Evolution Spirituality found at Universe Spirit is a dynamically evolving new form of Open Source personalized spirituality based upon:
i.) Evolutionary science,
ii) a commitment to a deeper understanding of all of the world’s spiritual wisdom traditions and an ecumenical engagement with them towards understanding Ultimate Reality.
Our goal is to both "transcend and yet include" the life-affirming wisdom of all religious and spiritual and scientific traditions while working simultaneously for deep and embodied personalized spiritual praxis (effective personal spirituality practices as distinguished from spiritual theory and theology.)
Personalized Spirituality simply means it is you that chooses what to believe from humanity's vast spiritual heritage. There is no other final spiritual authority for those individuals willing to read and learn.
As an open-source spiritual organization, anyone with useful new spiritual information can participate in co-creating their spirituality. This is aided by the fact that we have neither sacred founders, popes, or personalities; nor sacred revelations that might separate any individual from their own authentic personal spiritual discernment and their own appropriate spiritual path.
Our invitation to everyone wishing to participate in "the great spiritual adventure of time" is to join with us and continue discovering the essence of Ultimate Reality—whether through the religions and spiritualities of past and present, through your own personal yearnings, or in concert with your fellow spiritual journeyers in spiritual community as we together help unfold a new spiritual vision for the future. As far as we are aware, nothing quite like this has ever existed before. We are excited by the possibilities that the emergence of a new Universe Evolutionary Worldview and the Internet have provided for the emergence of this dynamic new evolutionary form of spirituality.
Open Source Personalized Spirituality Vs. Religion?
For many of the estimated 30% of the population that calls itself spiritual, but not religious the very word religion creates an unpleasant and aversive reaction. One does not have to go far to see the excesses and abuses of religion today or remember the abuses of the past.
But, what if a group of spiritually mature individuals could in fact co-create a new form of Open Source religion that performed many of the vital social functions that healthy religions perform such as promoting service and unselfish fellowship; answering the ultimate questions of life; encouraging human friendship and all types of better relationships, conserving morality; promoting community welfare, promoting family life; providing wise counsel and spiritual guidance; encouraging group meditation and worship; socially demonstrating loyalty to Ultimate Reality; fostering attraction to the highest values; delivering tolerant religious education; magnifying the lures of truth, beauty, and goodness and facilitating the spread of the messages of spiritual hope, renewal and at-onement --- without devolving into the social pathologies of many past and current religions?
In its most essential form, almost all current religion is the organizationally prescribed practice of a single particular path leading to Ultimate Reality, God, the Mystery, the Allness. Our new form of Open Source, spirituality is the integration of what is best from all religious paths leading to God, the Mystery, the Allness.
It even holds the potential to emerge, unveil or evolve completely new views of Ultimate Reality based upon the shared new empirical spiritual experiences of the members of all religions. Evolution Spirituality is a facilitating channel for all personal spiritual paths with its main purpose being to expand, accelerate and support each individual’s unique spiritual unfolding (personal path) toward the Divine.
If you believe that there are as many unique spiritual paths to Ultimate Reality as there are unique people, and, that every individual has the right to find and choose their own best path from the wisdom of all paths, then humankind's combined spiritual wisdom heritage held within a new form of open source personalized spirituality and religion offers you unique advantages for enhancing your spiritual growth. The following is by Steven Dinan from the introduction to his book Radical Spirit. It expresses in a more poetic way some of the many things this (r)evolutionary new organization is moving toward:
"... I have, an image of a future in which a new brand of spirituality has fully emerged, a spirituality that takes the entire world as its starting point, that marries inner and outer work, that cultivates stillness and compassion in the midst of active, engaged lives. This spirituality is a slow dance of evolution, a tender response to the pulsing heartbeat of the universe. It builds upon – but ultimately goes beyond – traditional belief systems to create a unique path, marrying ancient wisdom, scientific and philosophic truth, and personal insight. It is a spirituality that honors periods of withdrawal, of inner contemplation, as equally as it honors the active and passionate life. It recognizes a sublime Ground, ultimately beyond all manifest form, while it also sees the realm of manifest form as the playful and ecstatic dance of that very Ground. Its God is to be found both in prayer and in lovemaking, in meditation and in mountain climbing. It sees every moment as an opportunity: for learning, for giving, for expressing a truer nature. Perhaps more than anything, it is a spirituality built upon adventure, a plunge into the unknown."
If the possibilities above intrigue you, continue reading about the advantages to be gained as well as the religious pathologies to be avoided.
The Current Spiritual Goals of Our Nondenominational, Nonprofit Organization
To Enhance Your Personal Spirituality by:
1.) Providing deeper, broader and more universal, and inclusive answers to the ultimate spiritual questions of life, such as:
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Who and what is Ultimate Reality and what are his/her/its purposes?
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Who and what is Ultimate Reality and what are his/her/its purposes?
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How is the Ultimate Reality realized in our individual and collective lives?
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What is the true origin and essence of the individual, humanity, the planet, and the living and non-living systems of life?
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What is the highest purpose and destiny of the individual, humanity, the planet, and the living and non-living systems of life?
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What is the purpose and meaning of the universe?
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How do we best live our lives with nature and our fellow beings?
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What is our spiritual responsibility in co-creating a better world in the here and now?
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How do we understand our relationships in relation to the dualities of life that so often seem to cause relational conflict?
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Is there an afterlife, and if so, how do we prepare for it?
2.) Collecting and providing all of the most universally applicable spiritual wisdom and processes from humankind’s vast spiritual heritage to help individuals achieve:
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direct spiritual experience(s) of Ultimate Reality,
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successful lives and
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co-creation of a better world.
3.) Re-integrating and re-balancing feminine spirituality (the Divine Feminine) with masculine spirituality (the Divine Masculine)and then spiritually including, but transcending these qualities as well.
4.) Integrating art and beauty back into its vital role within spirituality and religion.
5.) Re-integrating the life-affirming values and wisdom of spirituality with the facts of science and the beauty of philosophical inquiry.
6.) Integrating the highest spiritual wisdom of the West and East with the facts of science to expand direct spiritual experience(s) with each of Ultimate Reality and all of the paradoxical Divine co-absolutes of the Oneness. The tripartite of Divine co-absolutes within the Oneness is sometimes called the "I" co-absolute of God, the "We" co-absolute of God, and the "It" co-absolute of God. They are also more commonly known as: :
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The Personal Absolute (the God/Goddess as offered by spirituality. This would also include our direct personal relation to this Personal Absolute),
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The Evolutionary Absolute (God/Goddess evolving through and in the universe with us as partners. This form of Deity is both science-revealed and humanly co-evolved in time. This co-absolute form contains both personal and impersonal aspects) and,
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The Impersonal Absolute (Concepts such as the non-personal Buddhist Emptiness, Brahman, the Tao, or the “I am witness” as offered by many forms of eastern spirituality.)
We hold that for one's spiritual life to grow to its fullest heights and the world to flourish in the most life-affirming ways, one's spiritual path is most optimally served by regular and balanced direct spiritual experiences with each and all of the Personal, Impersonal and Evolutionary co-absolutes of Divine Oneness.
7.) Offering new integrally informed perspectives on spiritual ethics and morality.
8.) Presenting the collected Open Source spiritual wisdom of humankind in such a way that it is coherent and internally consistent.
9.) Creating evolution informed religious metaphors, rituals, ceremonies, and sacraments, and a new story that embraces all humankind and life.
10.) Promoting the critical importance of spiritual work along with psychological shadow-work to facilitate the historic peer community proof of authentic spiritual growth and practice by the balanced living of the classical, postmodern and integral virtues.
11.) Seeking a greater understanding of all the spiritually classic, scientific, and yet unknown aspects of the afterlife.
12.) Teaching that there is no wrong form of spirituality or religion because every human being must grow level by level from birth through the entire spiral of developmental levels of consciousness. Authentic Ultimate Reality and spiritual expression will always look significantly different from each human developmental level. Additionally, everyone has a right to be and remain at any developmental level for as long as they wish. No developmental level holds intrinsic or natural authority or superiority over any other.
13.) Teaching and integrating the spiritual wisdom found within humankind’s developmental levels of consciousness (archaic, magic, mythic, rational, pluralistic, integral, and super-integral) and then being an effective spiraling platform for educational and experiential progression through those developmental levels.
14.) Assisting other religions in integrating their faiths, i.e., assisting in the evolution of integral Judaism, integral Christianity, integral Islam, integral Buddhism, integral Hinduism, etc., we can thus facilitate the growth of billions of individuals through the spiraling developmental levels of consciousness to create a more tolerant and life-affirming world for all.
15.) Presenting the collected spiritual wisdom of humankind in such a way that it can easily be assimilated at every level of consciousness in every domain, level, line, and stage of human development and by any personality type, learning style, culture, race or ethnicity.
16.) Honoring relationship as an end in itself and growing spiritual communities globally that are aligned with our goals.
17.) Promoting service to community and society that is informed by the Universe Evolutionary Worldview.
18.) Expanding the global commons so as to help spread the ideas of personalized spirituality.
19.) Being a fertile spiritual incubator for the emergence of empowering new leaders who will inspire by example and lead the world toward more life-affirming evolution in all areas and walks of life.
20.) And finally, by asking for your help and ideas. If you do not see any goal above that you think should be a part of the goals of our new personalized spirituality, we invite you to tell us about them.
How we intend to reach our goals:
1.) While many religious orthodoxies proclaim that they are the only way and complete truth, we intend to be a gracious organization. Our educational attitude is, “Yes, you’re currently right and that is always true, but it is partial rightness in an evolving universe. And, there is more wisdom available to increase the current wisdom rightness of your life.”
2.) Be a both/and unity and solution-creating organization versus an either/or duality creating organization.
3.) Stay humble by not forgetting that our perceptions of any given spiritual reality are also conceptions that are at least partially constructed and created by us. At a particular time, they can be good and useful interpretations or metaphors, but as we evolve, and as the deeper and broader structure is uncovered, those perceptions will evolve too.
4.) Doing everything possible to educate our members about the many pathologies and abuses of past religions and the critical spiritual safeguards that are necessary to prevent them from occurring in our new religion. Some, but by no means all of the pathologies of institutionalized religion have been: fixation of beliefs; establishment of oppressive ecclesiastical authority; religious fundamentalism; tendency to standardize and fossilize truth; diversion of religion from the service of God to the service of the church; fund raising focus in place of a humble spiritual service focus; creating discriminatory religious castes; becoming an intolerant judge of orthodoxy; creation of the aristocratic "chosen-people" attitude; sexual and financial abuse of members, undue psycho/spiritual influence or coercive influence over members negating or debilitating their ability to exercise spiritual free will; fostering of false and exaggerated ideas of sacredness; routinization of religion; accepting religious symbols and ceremonies in place of authentic direct spiritual experience of and with the Divine, using blind or absolutist faith to override proper faith balance with rationality or scientific facts; preventing or slowing members progressing through Fowler’s natural stages of spiritual growth; tendency to form sects and competitive divisions; petrification of meditation/worship; venerating the past while ignoring present demands; failure to make up-to-date interpretations of religion’s messages; entanglement with functions of secular institutions; inclination of leaders to become administrators instead of ministers; accumulation of vested interests toward increased secularization; failing to hold the interest of adventurous youth and losing the hope renewing wisdom from ongoing personal direct spiritual experience with the Divine. Click here to learn more about our spiritual safeguards against other religious pathologies and abuses.
5.) Have most of our spiritual education materials, organizational policy, and operational direction be co-created by a spiritually mature community of self-organizing individuals operating from a Universe Evolutionary informed worldview to the best of our ability.
6.) For a lot more of the details about our spiritual and administrative principles for how we intend on reaching our goals above click here.
An invitation to join the personalized spirituality adventure
We invite you to help us co-create a new form of evolutionary, Universe Evolutionary Worldview - informed spirituality and join our spiritual community if you feel that:
- your current religious practice could be deepened, broadened, or revitalized by new spiritual wisdom, or
- you have substantially outgrown your current religious practice and feel that it no longer reflects enough of your present spiritual or intellectual development, or
- you might like to be a pioneer in the first evolutionary religious organization and community that is dynamically co-creating “open source” personalized spirituality. Open Source simply means that we are open to having anyone or any organization add to or help refine our open-access collections of humanity’s spiritual wisdom heritage. This term originally came from the software world where anyone could alter the software code as long as they also made it freely available to others to modify as we also do with our spiritual wisdom collections
Universe Spirit is a place where your evolving personal spirituality can potentially benefit every other member of our community. It is also a place to potentially learn from the personal spirituality of every other member of our community as well as from humankind’s vast heritage of spiritual wisdom.
What do you think about the above?
Is it possible and or even desirable to birth a new personalized spirituality? This is a bold idea. So, if you will, please join us in a very practical inquiry into the how and what of a co-created personalized spirituality. Even now, we are in the process of implementing our version 3.0; we intend to learn as we go and we invite you to come along if you feel the call to this spiritual adventure.
One of the first questions that strike many people is: What would the world’s first personalized spirituality based on an Universe Evolutionary Worldview actually look like in day-to-day practice? How would it differ from other systems? Thanks to our board, staff, advisors, and many colleagues, we hereby offer up our work-in-progress of a co-created vision of personalized spirituality, one that addresses such questions.
We also invite you to bring us your own spiritual project, any worthy initiative that you should think should be acknowledged or supported by the first personalized spirituality—Evolution Spirituality.
If you are excited or intrigued about what you have read so far, we invite you to click this What's Next link.
More About Our Website and Organization
With over 40,000 web pages, this rapidly growing online and global spiritual community is a networking hub for cultural creatives as well as others in the spiritual commons seeking to integrate their personal spirituality with the beauty of art and the most useful advances in science and philosophy.
On this website you can:
- be supported on your unique personal spiritual path,
- connect with artful, joyous kindred spirits,
- co-create a better world through partnered
- spiritualized social activism,
- share your spiritual, social, and life wisdom to help expand the growing global spiritual commons as well as support the spiritual growth of other community members.
Our omni-denominational spiritual community has emerged from the evolutionary process as well as the social and scientific consciousness of the post-postmodern age. As such, it is capable of producing unique benefits not
currently available in other spiritual organizations, which individuals can expect to experience from successful involvement with the Universe Spirit organization or the materials and courses on this website.
Click on the benefit type below of which you are most interested:
While religion separates people into different often conflicting "us versus them" beliefs and denominations, spirituality unites people at the deepest "we" levels. First spirituality unites people at the deepest levels first through their common connection to a universal spiritual Origin. (Recognition of this spiritual common Origin is key to understanding that humankind is truly, but one extended family.) Then spirituality unites people through the alignment of their common and deepest spiritual intentions.
(Intentions like supporting every individual’s freedom to make spiritual choices, to grow spiritually, to better understand their highest spiritual dignity and the nature and purposes of their spiritual Origin or, intentions like to love or to be compassionate or, to have and give justice.)
Universe Spirit seeks to:
- create a new way to unite us both in our common spiritual Origin and in our deepest, common spiritual intentions and,
- help co-evolve a new and better world.
In essence, Universe Spirit is the birth of a new type of unique spiritual movement that is being co-evolved in a continuous, collective co-creative effort within the global spiritual commons and that:
- allows us to move past that which divides us and
- allows us to focus on that which unites us at the highest spiritual
level.
When there exists this deeper alignment to work toward realizing our common spiritual intentions and for our common spiritual Origin, we no longer need agreement upon the particulars of our diverse, denominational beliefs, doctrines or spiritual authorities and, there is naturally a greater sharing tolerance and appreciation of our wonderful denominational diversity.
Universe Spirit is a place of spiritual freedom, creativity and delight where individuals can find support for their unique personal journey and adventure towards spiritual completeness. It is a place where you will discover and/or release more of your most authentic ecstatic, highest selves.
If you recognize that Universe Spirit is dedicated to helping you to create and/or expand your personal spirituality and then helping you make your life into a work of art on all levels, --- spiritual, mental, physical and social so that we
can all share a better world, you would then have a good starting idea of what we are. But, we also are and do much, much more.
Heard enough?
Please click the image below and join us!
