The Wall Street Journal:(1) “former San Diego Mayor Bob Filner pleaded guilty … to … felony … and misdemeanors … from sexual harassment allegations:. “J.P.Morgan Chase & Company has agreed to pay $100 million to settle charges by the Commodity Futures Ttrading Commission related to the bank’s ‘London Whate’ trading debacle of 2012 …”. Former Financial Corp. executive Rebecca Mairone said the ‘Hustle program was no hustle … the government alleges she and Bank of America … defrauded … Fannie Mae and Freddie through a program called the High Speed Lane, also known as ‘Hustle’ … “Ms. Mairone … could face civil penalties of … $1 million”.

Taken from just one day of WSJ reporting, these daily headlines point to an increasingly massive breakdown not only of legality but of morality in the highest (and lowest) levels of our country.

Why is this occurring? How did so many get to the point of increasingly having to replace their inner spiritual void with the greed-ridden ingredients of power and money? In addition to countless answers to this question, I offer that we have simply lost our God, and one reason for having so lost, is that our religions are too often failing to provide a meaningful spiritual food for our starving souls.

In claiming this, I refer to the fact that our scholars and pastors have known for many years there is another Christianity than the one we have practiced for the past two thousand years. Our clergy have chosen to hide it from us because they fear we are not ready for it – that it will cause too much of an uproar – that the revelation will cause more damage than gain. Fifty years ago that might have been true, but the fact that so many of us have since left the church because it no longer speaks to our spiritual needs, is evidence the damage is already occurring, and is a valid argument against continuing to ignore this new truth. This is not to say that conventional Christianity is no longer needed, for it is. It is needed and savored, by those to whom it speaks. But for those to whom it does not speak, the saving grace is that there is more than one Christianity, and always has been. It is the religion of Jesus that has been hidden and ignored. While there is the conventional belief in Jesus as God – as Savior – as judge of the right and wrong – born of a Virgin – one who’s body ascended to heaven to sit at the right hand of God, (actually, this is also the story of Mithra, several hundred years before Jesus), there is the other (actually the first) Christianity which was never called “Christianity”, that was/is the of Jesus the human being. You will find this original Christianity described in scriptures pre-dating the better known four gospels. Bu this original story, apparently being less attractive than the more fantastic gospel stories, lost appeal shortly after Jesus’ death, and has not been rediscovered until just recently. While this new/old religion of Jesus is still in the process of being more fully defined, its origin lies within the hidden Gospels of “Q” and of Thomas, discovered in early twentieth century.

For me, the appeal of these (lost) gospels is that it is no longer necessary to abandon our intellect in order to believe their truth. This freeing of our intellect from obedience to creed thereby renders it unnecessary to live a half-truth Christian life, which often requires maintaining two different faces to the public, and the potential for deceit and immorality that can go with it. While it is beyond the scope of this brief introduction to describe this “new” Christianity, you will find much to begin with in the contemporary writings of the Westar Institute. In the meantime, until we bring this original (lost) teaching of Jesus into the 21st century – and with a continually evolving message that feeds our souls better than power and money – we will continue to flounder in our search for meaning, and the immoralities and illegalities will continue:

The Wall Street Journal:(2) “U.S. Accuses Infosys of “Fraud and Abuse”. ” … British prosecutors say … three former journalists … pleaded guilty to illegal … voice-mail interception”. “Forex Trade: Two recent members of an industry committee … have been put on paid leaves of absence amid … currency manipulations …”.

Time Magazine:(3) “After the U.S. exposure of the (Volkswagen emission) scandal, Britain, France, Italy, Canada and South Korea announced investigation. All these countries have faced corporate scandals of their own … none have clean hands, but German industry was suppose to be above this sort of thing – or at least too smart to be caught.”

And finally, the multiple reportings of the intentionally contaminated drinkiing waters of Flint Michigan …

When will we begin this next Renaissance?

Robert Rock, Redding, CA
Copyright 2016

(1) 10/16/13
(2) 10/31/13
(3) 10/12/15