WHAT IS SPIRITUAL SCIENCE?
Though listed as a religion for legal and tax purposes, SPIRITUAL SCIENCE is a philosophy, a way of life, and a non-sectarian spiritual practice that teaches individuals to explore the depths of their relationship to all things, to their concept of Deity (God/Goddess/All That Is), and to their own selves.
SPIRITUAL SCIENCE is an investigation of a person’s relationship with God/Goddess on a deeply personal level. Based on an individual understanding and application of the laws and principles of the universe, as well as esoteric and metaphysical philosophies, it encourages each person to test their beliefs and prove them scientifically to themselves as much as possible. SPIRITUAL SCIENCE is the science of individual spiritual growth.
SPIRITUAL SCIENCE is inclusive, believing that all people and all religions are inherently good. It places emphasis on meditation as a path for connecting with one’s inner guidance, developing intuition and psychic abilities, and fostering spiritual awareness. Most importantly, SPIRITUAL SCIENCE teaches that through their thoughts, words, and actions, every individual takes responsibility for their own self and their own life.
SPIRITUAL SCIENCE speaks of four faculties that must be acquired on the so-called preparatory path, or Path of Probation, before one can advance to higher knowledge. The first is the ability to distinguish in our thinking between truth and appearance—between what is true and what is simply opinion. The second is the ability to value truth and reality in relation to appearances. The third consists of the application of the six qualities for initiation: control of thoughts, control of actions, perseverance, tolerance, faith, and equanimity. The fourth is the love of inner freedom.
📖 — Rudolf Steiner, How To Know Higher Worlds
SPIRITUAL SCIENCE teaches that man’s relationship to God is both spiritual and scientific. It teaches humanity whence it came and whither it goes. Spiritual Science teaches the continuity of life, but most importantly, it teaches man’s co-relation to God.
Spiritual Science is soul development, soul unfoldment, and soul progress, and the culmination of these three-in-one is: Love, Unity, and Peace.
📖 — Paraphrased from the tenets originally from Rev. Julia Forrest, First Spiritual Science Mother Church, New York City, 1935. (See History.)
As the consciousness of man unfolds, it reveals LOVE, UNITY, and PEACE. The LOVE, which is GOD, reveals the UNITY of all mankind as children of God, and this reality, in turn, results in PEACE.
📖 — Rev. Alice Wellstood Tindall, “What Is Spiritual Science?” as published in the Psychic Observer, October 1969.
Much of the philosophy behind SPIRITUAL SCIENCE can be summed up in the following excerpt from a channeling by Rev. Diane S. Nagorka on Sunday, January 4, 1976, as printed in Spirit as Life Force:
Forever ago we met in the Temple of the Sun, for the Sun has been forever. And forever has man worshiped within his heart—within his mind, within his Spirit—the King of Kings, that Presence, sacred and holy, called by different names throughout the Ages:
🔹 I AM
Each of you is to understand at this time that there is no one religion, there is no one dogma, there is no one form of worship. Man creates for himself a set of forms, a set of rules to fit his needs. Then all forms are good according to the development of the individual.
As you sit and examine yourself, understand what you find within yourself as you dig and dig and dig. In the eternal search for identity, you seek the true God. What is your identity then?
🔹 I AM. There is no other.
We walked together through many temples. We worshiped at many shrines. We have been many colors. We have been all levels of humanity, from the lowest to the highest. Mankind thus gains knowledge.
For when you understand all manner of experience, you become a total and whole individual. Then do not turn up your nose at your neighbor or sit in judgment upon your sister or brother. And do not say, ‘There, but for the grace of God, go I.’ For, my brother, there have you gone, and there have you been.
You experience all things, and you must understand all things before you are Master. For a Master is one who knows, who understands, and who is filled with compassion. This is the ultimate walk.
📖 — Rev. Diane S. Nagorka, January 4, 1976, from Spirit as Life Force.