Metaphysical meditation

in after of Lao Tzu... Descartes... Todeschini

Internet, September 3, 2022

      Dear Fiorenzo, Dear Friends of Marco Todeschini,

     this time I am writing to you these reflections of mine on the infinite and on the infinity of God, which I would never, ever have been able to mature if I hadn't first met you and Marco Todeschini. Nor would I have retrospectively revisited a Plato, a Saint Augustine of Hippo, a Descartes, and many other great thinkers of all time. Not excluding God Jesus, of course.

With these premises it might seem that I am about to speak of the Christian faith, but no, or not only. I'm about to generalize big time. Which does not mean that I will be superficial or approximate in my arguments. I will simply dwell on what in my opinion falls under what is universal and imperishable. Or better yet, in Todeschini's words, I will say something of my own about the "Bio-Physical World" and the "Spiritual World".

Michele

"Our Lady of Piety" by Michelangelo Buonarroti (1475-1564), from 1499, exhibited in Saint Peter's Basilica, Vatican City, Rome. Photo by M.L.

"Saint Michael the Archangel defeats Satan" by Guido Reni (1575-1642), from 1636; kept in the Church of Santa Maria della Immacolata Concezione dei Frati Cappuccini, in Rome. Source: Wikipedia. Note how, in the symbology of Reni's painting, Saint Michael does not pierce Satan. Maybe he would like to do it, he would like to eradicate evil forever from the universe, but he doesn't place himself higher than God, and therefore not even the archangel can do it, nor does he want to judge, much less erase it from the face of the universe. He will know God what to do with Satan. According to the etymology of the name "Michael", deriving from its ancient Jewish root, the meaning is: "Who is like God?" Answer: No one is like God, no one is equal to God, except God himself.

METAPHYSICAL

MEDITATION

AFTER:

the legendary Lao Tzu (lived 6th century BC, China), Chuang Tzu (4th-3rd century BC, China), Lieh Tzu (5th-4th century BC, China), Socrates (b. 470/469 BC- d. 399 BC, Greece), Plato (428/427 BC-348/347 BC, Greece), Augustine of Hippo (AD 354-AD 430, ancient Western Roman Empire, present Algeria), Avicenna (980-1037, ancient Persia, present Iran), René Descartes (1596-1650, France), Alfred North Whitehead (1861-1947, United Kingdom), Bertrand Russel (1872-1970, United Kingdom) and Marco Todeschini (1899-1988, Italy). And many more could be added, up to the sum of all the people of the generations that preceded us, as well as all of us, because every day each of us can learn something good from all the others and teach something good to everyone. However, here the difference is made by Marco Todeschini and his Theory of Appearances. It is he who takes us back to the high road in the search for truth. And towards the Absolute of  Spiritual World.

WHY DOES

ABSOLUTE OF

SPIRITUAL WORLD

- as defined by the Engineer Todeschini - manifest himself to Man in so many different ways, even in the denial of its very existence?

An obvious answer, but nothing is more difficult to understand than the obvious: because spiritual Perfection does not need slaves of any kind, whatever it is or is not.

Servants of God yes, at the service of the Supreme Good, but slaves, never! It is one thing to choose to serve God according to one's will, it would be another thing if this were an obligation, and by no means spontaneous. In fact, what created the universe does not know what to do with puppets, robots, front names and mediators of any kind in order to fulfill his Will.

Instead metaphorically speaking, he is rather Satan, the prince of evil and the mundane, the one who, poor in spirit, needs slaves, because he loves no one, not even himself, and trusts no one remaining a prisoner of his own paranoias, i.e. chains. Always remaining in metaphor.

Metaphor aside, man and the societies of men self-determine in their own spiritual choices (nothing to do with buying goods at the supermarket or on line): atheists, normals (as defined by Engineer Roberto Vacca: "I'm fine as I am and I don't need others to tell me how I should be"), agnostics, believers, animists, Confucians, Taoists, Buddhists, Muslims, Shiites, Sunnis, Hindus, Jews, Christians, Jehovah's Witnesses, Mormons, Quakers, shintoists, polytheists, etc. And everything is still possible. Our future is not written anywhere. Only the Absolute of Spiritual World knows it, but it has not imposed it on anyone. His is a kind of "knowledge in retrospect".

CAN WE PROVE

THE EXISTENCE

OF GOD?

One of the greatest thinkers of all time, René Descartes, seems to have wanted to demonstrate the existence of God by virtue of pure reasoning, i.e. with logic. But reason can perhaps lead us, at times, to a step away from God, after which from that moment on, always and in any case, only faith can enlighten us. However, it is indubitable that René Descartes, as well as Saint Augustine of Hippo and many other great philosophers of the past, have always tried to rationalize the question of the existence of God. But in retrospect. Their rationalizing was nothing more than reasoning about God. Thinking about God (i.e. praising God, i.e. loving God). Is there something wrong with this?

No. The point is that reasoning about God, or non-God, or Other, is not a "sin", on the contrary, it is good. Because there is always something new to learn. About ourselves, about others, about the world.

On the contrary, if you don't believe in God or whatever you like, the whole question is resolved in a handful of words - following the path of logic: you cannot prove the existence of what does not exist. So, if we want to believe that God doesn't exist, or if we don't care about the word God, nor about the idea of God, the whole question could be settled like this. Because precisely, as is known to most and quite the opposite, faith is sufficient in itself, not needing embellishments. Even if we are not all naive, it is clear that simplicity is always the most elegant and natural solution. Yet precisely we are not all moderates or hermetic, therefore we reason about God and we reason in a big way. Our reasoning of God is basically simple mysticism. Because the simple that is in us accords very well with the mystical that is in us. Like Descartes, we like to think, therefore to be, i.e. to exist. What better proof of the existence of the soul? Sensitive, thinking. The invisible is before our eyes, you can't get more objective than that. It is absolutely simple. Others call it illusion, instead we have experienced it for a lifetime and we call it Immortal Soul, and we call illusionists those who do not want to recognize its greatness. It is almost a prayer traveling in the light of eternity:

COGITO ERGO SUM SIVE EXISTO (I think, therefore I am, i.e. I exist).

But is it really a certainty, an unattainable fortress, to affirm that the existence of what does not exist cannot be demonstrated?

Let's be honest: it's not at all.

If billions of people in the world and all generations and generations of men, thinking beings, who have preceded us have believed in something more than what can be seen with the eyes and perceived with all our other senses, there will be a reason, or not?

Maybe someone will smile, but no, it's not because of our constant copulation and procreation.

Perhaps it's us and have they all been insecure, in need of some consolation to heal all our physical, psychological and existential limits?

Do we need God? Don't we need it?

We come full circle: God does not need slaves of any kind. Nor do we need a guardian to fill the gaps in our limitations, which ultimately makes us human.

Someone would say: but if you had been born in India or in Arabia or in the Far East, by now you would not be a Christian, but a Hindu, a Muslim, or a Buddhist. It is true. But what's the difference when you believe in something bigger, immensely bigger than what you see? Here too we return to the starting point: the Absolute of Spiritual World does not need slaves of any kind. Man and societies of men determine themselves as to what they will or will not believe.

... "Because that's what I want to believe."

More or less these are the words with which the father replies to her daughter, when the mother's orphaned daughter asks him where is the mother and why she can't see her: she has gone to Heaven. The daughter is the protagonist of the film Prometheus by Ridley Scott, 2012. There are those who believe in what they see, there are those who do not believe in what they do not see, but above all, each of us must be free to believe in what he wants. In other words, at least potentially and in principle, free will is not an illusion. Because we can all experience precisely this: "because this is what I want to believe in". Faith, or non-faith, are both sufficient in themselves.

WHY DOES

THE UNIVERSE

have to be infinite?

Because in this way no one will ever be able to possess it, nor dominate it in full. Not even the most evolved and malevolent intelligences and societies in the universe. Another consequence: no event will be able to definitively destroy the life phenomenon, so Life will continue to spread itself in every corner of the universe. Infinity, Freedom and Change are written in the great book of nature and in that of the spiritual world. Life. The greatest of miracles worked by God and by his infinite creatures.

Ignorance calls Chaos, Random and Finite that which it cannot understand. That's okay too, but it's not good for all those who still believe in the principle of causality, cause and effect, as well as in the anti-magic principle (in short, reductively: there is no room for magic in the real world), as it was defined always from Todeschini.

TO BELIEVE

I, like many others like me, I want to believe in what unites us, not in what divides us. Examples: The International Space Station, major projects such as the Mediterranean Express by Rick Megiddo, the reforestation in the Sahel, in the Gobi desert and in the world, Arts, Crafts, Music, Sport, and much more. Knowledge, the search for truth. There is no deadline, we can go on like this forever in an honest, humble and virtuous conquest of the truth, along the road that we build ourselves.

THE MYTH OF

GLOBAL CAOS

and "we have too many", according to ecological footprint criterion: this is not the most important truth about this matter, also because in nature the number is the strength.

Only chronic pessimists would think 8-9 billion people are a problem. If we are billions rather than millions, there must be a reason, or not? It is Men who give a value to things and not the other way around. Even the children know it. Coal, or oil, has been lying underground since time immemorial. But it is the man who knew how to use them to his advantage. Generations and generations of men: this is real magic. This is the real resource and it is the ultimate truth: Man, and every other form of life, is central into the universe.

On the other hand, a lifeless universe - infinite or "only" immense - would be an ornament not even useful in itself. So yes, we are many, so this is precisely the time to carry out great works and commit ourselves to many small and large challenges. If, on the other hand, we continue to wait for the "free" economic market - that is, a system that is fundamentally anarchic in itself - to determine all of this, then we are already ruined from the start, because the economic market is not an intelligence, but the set of production and exchanges of goods and services between men: maybe you call this... intelligence?

A little bit of cooperation and... "magic"... we can do stuff by giants. In short, no saint, no hero, no genius, no sacrifice, no resilience: nothing superhuman. Of course, sometimes special components are also needed, rare like heroes or like the sacrifice and genius of our Marco Todeschini, but it is the ability to create a system between the parts, that is, synergy (something slightly more complex than "the 'union is strength"), which makes the difference. A certain Richard Buckminster Fuller said it, in the 20th century, the famous engineer and architect known for his geodesic domes and other incredible wonders.

How many messengers and how many messages does the Absolute of the Spiritual World send us! They are gifts to us. We must learn to recognize them, never let our guard down, straighten our antennas. All around us is not hell, a deception, a profit, as some great illusionist would like us to believe.

      Dear Fiorenzo, Dear Friends of Circolo Todeschini,

I close here with my great hope and wish for a better world, always in the sign of optimism and the liberation of humanity from any chain, hoping I haven't bored you too much, see you soon,

Kind Greetings to you all,

       Michele

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