by Richard A. London, 6th Guardian in Chief
December 14, 2025 in the Blue Star Memorial Temple
Religion, Science and Economics — these are the foundation stones of the Temple of the People. According to the Temple Teachings, “There can be no true religion without its scientific basis, and there can be no right economic system not based on a science that is religious and a religion that is scientific.”
That a “right economic system,” would make possible the production, the consumption, and the distribution of basic goods and services more affordable for the many able-bodied human beings endeavoring to thrive, let alone survive on this planet, would seem to be a miracle. For humanity to have faith in a true religion with its scientific basis while trusting in a science that is religious might require a miracle as well.
How humanity fully evolves from its “survival of the fittest instinctual phase” into embracing the “realization of the Presence of the Avatar as a living Power in our daily lives” remains a daunting challenge, to be sure.
Affordability seems to be a hotter topic these days, as in the cost of many of the necessities of life have substantially outpaced the earning potential of many a household during my lifetime. There is no doubt about this, at least from my point of view. However, not being able to make ends meet has always been a challenge throughout the ages, as has been the acceptance of the need for one to be useful and self-responsible.
This past Convention, we concentrated on “Nurturing Oneness as a Living Power.” Every year our Conventions have focused on aspects of the Temple Teachings, ultimately intended to encourage our endeavoring to realize the Presence of the Avatar as a living Power in our lives.
And now we find ourselves experiencing this time of year when traditional offerings of Peace and Goodwill are being highlighted throughout the world. All the while, the contentious religious, scientific, and economic aspects of life, even during this special time of year, continue to be divisive at best.
The essences of the Temple Foundation Stones, the Golden Rule, and the Avataric Mantram — together, an inter-reliant Trinity — need our devoted aspirations for there to be the potential to experience Affordability for All. Sounds utopian, and yet it will always be a matter of choice. To navigate our way through untold choices, using spiritual Principles as our compass, has never been an easy task. Many of us remain unaware and detached from the Karmic nature of what we perceive to be the tragedies and miracles of life.
During the Temple’s daily Noon Healing Service, we hear, “Though we call Thee God or Lord or Christ or Buddha; though we call Thee Jehovah or Master, Krishna or Osiris, yet from our very call comes the serene assurance that Thou dost hear our voices; that Thou hast long foreseen our need; long foreseen to its fulfillment; and long awaited our recognition of Thy beneficence.” This one declaration begins to acknowledge the multitude of avenues for calling out to a Power greater than ourselves.
The onset of the Winter Solstice is beyond any timing coincidence, as the various holidays may now be capturing our attention. I was raised to be most familiar with the traditions of Judaism and Christianity.
This evening’s sunset begins the Jewish Festival of Lights, when the first of eight candles is lit. The story of Hanukkah reminds those of Jewish faith that nearly 2,200 years ago, the Holy Land, now sacred to Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, was ruled by the Syrian-Greeks, who tried to force the people of Israel to accept Greek culture and beliefs instead of the observance and belief in God. Against all odds, a small band of faithful but poorly armed Jews, led by Judah the Maccabee, defeated one of the mightiest armies on earth, drove the Greeks from the land, reclaimed the Holy Temple in Jerusalem and rededicated it to the service of God. When attempting to light the Temple’s candelabrum or seven-branch menorah, they found only a minimal amount of olive oil that had escaped contamination by the Greeks. Unexplainably, if not miraculously, they lit the menorah and the one-day supply of oil lasted for eight days, until new oil could be prepared under conditions of ritual purity.
Growing up, I recall a number of Jewish holidays invoking the memories of perseverance, and of survival. I would even say that to afford to be Jewish has come at great cost. There are so many historical narratives, some more controversial than others, and yet, despite the nature of an age-old insidious Jewish resentment, there can be no denying the impact Judaism has had on the world. The nearly 3,500 years ago account of Moses returning from Mount Sinai with the revelation of the Ten Commandments, to a people recently liberated from 400 years of Egyptian slavery, only to find many of them having descended into worshipping the golden calf, reveals the beginning of insights into the Foundation Stones of the Temple of the People. To the openminded, this historical rendition can shed light on the evolution of civility and its connection to religion, science, and economics.
Needless to say, growing up with my confusion about the relationships between religion, science, and economics was somewhat exacerbated during this time of year. The significance of extreme commercialism, the Jewish people still waiting for the Messiah, and those of Christian faith celebrating the birth of Jesus Christ, all in their unique ways continues to draw me ever so much closer to relying on the Avataric Mantram.
I have come to believe that the Avataric Mantram is directionally determinant to the evolutionary affordability of life as we know it. Being alert to the mindful guidance of endeavoring to realize the Presence of the Avatar as a living Power in my life, provides guardrails for keeping me grounded to my understanding of the Temple Teachings.
As with many symbols that have evolved over the ages from the sacred language of Sanskrit, I resonate with the word Avatar holding the meaning of a Divine Descent, even if merely appearing as a thought, word, or deed. At this stage of my life, I can accept the value of interchanging the word Avatar with the Ten Commandments when reciting the Avataric Mantram. That same holds true by interchanging Avatar with Jesus Christ. And yet there are those of us who have been making their living by endeavoring to realize the presence of the golden calf as a living power in their lives. I would suggest that the function of revering the golden calf in the economies of life has led to incremental speculative mortgaging of the future of our children’s children. In other words, to society-at-large, how we finance the production, consumption, and distribution of the necessities of life has become a higher priority and deemed more precious than the actual necessities and the people who depend upon those necessities for themselves. Hence, over the long run, our present wellbeing is truly impacted by whoever, whatever, or wherever we place our power. The Haudenosaunee gave us the Seventh Generation Principle for honoring and respecting the future of our children’s children. While a disproportionate share of humanity struggles to make ends meet, nearly every other living thing and creature continues to demonstrate the affordability of living one day at a time, especially if their habitat has been able to survive an invasion of unenlightened selfishness.
Whether waiting for the Messiah, believing in Jesus, or realizing the Presence of the Avatar as a living Power, all three invoke faith, respect, and trust in the sacredness of life.
According to the Jewish tradition, “all the nations of the world will recognize the Messiah to be a world leader, and will accept his dominion. In the messianic era there will be world peace, no more wars nor famine, and, in general, a high standard of living, with all mankind worshipping one God, with a greater sense of appreciation for the spiritual and moral way of life. The coming of the Messiah will complete God’s purpose in creation: for man to make an abode for God in the lower worlds — that is, to reveal the inherent spirituality in the material world.”
According to the New Testament, from Matthew 10:34, “Do not suppose that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I did not come to bring peace, but a sword. And then beginning from Matthew 25:32, “All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate the people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats… He will put the sheep on his right and the goats on his left… Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world.’”
From the March 1926 Temple Artisan, William H. Dower shared, “In the Bhagavad-Gita we read that Krishna, a symbol of any Avataric manifestation, reincarnates among humanity “whenever there is a decline of virtue and an insurrection of vice in the world,” and that this manifestation is for the purpose of “the preservation of the just and the destruction of the wicked.” In other words, it is the saving or redeeming principle that comes into manifestation whenever conditions have arrived at that stage of disintegration and chaos that would subvert the Divine Plan, if long continued.”
From the October 1912 Temple Artisan, Dower advised:
“Without formality, without outer arbitrary organization, let all who feel and believe the truth of the advent of a redeeming Cosmic Force, repeat the Avataric Mantram daily and constantly. It will help to build a matrix — a heart center — through which the Christ Force will externalize in qualities of living power. It was in 1898 that the Temple, in an Inner Order known as the Order of the 36, gave out the great message that the Avatar had been born on the astral plane and within a specified time would descend to this outer plane — not, however, by process of ordinary birth but by a process of condensation of this astral body now developing on an inner plane — and that as this development went on, humanity generally would feel more and more the presence and nearness of the coming Christly Power. In consequence, all that would transpire in the world would be preparatory to that Great Event in all fields of human activity: religious, scientific, political, and economic. The heavens themselves proclaim this to be the Messianic cycle. The stars are singing it; the hearts of humanity are attuning to it. The old order is passing away and the New Order of the Ages is upon us. Look with the inner eye and harken with the inner ear, and the signs and sounds that herald the rosy dawn as a new day for humanity will be apparent. Yet it is folly and vanity for anyone to predict just how this Christly Entity will appear and in what guise, whether it be with transcendent power or transcendent humility or as an invisible yet life-giving Sun (Son), warming and changing the Heart of the world in the twinkling of an eye. Those who know say that the Christ ever comes in the most unexpected ways; yes, even as “the thief in the night.” Keep clean your heart and mind, and the earnest endeavor to realize His Presence daily will assuredly help in the recognition of the Christ glimpsed in the bloom of a flower, the soft glow of the stars, the shine of kindly acts in daily life, or the spirit of Love impelling all humanity to ideals of truest Brotherhood.”
I find that the somewhat veiled essence of the following two poems hints at the spectrum of potential attitudes during this time of year.
The Second Coming
By William Butler Yeats
Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.
Surely some revelation is at hand;
Surely the Second Coming is at hand.
The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out
When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi
Troubles my sight: somewhere in sands of the desert
A shape with lion body and the head of a man,
A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,
Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it
Reel shadows of the indignant desert birds.
The darkness drops again; but now I know
That twenty centuries of stony sleep
Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?
And this is entitled:
The Avataric Coming
By John Varian
Love is a white light of beauty.
It is clothing upon the souls.
It is constantly building friendship.
It is shining deeper and deeper understanding, comradeship.
The Avataric conception is upon us.
It is above us, glory in the heavens;
It is beneath us, embryonic powers;
It is about us, beauty of perception;
It is within us, growth, wisdom’s growth.
Out over the universe its marvels spread vastnesses,
Wings of beauty upon each one.
In through creation it impels love, ever increasing love.
Over the earth it is flowering wisdom, fructifying that seed.
Within the hearts of man it is the blessing of true love, high
growth, faithfulness.
I will close by mentioning this version of the ABCs of distraction — “amusement, bickering, and convenience” — which tends to tamper with our abilities to truly know consensus and appreciation for the fundamental Universal rules and laws guiding the Principles of Existence. The evolution of humanity’s consciousness continues to have the opportunity to be influenced by the likes of the Ten Commandments, the Beatitudes, the Ten Rules of Discipleship, and the Bhagavad-Gita. In addition to these, Mother Nature also offers clues to the Prescribed Way of Being gifted from a Power greater than ourselves. The Law of Order, of Balance, has a tendency to invite our participation before it is demanded. For a few of us, to be obedient to something beneficial without a choice can trigger a powerful resistance capable of impacting the many.
Nevertheless, if humanity is to ever share in a true religion with its scientific basis, and a right economic system based on a science that is religious and a religion that is scientific, how can we possibly not afford to be endeavoring to realize the Presence of the Avatar as a living Power in our lives?
Blessings to us all…
— Richard A. London
6th Guardian in Chief