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In our time, counterfeits abound and it's good to draw distinctions between the true and false, and that was my intention — which appears not to have been as clear as I hoped

Thank you for the clarification, dear spirited!

I can give a fine example of such a "counterfeit" — the so-called New Age Religion which proclaims the second coming of the Christ. Indeed, according to its prophet Benjamin Creme, the new Christ was incarnated in the Himalayas in 1977, and then moved to London, where he has been waiting in the wings ever since for the right time to declare himself.

But this new Christ is not Jesus. It is a risen Master of the Hierarchy by the name of the Lord Maitreya. He is "moving up" in the Hierarchy, because the current incumbent of the Office of the Christ — see, Christ is a hierarchical office, not a person, not the Son of God — Sanat Kumara, is preparing to leave our earthly system altogether, to assume higher duties elsewhere in the Cosmos.

The one really important thing about Maitreya's accession to "higher office" is the expectation that the traditions of Christianity and Buddhism will be thoroughly blended under his guidance and example. And this is the New Age, One-World religion that all men will come to believe. And a paradise on earth will then commence — under the supervision and direction of the Masters of the Hierarchy.

The risen masters are human beings who, through esoteric practices and a succession of "initiations," through their own efforts are becoming increasingly "god-like." Anyone who wants to take up these practices can do the same for himself. I.e., one can become a risen master himself, given enough time.

There are seven intra-planetary initiations. Jesus Christ is considered only a fourth-degree initiate (owing to his Crucifixion — that was His fourth initiation right there — but there is no mention of his Resurrection). As such he is outranked by the Buddha, who in turn is outranked by Maitreia and the soon-to-be-departed Sanat Kumara.

Here is the rather innocuous-sounding major prayer of this ersatz faith:

The Great Invocation

From the point of Light within the Mind of God
Let Light stream forth into the minds of men.
Let Light descend on Earth.

From the point of Love within the Heart of God
Let Love stream forth into the hearts of men.
May Christ return to Earth.

From the center where the Will of God is known
Let purpose guide the little wills of men —
The purpose which the Masters know and serve.

From the center which we call the race of men
Let the Plan of Love and Light work out.
And may it seal the door where evil dwells.

Let Light and Love and Power
restore the Plan on Earth.

Are we getting the picture here? It is easy for me to understand how an idealistic young person who is disenchanted with the traditional church or synagogue, or a highly-rationalist atheist, would find this new "religion" appealing. It has a nifty scientific, astrophysical ring to it. It totally dispenses with the Christian God and the Holy Scriptures, while retaining the use of familiar Christian symbols.

In Transmission: A Meditation for the New Age [1983], Benjamin Creme justifies the new one-world religion this way:

God is both out there and in here. The Christ taught that God is within. Nevertheless, the general view of God in the Western world is to see God as out there, transcendent, above and beyond its creation, to be worshipped from afar. The Eastern approach is quite different. It is to the God within. The Eastern religions have taught us that God is everywhere, that there is nowhere where God is not. God is in all creations — men, animals, trees, everything. There is nothing in the manifested world which is not God. All beings and the space between all beings is God, closer than the breath, closer than the hands, God immanent.

Both approaches are right. God is both transcendent and immanent. In the new world religion, the Christ will bring these two concepts of God together, will synthesize them to show that God is transcendent, above and beyond man and all creation, while at the same time intrinsic, immanent in all creation. Both concepts are true, and both can be held simultaneously, even if they seem to be contradictory....

But Creme never really explains how that can be. I had a face-to-face conversation with him once upon a time, and would have loved to explore his thinking on this question. But once he discovered I was a "greedy capitalist," religion and philosophy went right out the window, and we spent three hours sparring about politics and economics. It is absolutely clear to me that Benjamin Creme is a British socialist and a radical progressive "one-worlder." And this one-world religion is propagandizing recruits to his political and economic views.

Anyhoot, dear sister in Christ, I thought you might find this stuff interesting. It demonstrates that "gnostic systems" are very much alive and well TODAY....

Your observation that Darwinism is an inversion of the great chain of being "bespeaking an unbroken continuity between the low (chemicals) and the high — mind" is spot-on, IMHO....

Thank you much for writing, dear sister in Christ! Please share your thoughts with me?