Number 80.- Renunciation, Way of the Soul
A Commentary on the Teaching 1 “Renunciation is the Way of Cafh”; from Course XVIII, “The Way of Renunciation”.
This sentence, “Renouncement is the only salvation way, and there is no other way”, can become a synthesis of the first teaching in Course XVIII “The Way of Renunciation”. This statement comprises Humanity as a whole. It is the doctrine posed by all Great Initiates, but they had not been listened throughout centuries. It is a universal truth.
The true Being, which we are, is hidden by a solid, quite thick cover formed by the accumulation of false goods of every type: personality, possessions, intellect, virtues, defects, power, vanity, understanding, bitterness, triumphs and defeats…All this is false, illusory and unreal. Our true Being is so submerged in the depths of this shell –in the dark– and remains as blind and deaf as to believe that We are this cover, and “this” is only an artificial entity.
But, according to the experience of many souls, in our lives there are certain moments when, for instance, as we look at us in a mirror, we do not recognize ourselves; so we say: “¿Who are you? That one is not Me; What I am doing in this body?” These expressions come from our poor Being buried. Quite likely we move our heads to and fro as if we denied those essential but anguishing questions, and we continue our Senseless life.
It is this true Being that runs the real risk of disappearing as an Entity. He will be disintegrated if is unable to manifest himself and grow; he will die of inanition and suffocation. If this happens, the spiritual energy forming it will be definitively degraded and will integrate the deposit of elementary wastes.
He will only be saved by Renunciation; it is the only way of dissolving the cover and giving light to our inner Being by saving him from his destruction. If the Being is tied, adhered and covered by a thick layer of perishable things, he will perish with them. So, Renunciation is the only way of liberation. The real Being is in himself; he owns nothing. So, renunciation is to leave everything behind.
Renouncement
How to achieve renouncement? A previous step is to assume that we are not what we believe to be, and to know that the Being –which we are– needs nothing and has nothing: he Is.
What is renouncement? In Course “Spiritual Development”, Teaching number 8, Master Santiago explains it. You find a guide to work in this direction in seven renouncement grades established by him, which could be summed up as follows: by breaking the ordinary personality, by honestly recognizing one’s inferiority, by breaking the concept on separateness, by working for the sake of working, by living in inner serenity, by spiritual liberation and Being in the eternal hour.
But any synthesis leaves aside the highest riches: the living, original word. So, it is recommendable to go to the source, to Teachings such as they have been given.
Salvation
It is Teaching Number 15, “Reincarnation”, Course VII, “The Becoming”, that reads, “To reach liberation, the individual being should evolve through numerous incarnations. If man does not remember his past existences, he keeps however the experience of those ways traveled through”.
The chance to reincarnate gives experiences to attain the salvation throughout many lives. In the above-cited Course, you find this explanation: the average frequency for ordinary people as we are is seven hundred years. It was thus for millennia, but now, at the end of this Humanity, is differently. Chances to solve, in other lives, any mistake or negligence of this life are over.
In Reflection Number 75, “The Radiant Barrier”, this fact has been widely explained. It is recommended its reading, since it clarifies the present situation by emphasizing two determining events:
One: Present Humanity is reaching its ending, and this fact is profusely demonstrated. Our time is over; it is now or never that the spiritual lucidity should be achieved through Renunciation. No more time for reincarnations; the school is closed. No more repeaters; if objectives are not attained, we’ll be thrown out of the system.
Two: In present incarnation, Christ-Maitreya, the Great Solar Initiate, has established the least limit of spiritual vibration to reach (the Radiant Barrier). The trouble is that, although we know that this limit so high, we do not know the scale. A simple reflection should lead us to think, “I should be better prepared for ten out of ten for me!”
Brother, it is Time
We can accede to this truth through Master Santiago’s Teachings and are obliged to disseminate it through Humanity as a whole. It is an extraordinary mission, since the renouncement message comes to us at a propitious time when Humanity can understand it: it is already prepared for it, and needs it.
As every one of us feels this impulse to the divine, his genuine yearning is to reach his own liberation. But the true Vocation for Renunciation never can be selfish. We should stay at the inflection point: by giving and taking in both directions, between the divine and our brothers. But not as somebody else in the middle, but by disappearing in order to become simple communication channels. So, the Message will find destination. But our preparation should be complete and absolute for it. If Vocation is true and not other illusion plotted by our mind to deceive us, the souls feel the impulse to fulfillment and participation under any circumstance throughout life.
Brothers, it’s high time that…
Many souls to be saved still are expecting in the dark. And as we know, these are pressing times. The Renunciation message, expanded from those who practice it, will give them light that they need.
As the result of living the Renunciation, the new Humanity will have a different way from ours to go toward the Divine: Humanity will do it through mystique of whole human perfection. This fundamental subject has been specifically considered by Santiago Bovisio during a retreat in 1951, not included in Courses, but entirely developed by Reflection Number 49, with the same name.
Necessary Preparation
The Teaching reads: “But our preparation should be complete and absolute for it”. What is this preparation required?: to be consequent with our vocation by fulfilling it. This Truth should be lived in order to disseminate it.
In the Teaching you find specific references to Vows, and to their understanding and fulfillment, all this in relation to a time when Cafh existed as a Holy Order physically expressed; today it exists on the astral plane, being ruled by the Founder Bovisio and protected by the Holy Masters.
Now a question arises: today many of us are in contact with the Teachings, and this number grows and grows. Likely, most of them have never have taken a formal vow. So, how should be these points interpreted?
If we are in contact with the Teaching this is thus because there was a search, a meeting and, quite possibly, a previous compromise: a Vow. Usually, this is a secret between the soul and the divine.
A Vow is a promise, a potential value, an intimate compromise between the soul and the higher Being addressed by this soul. A Vow constitutes the most important act achieved by a man in this material world, because of his link with words expressed by the Divine Law.
It can be taken spontaneously, but not if there is no reason: it must be taken as an answer to an inner stimulus. For instance, in front of an intuited promise, from divine to human: “You will be With Me”, the soul can answer: I’ll love you forever”. So, if you experience something like that, you have taken a Vow. What else do you need?, its fulfillment.
But one should know that to have taken a Vow implies renunciation to some extent. Vow implies renunciation through a temporary Silence compromise, which is the first for those who are entering, that is, the Sponsored, or through other Vows with gradual compromise up to a perpetual Renunciation Vow.
This must be known, and also you need to know that there is no return for him who has started this way.
Vocation and Community
Vocation is Renunciation; otherwise it is not Vocation. Life in Community is the most suitable way of achieving the highest Renunciation. But this does not mean an indispensable condition. The Teaching reads, “An aspirant wrote to his Spiritual Director”, “I wish to be ordained for a more intimate union with the Divine Mother”, y and his Director replied, “For a more intimate union with the Divine Mother you do not need any ordination; within the reach of every Son there are means to achieve this purpose, since this is an entirely inner good. Even the humblest Sponsored Son can attain the Divine Union if he surrenders with unlimited love and arranges his life with suitable asceticism. Here is the message for today, for most of us, “if he arranges his life with suitable asceticism”. This is totally coincident with the already-mentioned teaching on “Whole Perfection”.
In Teaching on “Renunciation is the Way of Cafh”, now commented, later it adds in relation to the experience of Renunciation, “The Ordained Son is he who practices it and fully lives it”.
Is there anything preventing us from living renunciation in the world if and when vocation is real? And if one wishes to live in Community because we feel this would be the best way of self-development, but this chance is quite far way, can this be an obstacle to live this renunciation? No, it cannot do; on the contrary, can there be a better chance to practice renunciation than a privation of this desire and become a living exemplar of renunciation in the world?
Dance of Fire
What has led us to read these Reflections, Teachings, and Master Santiago’s life: an inner search, yearning for transcendence, undefined restlessness, strong tendency to live differently, and some acquaintance talking to us about this? It does not matter. It is for some reason. Pure chance is non existent on the spiritual plane.
Here, fundamentally, it is a notion that has led us. There was both a search and a meeting. There was a renunciation: renunciation to certainty –which is psychologically necessary, but not for the soul– that we are really alive.
And if now we are a little ahead, if certain clues come up and say “here is the pathway”, it is quite likely that we are led to devote us and follow it at least by ourselves. One can say, “As I have found this, I won’t leave it, and I will follow it because it is my way”. This is already a compromise, promise, and vow.
And thus the dance starts. Let us notice it has started by inner need and renunciation. Later, as the soul goes ahead, the movement becomes an ascending spiral: Every grade of renunciation is a stimulus for taking a vow. Every vow is other stimulus for deeper renunciation.
A vow is a promise; it is not anything achieved. So, if by starting there, the vital reality of the soul is consequent with one’s promise; it will lead the soul through different grades of renunciation to new vows with a compromise of higher level. Until the perpetual Renunciation vow that will lead him –if and then this vow has been fulfilled– to the Substantial Union in the holy flames of the Divine Mother.
It is the Dance of Fire. It is the consubstantiation of inner fire in every one of us with the Eternal Fire of the Divine. It is music, with more a more sublime tones; it is harmony of mutual promises between the Soul and the Divine.
If one knows how important these compromises are, we will understand that we should be prudent and see as clearly as possible where we can reach with our surrender. But when one is sure, we should manifest it loudly and clearly, with precise words meaning exactly what one is ready to do. After our promise, perhaps we hear inside us a Voice telling us: “Now, Do it!”.
Vow is potential Union since the beginning. And if the soul can be fully conscious of the fact that, after the vow is taken, the connection has been established by the Restoring Potentiality of the Vow as a holy act, the soul can wait imperturbably for millennia until the time when the becoming fulfills its cycle and beings return to the undifferentiated BEING.
Here is the preparation requested: Fidelity to Vow. Trust in the destiny of spiritual realization that these Vows imply: trust and consequent action. We should not be negligent. Our Real Life runs the risk. Or is it otherwise?
But of course this could remain unfulfilled because we are humans.
And in this case, what happens? The Teaching speaks of a curse. Here is the intrinsic result of lack of fidelity; it is something committed by the soul against the soul: Once we were blind, but as soon as we took away our bandage, we saw the sunlight; this is irreversible. Although later we turn one’s back to the sun, no place will be left to which we may belong: The way of Renunciation won’t be ours, because we refuse to travel through it; to remain ignoramus in the world is strange to us because we have already seen the light and cannot ever refuse or deny it.
The perfect diamond
The Teaching reads, “The Son’s Renunciation is not total and never will be total until the time when the whole humankind has understood and lived this unique, universal truth”.
From Vocation for Renunciation to active service: If our vocation is real, indefectibly it will lead the soul to take on itself all those souls that can possibly be saved. It is an inevitable consequent responsibility.
It is thus because the soul tending to fulfill his destiny will attain the Divine Mother’s feet, will feel her Presence, and will taste honey drops of the Potential Union made act at once, but afterwards an eternal verity will fill the consciousness, which eventually the soul can express thus, “I looked around and asked: Where are my Brothers? The colorless and soundless voice of the Divine Mother told me: You must return. So, with the golden thread of the Divine Promise, I went back and looked for them”.
Those souls that in the wake of their efforts attain the vibration of the Radiant Barrier, which they need for their salvation, will create a big diamond of ineffable beauty and multiple facets: each one is a Soul. This Diamond will remain at the Divine Mother’s feet so that She may take and melt it in the Fire of Her Love.
Fanny Luz
