Let ETs Open Your Mind
by Rev. Cory Coberforward
2 Kings 2:9-12
When they had crossed, Elijah said to Elisha, “Tell me, what can I do for you before I am taken from you?”
“Let me inherit a double portion of your spirit,” Elisha replied.
“You have asked a difficult thing,” Elijah said, “yet if you see me when I am taken from you, it will be yours—otherwise, it will not.”
As they were walking along and talking together, suddenly a chariot of fire and horses of fire appeared and separated the two of them, and Elijah went up to heaven in a whirlwind. Elisha saw this and cried out, “My father! My father! The chariots and horsemen of Israel!” And Elisha saw him no more. Then he took hold of his garment and tore it in two.
Responsive Reading – Ezekiel 1:22-28
Spread out above the heads of the living creatures was what looked something like a vault,
sparkling like crystal, and awesome.
Then there came a voice from above the vault over their heads as they stood with lowered wings.
Above the vault over their heads was what looked like a throne of lapis lazuli,
and high above on the throne was a figure like that of a man.
I saw that from what appeared to be his waist up he looked like glowing metal, as if full of fire,
and that from there down he looked like fire; and brilliant light surrounded him.
Like the appearance of a rainbow in the clouds on a rainy day, so was the radiance around him.
Read the written message below with music videos
There’s a lot of news lately about government disclosures of alien aircraft, or at least, what they are now calling unidentified aerial phenomena (UAPs). The US and others have started to share information about these strange objects, many of which move much quicker than our fastest planes and seem to defy the laws of physics as we know them. The idea of extraterrestrials can be an enlightening one because it can open us to a sense of infinity and wonder that we can sometimes lack in today’s modern world, one in which we strangely feel like we know just about everything. Confirmation of UFOs and perhaps even extraterrestrial visitors calls on us to question our sense of superiority, calls into question some of our belief systems, and in general, opens our minds to the infinite mystery around us that we often miss. Perhaps, this is why the great scientist turned mystic, Emanuel Swedenborg, wrote so much about ETs!
Yes indeed, ETs were one of Swedenborg’s favourite subjects, using the subject of life on other planets to highlight that there are many ways to live in unity with the Divine Creator throughout the universe. He wrote that he saw many different intelligent species from other planets in heaven, most of which had a deep awareness that all life is synonymous with God’s Life. Yes, he believed that most aliens were at a higher spiritual awareness of their unity with God than we currently are on the surface of our planet. You can read more about his observations of ETs in a little book now called Life on Other Planets, as well as extensively in the final tomes of his largest work called in English, Secrets of Heaven.
In a way, Swedenborg was quite modern in his reflections about extraterrestrial spiritual ideas and modes of being as recent years have seen a rise in popular videos about ETs. This rise coincides with a renewed interest in spirituality, and it seems as though our younger generations are having a type of renaissance when it comes to out-of-the-box thinking. However, Swedenborg is still quite readily dismissed by some due to his belief that there are (or were) aliens living on (or in) many of the planets in our very solar system. In fact, I recently heard from a congregant that some of their friends had dismissed Swedenborg because of just that!
To be honest, this was a bit of a stumbling block for me when I was first perusing Swedenborg’s opus of writings. I thought to myself, “How can this great thinker believe that aliens live on (or in) Venus!?” What I find interesting about this tendency from myself and others is that it highlights two things: 1) our belief that we truly know what’s going on around us, which means it takes very little for someone to write off one of the greatest minds of our age (at least according to Emerson and Helen Keller, among other great thinkers and activists). And 2) that our scientific culture doesn’t actually often take a very scientific approach to things, assuming we know all there is to know about planet life, other dimensions, and, well, pretty much everything.
Now, as you might have guessed, over time I’ve warmed up to good ole Emanuel’s assertion of life on nearby planets for two key reasons: 1) I came to realize that Swedenborg was in the spiritual realm when he saw these ET spirits, meaning that perhaps these ETs are from another dimension or even another time, maybe millions of years ago, parallel or otherwise and 2) many of these more modern ET reports say that there are vast civilizations that live within planets, and Swedenborg himself writes of aliens that seem to live underground. And, also, I can always fall back on my old explanation for these fantastical assertions, which was that since Swedenborg was in the spirit when he saw these things, how could he truly know that the little green men and women were actually from Mars? Perhaps that was just a best guess!
But whatever the explanation, I write about this because it seems to have been a stumbling block for many intrepid Swedenborg researchers, and perhaps for others just seeking to open their minds. That alone can be a good thing to recognize in ourselves, because noticing our internal blockages and sense of limitation about ourselves and the universe is the first step to recognizing the openness of the Spirit at our core. We see the limitations of our thinking from a place of openness, this friction with recent revelations about UFOs can even help us see that although our thinking is limited, our awareness and our light, and God’s light, is not! Stepping out of the limitations of our assumptive thoughts doesn’t mean giving ourselves up, but settling more in the peace and openness of the love and light that we are.
It's funny though, despite Western modernity’s assumptions, ETs show up throughout the world’s traditions again and again. From appearances in the Old Testament as a chariot of flame or “wheels within wheels” in the sky to perhaps even being the star that traveled through the sky leading the magi for perhaps days, only to stop above Christ’s manger. And these indications go beyond the Bible and Swedenborg, Indigenous traditions are full of references to ETs and extra-dimensional beings, angelic or otherwise, even some that say that their people originate as beings from the stars or from underground. And the various spiritual traditions that are often called Hindu or Vedanta speak of flying craft like UFOs and of beings from many other planets and realms, we see this also in Sikhism and Buddhism. It is only the youthful tradition of current day scientism that tends to write off ideas of angels, ETs, and other dimensions! But with recent ongoing revelations, I believe it’s only a matter of time until public, modern-day science catches up, and these recent government disclosures will surely help.
The Spirit of God is infinite and diverse, and so why would God only manifest on one little blue dot in the universe? Why wouldn’t life be prolific, just as Swedenborg so often asserted? And so, this topic is a test of our minds, how limited is our thinking? One reason Swedenborg wrote about aliens was to show us that there are many ways to live a spiritual life, and when we think more broadly in this way, we open both our minds and our hearts and let go of stilted, rigid thinking. When we make church or religion more about ourselves, which happens to each of us, we forget this call to step beyond ourselves, “to die to ourselves” as Christ required of us to fully entre heavenly life.
Unlike Christ, I wouldn’t go as far as to say that we have to reject spouse and family to find unity with the Christ-Spirit, but his sentiment was true: we must step beyond our limited thinking about life, about us. Although Swedenborg was a Christian mystic and possibly one of the most prolific scientists of all time (despite being relatively unknown today), he believed that a true walk with Christ accepted that all truth-seeking walks and traditions had the potential to help deepen someone’s heavenly life, that they all can help deepen someone’s walk with the Divine Unity that Life is, that we all are. He said this because he witnessed that both the countless religions on this world have all led to heavenly life for some of their adherents, but also the countless spiritualities throughout our universe have also created angelic beings, with love and wisdom beyond words. And this great sage also asserted that our minds tend to want to judge and control, and when we empower our sense of limitedness, we can get bogged down by this narrowness of likes and dislikes, much like eating from the tree of knowledge of good and evil, especially when it comes to others. To remedy this, Christ calls on us to be open to the true diversity of heavenly love and wisdom, rejecting our sense of limitation and need, and accept the way things are in this very moment.
Personally, I don’t have firsthand knowledge about ETs or angels, but perhaps you do. For those that have, what did that experience of vision or spirit open you to, how did it affect you? I hope that you are willing to share about it during our discussion. We hear that through experiences like Near-Death Experiences and ET encounters or channeling, people have a renewed sense of their unity with the cosmos and often open to a greater wisdom. This can also be true for those of us who walk with Spirit in our everyday life, and we’d love to hear from you too.
So, why do the world’s spiritual traditions repeatedly reference alien craft and beings? Perhaps to tell us that we’re not alone, that there are other beings out there in their diverse walks with God. And perhaps it’s to open our minds and to sometimes shock our system from time to time, like reading the book of Revelation or having a psychedelic trip into the spirit ourselves. Or perhaps, it’s just because they happened and they are sharing their lived experience, wanting to convey the love and connection that they found on the other side. Indeed, in our own lives, the cosmos has been shown to always surprise us with how beautiful, connected, and full of love everything truly is.
Blessings,
Cory