related information on the Shroud itself, its history, travels, chemical composition, stains, and various markings, along with the controversies surrounding same can be found in a cursory Internet search on the subject (see Shroud.com). Scientific investigation of the Shroud’s image began in earnest after a series of photographs were taken in 1898, revealing that the image is unique, a precise photographic negative of the man it once swaddled, emblazoned on a non-photographically sensitive cloth. Of particular interest, the human image on the cloth has three-dimensional properties, more recently used to fashion a life-size 3-D sculpture of the image itself. It has also been determined, quite mysteriously, that the blood stains on the cloth preceded the formation of its 3-D imprint, leaving it open to further questions and scientific scrutiny as to the origin and causal factor(s) of same.

Eighty years later, the 1978 Shroud of Turin Research Project (STURP) investigations confirmed that the image was not formed by dyes, chemicals, vapors, mirrors, scorching, or by brush strokes. Further, researchers have thoroughly investigated multiple materialistic explanations for this unique photographic image, and have thus far been able to determine, with 95% certainty, that this indeed is the burial cloth of Jesus of Nazareth (highly recommend clicking the Resource tab for a video summary of the Shroud’s authenticating data points, allowing ample time for download).

The most plausible and current scientific hypothesis verifying same comes from two teams of researchers, (1) John Jackson’s team, who proposed the vacuum ultraviolet radiation hypothesis in 2008, and (2) Paolo Di Lozzario’s team, who experimentally substantiated Jackson’s hypothesis in 2010. Again, one can find ample details on both these extensive research projects online. To date, the only known explanation for the formation of the image involves electromagnetic radiation, an intense burst of light energy equivalent to the output of 14,000 excimer lasers emitted from every three-dimensional point of the body in the shroud. Excimer lasers are advanced electronic devices that did not exist on earth in the first century. (Today, these lasers are commonly used in the production of microelectronic devices, semiconductor based integrated circuits or “chips,” eye surgery, and micromachining).

Further, there is a double image on both the front and back of the burial cloth, but no image in the middle of it, implying that the cloth collapsed into a mechanically transparent body. That is, one can see inside the body like an X-ray. X-ray technology also did not exist in the first century, leaving researchers to conclude that these three effects — the double-image imprint, its X-ray qualities and laser-like markings that image a photographic negative, all belong to a supernatural event. Of note, Shroud researchers have determined that the origin of the illuminating radiation on the cloth came from the whole body, and not from an external source. In collapsing in on itself via the resurrection event, it appears that the Shroud fell through the dematerializing body as matter was turned into some form of pure light energy.

The Shroud imprint (see contrasting pics above) bears the image of a first century crucified man who bled from the same wounds, found in their exact anatomical location as described in the gospels. Scientifically verified, the image was made on the cloth by a high intensity burst of light. Note: as it appears on the Shroud, the image on the left is a precise photographic negative, but as it appears on the right is the same image viewed positively in 3-D form. Which means that the original, centuries-old image as it appears on the Shroud is a photographic negative. If the Shroud is authentic, the nature and means of its markings lend credibility to light being the highest part of matter, and the Light of the World (Christ/Spirit) as being the organic substance of material form universally. Such scientific findings have implications beyond the burial cloth itself, further suggesting that the transfer of created images from their template in the eternal realm (quanta), into images as they appear in 3-D space-time, may parallel the same processes in photographic development, but along more complex transmutational lines. The difference being that ordinary photographic development occurs when photographic film is treated after exposure to produce a positive image, strictly by chemical means. Whereas in the very act/process of Creation itself, acting out of his universal dark room (dark energy/Spirit), the Eternal Photographer develops a positive image of an image/entity into the fabric of space time in a bio-electrographic process. The resulting image outlines the specific contours and features of that living entity, image, or object, bringing it into existence in like manner, transposing it from its invisible to material to 3-D form. Being fluid, the process is reversible upon physical death, retrieving/retracting the spirit-soul image from its likeness in bodily form upon physical death. Dematerialized, it is thein absorbed back into the divine ground (quantum foam/matrix) as raindrops ultimately seek the ocean, becoming one with it again. Recycled energy, it may later become available for further distribution in other material forms. Given the broad bandwidth spectrum of light, quanta, and notions of an existing multi-verse, all things are possible. Truth indeed can stranger than fiction.

“Imagination is the only weapon in the war against reality” (Mad Hatter, Alice Through the Looking Glass).

The notion of light (electromagnetism) in association with divinity recurs over and again at key points in the creation and redemptive narratives – in the creation story of Genesis 1, at the burning bush, on Sinai, over the Ark of the Covenant, in the Bethlehem sky, in the Transfiguration, at the sealed tomb of Jesus, in Paul’s Damascus Road conversion, and in the Book of Revelation. And of course, in the fiery explosion of the Big Bang, its aftermath still detected in flooding the entire universe with microwave background radiation (CMB), the ancient light 0f Gen 1:3 that began saturating the universe at the moment of creation. If authentic, it appears here once again in an unexplainable imprint on an ancient, full-body burial cloth that bears material witness to it being that of Jesus, thereby lending credence to his (a) resurrection, (b) identity as the Son of God, and (c) being organically incarnate in creation as the cosmic “Light of the World,” the Universal Christ, God incarnate, the invisible substance of all created form.

The combined evidence of science and the biblical record are compelling.

The “Light of the World” is a fitting name for Jesus’ God-identity, and when realized, ours as well, the result of a spiritual transformation/regeneration that allows for seeing as Christ sees, in integrated wholes, replicating himself in nature (natural revelation) and in an assortment of light beings and light workers throughout history in all fields (special revelation).

As in the case of the Shroud, no one can “prove” with 100% certainty the existence of the divine using empirical data points, whose scientific findings on this relic are nonetheless compelling. Data points are the exclusive province of the rational and sense-bound (effects, not causes), which do not meet the terms and conditions for a realized discovery and personal experience of the deeper mysteries of life as outlined in the New Testament. As in the Shroud research project, it is the humble province of science to merely discover, confirm, or disprove causal factors as they out-picture in nature and the cosmos. Withal, there remain credible historical (eyewitness) accounts accompanying the written revelation attesting to the wonder works of Jesus in his time, including raising others from the dead, and performing other miracles.

Evidence on the Shroud lends further credence to the notion that what the human species has most in common is not genetics, the socio-political state, or our tribal religions and beliefs, but our eternal origin in uncreated light. We are its image, likeness, eyes, ears, and mind. And like Jesus, it’s thinking, feeling, and acting incarnate. Activated or unrealized, Christ is simply the vivifying spirit of God in persons, and that spirit is *virtual in nature — uncreated (eternal) light.

*[Virtual, defined as “having the power of acting or possessing invisible efficacy without the material or sensible part”]

Like the air we breathe, sunshine or rainfall, in pure form this light (Spirit) is a standalone reality, common property shared by all, and owned by none. As detailed in the author’s synthesis model, incarnating this ambient light as inhabiting living things occurs in much the same way a physical body “inhabits” clothing, fills a coat of armor, or dons a space suit worn outside earth’s atmosphere. Or defined as energy, the way electricity “inhabits” each household appliance whose source lies outside and independent of each dwelling, and every appliance therein.

“I am a part of a part of a light, and it is the music” (Nikola Tesla).

Like Jesus, perhaps we do not live on the earth so much as the earth lives on us, light beings (spirits) draped in a material “shroud” bearing the image of same — best stated by Teilhard, “spiritual beings having a human experience.” According to the gospel accounts post-resurrection, the disciples could touch the wounds of Christ and later eat meals with him, though he could walk through walls and doors (de-materialize) without disturbing their material consistency. Such lends plausibility to a spiritual template as the body’s radiant virtual software (spirit-soul), and its physical manifestation as its simulated hardware (interface of brain and body), each one seamlessly co-present and reconciled to the other in the mystery of the incarnation. That is, the former (virtual software) develops (incarnates) itself into the latter (matter or hardware) the way a photographic image develops from its negative counterpart, in the SAME bioelectrographic manner that it imaged on the Shroud in resurrecting the body of Jesus.

After a series of deconstructions (death/resurrection cycles) in the unfolding story of a life, it is conceivable that the various forms (stages) this virtual energy (Spirit) has taken in human evolution, development, and spiritual formation returns once again to its pristine origins, in convergence, centration, and interiorization preparatory to separating from the body proper. Such is in keeping with the way energy tends to move and travel in cycles universally. Home at last in Omega, it has shed its once cumbersome bio-psychoid features and fetters, as a snake sheds its skin. Hence, what appears as physical death in biological entities is the result of this virtual software (spirit-soul) having vacated the forms that once housed them. Having separated from form, they retain their virtual (dematerialized) image, likeness, and uncreated energy that once animated what remains as a lifeless carcass.

Once again, used in this context and consistent with its formal definition, the word virtual is meant to describe “a power lacking absolute physical form.” This power is versatile by operating in conjunction with form, as does Spirit with matter (spirit-matter), and/or operating independent of form, as does the spirit-soul experienced as separate from the body in certain dissociative mental states, centering prayer, meditation, near-death experiences, and or separation from the body upon physical death.

Made in God’s image and likeness, the human form is designed to image the reconciled expression of all things big and small, cosmic and infinitesimal, the dynamic crossroads and trysting place of each. The direct experience of same occurs only there (liminal space) where matter becomes spiritualized, and spirit becomes materialized as one. Such is activated in spiritual realization (awakening), practiced in prayer, and perfected in the spiritual disciplines. In scientific terms, the locus of Spirit is in the vacuum state (ZPF) everywhere, hidden in the magnetic still-point between the poles, referenced by Jesus in Scripture as “the narrow way” located in the most interior part of the soul (spirit), and in nature (zero-point energy) as electromagnetism.

“One God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all” (Eph. 4:6).

Christ therefore is not a Jew, a Christian, Moslem or Buddhist. Christ is simply the spirit (quanta) of God in persons, and that spirit is light universal. Every-body contains it (him) and is contained or jacketed (shrouded) by it, regardless of race, color, or creed. Thus, Spirit cannot be denominated, save in unenlightened (dualistic) human thought and perception that by it flawed (lower) nature divides the unified field into sections, as on a gridiron.

Said Jesus to Thomas, the disciple who refused to believe unless he could see and touch the Master’s wounds, “Because you have seen me, you have believed. Blessed are those who have not seen and have believed” (John 20:29). Always and everywhere, divinity must be taken and experienced on its own terms, in its own time, and by its own means, principles and laws, all in a heartfelt way. That said, as with “evidence” minded Thomas, might the recent confirmation of a digital imprint on an ancient burial cloth be a modern-day disclosure left for our sense-bound, hi-tech age? Think of it. Jesus, the incomparable exemplar of selflessness sharing a moment of levity with the “Me” generation in a selfie, at the same time revealing the nature of Spirit as virtual/digital, and the material/psychoid dimensions thereof as its simulated, three-dimensional interface. He who laughs last, laughs best — with us, not at us, for the purpose of making himself real as an ambient presence in an organic, felt-sense way universally.

As for the doubting Thomas’s among us, the risen Jesus, well versed on the prevalence and depth of human unbelief and skepticism, and occasionally given to humor, sometimes bends to indulge us on our own terms, accordingly. As for the ancient burial cloth as “selfie,” he who laughs last, laughs best, with us not at us. The joke is on the death, “the last enemy that shall be destroyed” (1Cor. 15:26). As the “king of terrors” was not holden to him, neither is it holden to us through and in him.

Upon viewing the maimed three-dimensional body of Christ replica derived from the Shroud itself, complete with countless bodily scourge-marks that were followed by crucifixion, who among us, can forgive and love anywhere near resembling that?

On might consider viewing the full body image of the 4 X 14 ft. Shroud of Turin, commonly available online (again, Shroud.com). In summary, the sheer volume of scientifically conclusive studies on the Shroud, the radiation source of the image on the burial cloth issued from a burst deep inside the body, producing the front and back images from a singularity (quantum zero-point) in two opposite directions. Research physicists estimate the image was projected upward toward the top side of the cloth (front view), and downward toward the bottom of it from 34,000 billion watts of ultraviolet light, a rate of energy transfer equal to that of a nuclear power plant. Radiation emitting from a zero-point (portal) suggests a space-time interface (event horizon) where the pattern of the emission of an energy source remains motionless while matter (the body) and objects around it move. This is the exact same pattern that sparked the hot Big Bang event in the creation of the universe, likewise, implied in the Genesis 1:3 account, “Let light Be.” How can a dead body emit radiation? And how can the universe come from nothing? In itself, the Shroud introduces and opens a new book of physics previously unknown to science. Of a truth, science and religion, matter and spirit, eternity and time are one, innermost and outermost, essentially joined by a common element—light.

As the future is now, evolving from the fading Cenozoic (caterpillar) to the Ecozoic Age (butterfly), manifesting in and as light beings and workers, the author proposes a new and fitting genus-species name change — Homo elektor. 

Bodying himself forth in the created order throughout history, it is forever the Ambient Christ who is raised up to incarnate this cosmic web of energy in some unique human form for the betterment of mankind. In their time, such individuals were (and continue to be) strategically placed as living expressions of this sacred fire and light that creates, sustains, enlivens, corrects, and unites all things with intelligence, elegance, and passion. Such figures literally comprise history’s luminaries, “the brightness of his glory, the express image of his person, and word that upholds all things” (Heb. 1:3). They consist of the known and unknown, the headliners and the obscure, and all those in between. Several of their names are sprinkled via quotations throughout the author’s synthesis book, while others are featured in whole chapters.

[For further religio-scientific evidence on the author’s thesis as it pertains to solving other mysteries, including the discovery of Wilson and Penzias, and the much controversial data on off-world beings and their advanced (evolved) intelligence and technology, consult the website joeknowsgod.com]