November 2004 Source

Spiritual Transformation in Swedenborgian Churches

It is Sunday morning in Edmonds. The Rev. Martie Johnson, a Swedenborgian pastor as well as a military chaplain, opens the service at the Cascade New Church wearing a traditional white ministerial robe. The service feels very much like a contemporary Protestant worship including hymns, prayers, readings from the Old and New Testament, the only noticeable difference being an additional reading from Swedenborg. The well dressed worshippers sit facing the pulpit, sometimes kneeling, always attentive.

Twenty-five miles to the southeast in Redmond, the Rev. Eric Allison, wearing an open collared shirt opens worship for the only other Swedenborg congregation in the area by ringing a Buddhist chime. Casually dressed members meander to pillows on the floor or chairs formed in a semi-circle. The service is eclectic, including readings from Black Elk and Sufi Mystics, along with meditation, chanting and a healing circle. Reiki healers are available for those interested.

How can church services originating from the same source produce such different worship styles? Perhaps the answer lies in Emanuel Swedenborg’s teaching that each person receives God uniquely.

For Swedenborgians, God is a present reality flowing into the heart and mind of every person. Full reception requires regeneration, a lifelong process of spiritual development.

“Swedenborg predicted that the traditional church of the 18^th century would disappear and be replaced a new church, a universal church, a sort of heaven on earth” says Allison, whose Redmond congregation recently changed their name to Heaven on Earth: A Spiritual Community.

In Swedenborg’s vision, there is a place in heaven for anyone who loves, learns and acts in accord with a heart and mind tuned to God’s will.

“I think the multi-billion dollar transformational workshop industry reflects the new church in many ways,” says Allison. “The individual level of transformation is the new church. What is missing in the workshops is God in an overt way where God is specifically mentioned as the source of transformation. Many people want this spelled out.”

For that, Swedenborgians, like all Christians, turn to the Bible for guidance, but they don’t stop at the literal text, searching instead for it’s inner sense, or deeper meaning. They see the Bible as a transformational handbook, a divine revelation for the process of spiritual development.

“Everything is metaphorical because the whole Bible is an allegory,” says Johnson. “When we read a Biblical story, we ask: What is the meaning,? Where is the truth? We are then free to follow the truth for our spiritual development.”

“Our service is committed to transformation,” says Allison. During his sermon, Allison encouraged members to participate by sharing personal experiences. He read Old and New Testament passages illustrating an openness to the voice of God followed by a Swedenborg text about receptiveness.

“It’s our task to remain open, whole and connected in order to receive greater love and wisdom, choosing to let the spirit flow in,” Allison told his congregation.

For Swedenborg, God is an influx, or continuous flow of energy-like love and wisdom into all of creation and specifically into the hearts and minds of humans. We don’t easily recognize God’s inflow because of our preoccupation with the world and ourselves.

While openness to the influx creates heaven in our lives right now, self-centered thinking shuts off our awarenss of the flow and creates hell.

“The problem is in our own proprium (a term meaning selfishness),” says Allison, “which is rooted in a genetic desire to survive at the expense of anything else.”

Spiritual regeneration involves eliminating selfish feelings, thoughts and behavior, which are inherently evil because they cause separation, in favor of following God’s will towards unity.

Swedenborg did not accept the doctrine of justification by faith. Salvation is not simply a matter of belief, but a result of a well lived life.

“Spiritual growth involves change,” says Johnson. “Change involves doing. The goal is to grow from the inside out based on what he (Jesus) did.” God becomes present in use, actions stemming from loving motives that serve others and unite with a reality larger than the individual.

During the Edmonds service, Johnson performed a traditional Baptism including New Testament readings augmented with an explanation from Swedenborg on the purpose of Baptism. Johnson explains that Baptism does not confer salvation, but announces an intention to follow a path of regeneration.

“We live in equilibrium,” explains Johnson. “Because of God’s grace, we have free will to choose between good and evil. Heaven and hell depend on the choices we make every moment. Heaven is both a process and a destination.”

Both Johnson and Allison recommend the Robin Williams movie, “What Dreams May Come,” as offering a glimpse of Swedenborg’s Heaven and Hell.

Christianity based on Swedenborg’s writings requires a lifetime of personal reflection and learning. The writings are not easily accessible to an uncommitted reader. This might be why both churches are small, appealing primarily to members who are highly educated and often voracious readers.

A core of members are third or fourth generation Swedenborgians, but many others have returned to Christianity searching for deeper meaning.

Though members of both local churches are friendly, open and welcoming, don’t wait for the Swedenborgian community to come looking for you.

“We are probably the worst evangelists in history,” admits Rev. Allison. “Our last real evangelist was John Chapman.”

Better known as Johnny Appleseed, Chapman roamed the 19^th century Midwest, planting seeds and sharing pages from Swedenborg writings with farmers, then exchanging pages as he passed through again.

Other highly influenced by Swedenborg include Emerson, Thoreau, Henry James Sr. and Helen Keller.

Though Swedenborg wrote more than two centuries ago, there is a freshness to his insights and a system for personal growth. For those seeking spiritual transformation, these two local churches are a great place to begin.

Swedenborg: Smartest Man Ever?

Emanuel Swedenborg was an 18^th century Swedish nobleman with one of the great scientific minds ever, a prolific writer on various subjects from mineralogy to physics to anatomy, as famous in his native Sweden as was Einstein in America. He was so far ahead of his time that many of his theories have been credited to others at much later dates.

So brilliant was Swedenborg that a Stanford University IQ study showed him to be, along with two others, the greatest intellect of all time.

In his mid-fifties, Swedenborg began to have unique spiritual experiences that changed his life-course as he turned his intellect to spiritual matters.

The great scientist wrote that he had been allowed by God to explore heaven and hell in a waking state throughout the last 26 years of his life. His spiritual writings offer a detailed account of these experiences including extensive descriptions. He considered the spiritual world to be a present reality as well as an after-life destination.

Some have been so astonished by his claims they assumed he was mad, but all accounts point to his continued sanity throughout his life. Though he wrote in Christian terms, his experiences have been compared to those of Eastern mystics.

Swedenborg never showed any interest in starting a new religion, though his theology differs in key points from traditional Christianity. He foresaw an end to the church of the 18^th century and the coming of a new universal church.