I'm pleased and thrilled to have the opportunity to share an amazing discovery and set of principles to help you achieve continual transformation--The Universal Religion. The Universal Religion-Essentials for a Joyful Life, is a handbook on how to find your real life, your real destiny, and how to get there.
This experience can occur daily and has the potential of invigorating your soul and bringing you to the beginning of your true destiny as well as inspiring your family, friends, and acquaintances to acts of greatness and nobility. This most valuable of truths will fully satiate every good desire of your soul and bring you unimagined heights of new opportunity and enduring joy. And just as you are destined to realize these truths (through this book or another source), humankind is also poised for a universe destiny in philosophy, science, and religion. Indeed, all of us are touching the shores of an undreamed-of land and a full understanding of "The Universal Religion." Like most seekers, I too have plumbed the resources of the written word and have been frustrated by the forest of information that can brutally oppress and overwhelm the search for truth and the realization of spiritual longing. We don't go out and invest significant quantities of time and resources just for the immediate value of experiencing a book, group, speaker, talk show, or therapist. No, each of us craves the completion of self, the experience of God, the association of our fellows, and the joy of service. These threads unify the spiritual and religious expressions of humankind and remain the acid test for any experience or approach to personal spiritual experience. We are inexorably stretched to find completion by satisfying our constant yearnings for growth and God and will not experience real peace or progress until we understand the basic truths of God, the universe, ourselves, and our friends; until we accept reality, we cannot live.
This has always been the story of humanity, but now, in these first moments of the millennium, we demand help! We cry and agonize for our unmet longing and shove the meaningless explanations and priorities of our confused era over the precipice to avoid going into that same dead pit. Our hearts are open for the real thing. And because we've finally opened our hearts, they can be touched, caressed, and soothed by a gentle hand beckoning to the world of light and life: the Creator.
This book is a culmination and encapsulation of my understanding of the most profound and valuable spiritual resource I've found among the monolith of books, tapes, etc. The Universal Religion: Essentials for a Joyful Life is inspired by The Urantia Book and amply supported by quotations from our great religious traditions as well as contemporary expressions. This is truly a book which you can integrate with your present valued truths (in a religious tradition or otherwise) because it places ageless truths in a new context and unifies them around the basic overarching truths of The Universal Religion. It is these universal truths which will unify humankind and get you charged up and excited about life.
The text is open, plain, and meaningful, brimming with powerful insights and useful techniques for furthering the spiritual life. The chapters are arranged in a logical sequence where the basic foundation truths lead easily one to the next, until the whole of the spiritual life is illuminated, combining the best of the Eastern and Western approaches. You can know God as a person and friend while enjoying the experience of contacting His Spirit and seeking guidance.
In addition, every chapter teems with examples and anecdotes of first-hand spirituality from ordinary people, not noted authorities or public figures. You'll be able to think about a concept and then see how others articulate and live it in the real world.
I believe wholeheartedly that the statements in this book are true and the best synthesis of Eastern and Western approaches and will lead you to unknown avenues of spiritual satisfaction. My life has known the depths of total black despair and the heights of luminescent joy. Twenty years ago I decided to test the truths in this book with life's demands. My daily experience, as well as much that I've read, has only confirmed and strengthened my core beliefs. My purpose is to share them and encourage you to accept the experiences that will develop as you read the book. Your wholehearted open-minded reading of this book and use of its principles and techniques will bring you solid spiritual sustenance and ever-increasing joy.
This book is designed to take your heart and mind on a journey of spiritual progress that will never end. I promise you that your total dedication to truth and openness of heart will be rewarded by these pages.
So, allow yourself to go through this step-by-step journey to unseen wonders. Give me the pleasure of transporting you to a place you may never have seen or helping you to explore it more if you've been before. You may be tempted to rush over sections you feel are old hat, but the presentation of the material is almost as important as its content. Be patient and enjoy, even if you feel you are a pro.
I ask, friends, that you join me with an open heart, come as a little child, and experience the fresh, pure, invigorating wind, the breath of the Creator. Let's go together and examine these truths. With pure wholeheartedness and sincerity, a hunger for the truth, and the faith to accept what comes to light, please allow me to share that which meets the desire in my heart and the yearnings of my soul.
May you find this within these pages . . . The Universal Religion.
"That which the world needs most to know is: Men are the sons of God, and through faith they can actually realize, and daily experience, this ennobling truth."
--Jesus, from The Urantia Book
