Fascism in the Church: Ex-Priest On "The Pope's War," Clergy Abuse and Quelling Liberation Theology

From Democracy Now - Feb 28: 2013


http://www.democracynow.org - As Pope Benedict XVI steps down today, we turn to a former Catholic priest who was silenced and expelled by the Pope, then Cardinal Ratzinger, in the 1980s. Matthew Fox chronicles his story in the book, "The Pope's War: Why Ratzinger's Secret Crusade Has Imperiled the Church and How It Can Be Saved." Pope Benedict's tenure was marked by several scandals -- most notably his handling of the widening sexual abuse scandals in the Catholic Church, including allegations that he ignored at least one case of abuse while serving as a cardinal. Documents show that in 1985, he delayed efforts to defrock a priest convicted of molesting children. "I will take the Pope at his word here when he says he is tired. I would also be tired, too, if I had left as much devastation in my wake as he has," Fox says. "I think that the Catholic Church as we know it, the structure of the Vatican, is passé. We are moving beyond it, it has become a viper's nest. It is really sick what is going on -- obviously to cover up the pedophile priests."

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Hollywood-Style History

good movie

From Veterans Today - Feb 28: 2013

By Stephen Lendman

Hollywood’s complicity with Washington is longstanding. Movie moguls are duplicitous. The only thing they like like better than good films are good deals.

Washington’s requests are prioritized. Scripts feature pro-Western propaganda. “Operation Hollywood” explains.

Daily Variety/Hollywood Reporter David Robb’s book discussed Hollywood’s longstanding relationship with the Pentagon.

It began post-WW 1. The 1927 silent film “Wings” starred Clara Bow. It launched Gary Cooper’s career. It was about two WW I fighter pilot friends. It won Hollywood’s first best picture award.

“Hollywood Goes to War: How Politics, Profits and Propaganda Shaped World War II Movies” tells more. Clayton Koppes and Gregory Black explained. It discusses Franklin Roosevelt’s Office of War Information. It had enormous influence on Hollywood.

It impacted wartime filmmaking. Anyone growing up at the time remembers. WW II films proliferated. They’re still shown on late night TV. Cable channels feature them. Government censors had final say. They controlled everything from casting to production.

Studio bosses were well compensated to collude. Long before Pearl Harbor, film content promoted war. In 1939, Warner Bros. premiered “Confessions of a Nazi Spy.” It claimed Germany sought world conquest. It was before anyone knew Hitler’s full intentions.

In 1940, Charlie Chaplin’s “The Great Dictator” burlesqued Hitler, Mussolini, and Nazism. Other films featured war propaganda. Once America was attacked, they proliferated.

No plot too far-fetched was omitted. Even Tarzan was exploited. He waged war on Nazism in “Tarzan Triumphs.”

Hitler was no match for the king of the jungle. He defeated German invaders singlehanded. An elephant blitzkrieg helped.

Movie moguls supported the war effort. Most of all they prioritized profits. They claim they give people what they want. They reinvent history doing so.

Pentagon generals supported and approved “Top Gun.” A special Film Liason Office overseas propaganda filmmaking. It focuses on ones related to war. It chooses ones it wants.

It has final say on content and characters. It makes no secret of its purpose. It wants pro-Western propaganda featured. Few war films go other ways.

Zero Dark Thirty chronicled the hunt for Osama bin Laden. It’s grotesque, dishonest, and fabricated. It opened days before Christmas last year. It reinvented history. Bin Laden was dead and buried. In December 2001, he died naturally.

Hollywood and Obama claimed otherwise. History is reinvented. Doing so is shameless and duplicitous. It says more about America’s imperial agenda than truth.

It exploits 9/11 events. It ignored clear evidence. David Ray Griffin wrote 10 convincing books. America’s false flag struck the Pentagon, downed the twin towers, and Building 7.

Doing so launched overt and covert war on terror. It rages lawlessly at home and abroad. Hollywood marches in lockstep. Movie moguls misinform, manipulate public sentiment, and manufacture consent.

They convince people to support what demands condemnation. They persuade them to hate alleged enemies. They glorify war in the name of peace.

They proliferate Big Lies. They stoke fear. They aid and abet state crimes. They convince people that Washington’s wars are justified because they say so.

They call waging war on humanity liberating struggles. They believe might justifies right. Destroying nations to free them is OK.

Zero Dark Thirty reinvents history. It chronicles a hunt for a dead man. It turns rogue CIA agents into heroes. It’s long, boring, and dishonest. Much of what the film portrays has no connection to bin Laden.

It argues that torture works. Brutalizing detainees helped discover his whereabouts, it claims. Extrajudicial killing is glorified. Misfits become heroes. Crimes of war and against humanity are waged for our own good.

Hollywood and media scoundrels produce this stuff. They do so for profit. They’re unapologetic. Anything for a buck is OK. Propagandizing is the American way.

On February 24, Argo won top honors. Hollywood’s 85th Academy Awards chose it the year’s top film. It should have been denounced instead of honored.

It relates a little-known 1979/1980 Iranian hostage crisis episode. Demonstrators stormed Washington’s Tehran embassy. Fifty-three Americans were held captive for 444 days.

A generation of repressive Reza Shah Pahlavi rule went unexplained. He was Washington’s man in Tehran.

Six Americans escaped. Former Canadian ambassador Ken Taylor sheltered them in his home. He’s highly critical. He said script writer Chris Terrio misportrayed events.

The film recounts their rescue. It downplays Canada’s involvement. Terrio took creative liberties. Scenes were fabricated. People were mischaracterized. Iran’s “more hospitable side” was omitted.

Argo is malicious, unjust, and one-sided. It’s Hollywood propaganda at its worst. It foments anti-Iranian hatred. It stereotypically portrays Iran according to pro-Western misinformation.

Press TV called Argo “Iranophobic.” It’s Hollywood-style “Machiavellian maneuvering.” Film critic Kim Nicolini was quoted. She expected Argo to win. She said there’s nothing remotely “best” about it.

It’s “a piece of conservative (pro-Western) propaganda created by Hollywood to support the Obama administration’s” positioning ahead of last November’s presidential election.

“It also primes the war wheels for an American-supported Israeli attack on Iran, so that (Iran bashers) can feel okay about the war when they cast their vote for Obama in November (2012).”

Film director Ben Affleck reinvented history. Students who stormed Washington’s embassy believed it was a den of espionage. Overthrowing the new Islamic Republic was prioritized.

Affleck’s ignored the larger story. His film is one-sided. It’s “a sanitized version of events,” said Nicolini.

“(T)here’s nothing authentic about (its) manipulation of historical events.” It’s “pure political propaganda.”

“Given the vast number of people who have died in the Middle East (Americans, Iranians, Iraqis, Afghanis, etc.), why should we give so much attention to 6 white American diplomats who were saved by Hollywood and the CIA?”

“What about all the other people from so many cultural demographics who have and are continuing to be massacred, murdered and tortured daily?”

In 1979, Masoumeh Ebtekar was students’ spokeswoman. She hoped Argo would portray events accurately. She’s sorely disappointed.

“The group who took over the American Embassy were a group of young, very orderly and quite calm men and women,” she said.

Argo’s portrayal is wholly inaccurate. It’s fiction, not fact. It bears no relation to truth. It’s Hollywood-style rubbish.

It’s politically motivated. It leaves the 1981 Algiers Accords unmentioned. Iran and Washington signed it. Most Iranian assets were unblocked.

A day later, 53 US hostages were released. It was moments before Reagan was inaugurated. Washington wants US/Iranian conciliation concealed.

Argo ignored what it should have featured. It reinvented history. It did so Hollywood-style. It sacrificed truth. It bashed Iran in the process.

It’s part of Washington’s propaganda machine. It shouldn’t surprise. Doing so is longstanding. Hollywood does it for profit. It’s the American way.

About the Author: Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago and can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net.
His new book is titled “How Wall Street Fleeces America: Privatized Banking, Government Collusion and Class War”
Visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com and listen to cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests on the Progressive Radio News Hour on the Progressive Radio Network Thursdays at 10AM US Central time and Saturdays and Sundays at noon. All programs are archived for easy listening.

King's Crossing: God's Chosen People

From Sott.net - Feb 27: 2013

By Corey Schink

Recently, I've been reflecting on what all this bombardment of rocks from the heavens portends. Today I want to head down a different, but probably related, path.

I'm going to ask you to just bear with me as we go through this. There will be a lot of questions popping up, but I'm going to start with several core assumptions for this story.

• Assumption number one: there is a God.
• Another assumption: this God is best represented by certain types of people.
• Another assumption: since people cannot know anything for sure, they must have faith that these representatives can stand in for the all-knowing power of God. These champions therefore best represent humanity and are above the law because of their intimate association with God.

What's with all these assumptions? Well, I'm just venturing into bizzaro world for a minute, to see what it must be like to live there.

Let's begin with the Pope. The Pope is a well known pedophile sympathizer whose 'sacred city' - the Vatican, planted on Earth by God - serves to protect men who hunger for children's bodies and souls. Is this the Kingdom of Heaven that Jesus spoke of, where people who torture children physically, sexually, and emotionally, and those who protect them, are offered holy sanctuary?

What generally happens when people like the Lakota, the Palestinians, the Africans, the Yemenis, the Guatemalans, the Kurds, and many other groups make pleas for safe harbor, is that they are hunted down and killed. Are we to understand that God's representatives' silence of these peoples' plights means that these people don't deserve to exist? Through God's silence, the people of the world don't have to listen to their wails of anguish. Instead, they emulate the pedophile's champion - the Pope - cloaked in his robe of holiness. So, the logic must go, the pedophile's champion is God's champion is our champion. We should emulate them.

"His continued presence in the Vatican is necessary, otherwise he might be defenseless. He wouldn't have his immunity, his prerogatives, his security, if he is anywhere else," said one Vatican official, speaking on condition of anonymity.

"It is absolutely necessary" that he stays in the Vatican, said the source, adding that Benedict should have a "dignified existence" in his remaining years.

and

"Documents from the 1980s have been unearthed which conclusively show Archbishop Roger M. Mahony purposefully and intentionally worked to cover-up the sexual abuses of children. Due to this vile revelation the public has scorned Mahony, to which he says he forgives them for their anger. How generous of him."

This same God has other 'holy places', like Israel. The prison city of Palestine was given to it by God in order for Israel to have as many moving targets as it would need, whenever it needed them. It is Israel's ant colony; their magnifying glasses (drones) moving over the charred remains of children, women, men, hospitals and schools. This giant shooting range serves to hone their ability to kill without mercy and without thought. Their leaders want it to be so, to psychologically train their people to seek power over others by shooting humans in a barrel. Thus, God wants it to be so.

So, with centuries of suffering crystallizing the Jewish identity of being Chosen, usually due to the bizarre machinations of their leaders, is it any wonder why they now emulate them? In the end their leaders profit from this victimhood. By extension then, God does too. Their bizarre stranglehold over American politics and their ability to wage war, both through deception and in cold blood, results in power. For many who look back on the great ship of human history and see the river of blood that flows in its wake, this power must feel euphoric every once in a while. Or all the time. Methamphetamine does too. And the results are similar. God's plan all along was to get us high on blood.

The Israeli veterans' organization Breaking The Silence has documented numerous confessions over the last nine years.

These shocking admissions from Israeli soldiers document the maltreatment of Palestinians under Israeli occupation. The confessions prove that the immoral behavior seen in the disturbing images posted on Israeli soldiers' Instagram accounts, as revealed by The Electronic Intifada's Ali Abunimah, are not the case of a few bad apples.

In response to the question why a soldier comes and takes pictures of "his commander beating up an Arab," the sergeant replies:

It's a game, like getting pictures taken with a woman's underwear and bra (the witness told about such an incident at a Palestinian home in the Ramallah area, earlier in the interview). So that's how it is...

Iraq and Afghanistan, I mean Yemen and Pakistan, I mean... well, the entire world-battleground serves similar purposes for America, but America has a slightly different history. After centuries of multi-culturalism, it certainly does not have a solid ethnic identity. And that makes some people angry. It makes God angry. So God has a plan for Christians in the United States. It might be the other way around, depending on whether you have a bad attitude or not. The rallying cry of the Dominionists, the Christian Right, the Religious Right or whatever you want to call them, is this: "this is a Christian nation". Many of their followers are hell-bent on reclaiming an identity for this country, and 'Christian' is of course the way to go.

The powerful for-profit prison industry has teamed up with the secretive, 'war through deception' Religious Right to both secure a steady flow of inmates and to indoctrinate these inmates with the 'Christian nation' attitude. Does it work? Did the Inquisition (minus the torture, for now) work? I'm sure they just share Footprints stories and recite the serenity prayer. In a world where social services are continually being cut, this movement has a wonderful chance to step in and play good cop. After all, they're filthy rich because God loves them. And they're able to buy people with all of this money, crowd them into jails, and proselytize for the glory of the Lord. It's kind of like shooting humans in a barrel. Sounds good.

With the US government allowing for the indefinite detention and even outright murder of anyone the world over for whatever reason, it sure would be nice if the next president were an evangelical Christian. Just imagine what kind of glorious deeds he or she could do to glorify God. Until then, Obama has seen fit to make sure that, in the eyes of God, he will be judged righteous.

Based on interviews with witnesses, victims and experts, the report accuses the CIA of "double-striking" a target, moments after the initial hit, thereby killing first responders.

It also highlights harm "beyond death and physical injury," publishing accounts of psychological trauma experienced by people living in Pakistan's tribal northwest region, who it says hear drones hover 24 hours a day.

I can hear it, can you?... "God will know his own".

And so these are the representatives of God. These are the people we have chosen, in one way or another, to represent us. Walking around in this crazy world, I sometimes catch myself wondering if God actually likes these people. With the way they treat us, he... I'm sorry, 'He', must hate us. But there's so many of us normal types. Or at least there used to be. I just wonder, that's all.

Lesbian teen sues school after being suspending for anti-bullying shirt

[Young woman silenced via Shutterstock]

From Ray Story - Feb 26: 2013

By Eric W. Dolan

An openly lesbian student on Tuesday sued her high school in Florida after she was suspended for participating in an anti-bullying event.

“There are many LGBT kids in my school who have been bullied and harassed and who feel unsafe,” Amber Hatcher, 16, said. “I just wanted to stand up for all the kids in my school, gay or straight, who don’t feel like they have a voice to stand up for themselves. I wish my school would help me create an accepting environment for LGBT kids, not single me out for punishment.”

Hatcher, who is being represented by Lambda Legal, alleged the DeSoto County High School in Arcadia violated her First Amendment rights of freedom of expression.

She had asked permission last year to observe the National Day of Silence nearly a month before the event, according to the lawsuit (PDF), but the school’s principal said “peaceful protests” were “against District Policy.” Hatcher appealed to school district officials, but was again told that participating in the National Day of Silence was not allowed.

The day before the event, the principal called Hatcher out of class to warn her of “disciplinary consequences” if she observed the annual anti-bullying event. The principal also called her parents to tell them their daughter was prohibited from participating in the National Day of Silence.

She arrived to school on the following day wearing a red T-shirt with the message “DOS April 20, 2012: Shhhhh” and communicated using a dry-erase board. The dean of students punished Hatcher with an in-school suspension. The lawsuit claimed Hatcher’s activities in no way disrupted the classroom.

“DeSoto County Schools is practicing the very kind of harassment and discrimination the Day of Silence is designed to address in schools,” said Dr. Eliza Byard of the Gay, Lesbian & Straight Education Network (GLSEN), which sponsors the event.

“By participating in the Day of Silence, students across the country are directing attention to the reality that LGBT youth experience a disproportionate amount of bullying and harassment in schools.”
Lambda Legal previously filed a lawsuit on behalf of an openly gay junior at Waynesville High School in Ohio who was also prohibited from participating in the National Day of Silence. Last year, The U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Ohio affirmed the student’s First Amendment right to wear a t-shirt with the slogan “Jesus Is Not a Homophobe” to school.

College Rape Victim Faces Expulsion for Speaking Out

University of North Carolina School
Government building.
Photo Credit: Robert Poore/Wikimedia Commons

From Alternet - Feb 25: 2013

By Alex Kane

A sophomore at the University of North Carolina (UNC) is facing potential expulsion and other consequences from her school for what the college calls “intimidating” behavior. But the “intimidating” behavior may be that the student spoke out to the press about the man who raped her.

As the blog Jezebel highlights, Melinda Manning, the former assistant dean of students at UNC, and other students “filed a complaint [last month] with the U.S. Department of Education's Office of Civil Rights on behalf of themselves and 64 other unnamed sexual assault survivors, alleging that university officials pressured Manning into underreporting cases.” The complaint also alleges violations of laws under the “Campus Sexual Assault Victims' Bill of Rights, the Clery Act and the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA), and equal opportunity mandates” from federal civil rights law.

Now one of the students who was a party to the complaint, named Landen Gambill, is being investigated by the school’s “Honor Court,” which is tasked with reviewing allegations of misconduct on campus. The student alleges the charge results from her talking to the media.

Gambill had spoken out to the press about her awful experience reporting sexual assault at the school she attends. Gambill says she was verbally and physically abused by her long-term boyfriend. After the relationship ended, she had to deal with stalking, threats and harassment from the ex-boyfriend. When she pressed charges at the Honor Court, she says she had to answer humiliating questions.

“The woman student said to me, ‘Landen, as a woman, I know that if that had happened to me, I would've broken up with him the first time it happened. Will you explain to me why you didn't?'" Gambill explained to The Daily Tar Heel, a student newspaper at UNC, in December 2012. The court also “implied that I was emotionally unstable and couldn't be telling the truth because I had attempted suicide.”

Gambill added: “It's incredibly clear that those people had no idea what sexual assault is, what consent is. They were not only offensive and inappropriate, but they were so victim-blaming. They made it seem like my assault was completely my fault.”

10 days after news of the federal complaint Gambill and Manning filed broke, “Landen received an email from Elizabeth Ireland, the Graduate & Professional Schools Student Attorney General, who wrote that she ‘received a report of a possible violation of the Honor Code on which you are listed as the reporting party,’” Jezebelnotes.But Gambill says she did nothing wrong--she hasn’t even named her rapist, who lives across the street from her.

And then last Friday, Gambill received another e-mail from Ireland that said that sufficient evidence existed to refer the case to the Honor Court, though Ireland also said that being charged does mean she is guilty. The charges include “disruptive or intimidating behavior that willfully abuses, disparages, or otherwise interferes” with a student that “adversely affect their academic pursuits, opportunities for University employment, participation in University-sponsored extracurricular activities, or opportunities to benefit from other aspects of University Life.”

If the Honor Court finds Gambill guilty of “intimidating” her rapist, she could face a slew of consequences, including: loss of privileges on campus; a grade penalty; a written assignment; probation or suspension; and expulsion.

A preliminary Honor Court meeting with Gambill has taken place. Jezebel reports that  the student “asked whether she could have violated the Honor Code simply by saying she was raped; the answer was yes.”

“This type of gross injustice is the reason why UNC students are speaking out and demanding answers,” Gambill told Jezebel. “The reason why i'm so vocal about this isn't because I just want justice for my case. I want to make sure no one else has to go through this if they want to report an assault to the university.”

Alex Kane is AlterNet's New York-based World editor, and an assistant editor for Mondoweiss. Follow him on Twitter @alexbkane.

Benefits of Yoga—What the Research Says About its Use for Common Health Problems

From Mercola.com - Feb 22: 2013

By Dr. Mercola

Your body and your health can — indeed must — change as you start implementing the correct lifestyle changes. Yoga has received some well-deserved media attention recently.

Two recent studies show that regular yoga classes can help improve atrial fibrillation¹ (irregular heartbeat) and common psychiatric disorders.²

While I believe you need to incorporate anaerobic exercise (high intensity interval training) for optimal health, there’s no doubt that yoga can be an important part of a comprehensive exercise program.

Yoga is particularly useful for promoting flexibility and core muscles, and has been proven beneficial if you suffer with back pain. As you’ll see later in this article, yoga can also help you turn your health around if you’re too overweight to engage in more strenuous types of exercise.

Ideally, you’ll want a comprehensive fitness program that includes aerobic, anaerobic, and resistance training as well, in addition to flexibility and core-building exercises like yoga, or Foundation Training (created by Dr. Eric Goodman) which incorporates many Yoga principals but has modified it to focus on muscle groups that most Americans are at risk of injuring because of the enormous amount of time they spend sitting.

Have Irregular Heart Rhythm? Yoga May Help...

The first featured study³ included 49 patients who had been diagnosed with atrial fibrillation (AF) for an average of five years. AF — a condition in which the upper chambers of your heart quiver chaotically — affects an estimated 2.7 million Americans.

They’re typically prescribed drugs like beta blockers in an effort to alleviate the symptoms, but these drugs don’t work for all patients, and come with a slew of side effects.

Beta blockers work by “blocking” the normally stimulating effects of the adrenaline hormone on your heart. They also slow your heart rate and reduce your heart’s need for oxygen when you exert yourself, which means your heart doesn’t have to work as hard.

These drugs have been used for more than 30 years to treat high blood pressure, and they are recommended as the first line of defense in both the United States and international health guidelines.

Aside from often being ineffective, they’re known to cause an array of serious side effects including heart attack and stroke, type 2 diabetes, and sexual dysfunction, just to name a few.
Considering the hazards of the drug paradigm, it certainly makes sense to look into safer alternatives or add-ons, and yoga might offer quite a bit of relief.

For the first three months of the study, the participants’ heart symptoms, blood pressure, heart rate, anxiety and depression levels, and general quality of life were assessed and tracked. During the second phase, the participants took yoga classes at least twice a week for three months, while still tracking their symptoms.

At the end of the study, the number of times participants reported heart quivering (confirmed by heart monitor), dropped by half. Their average heart rate also fell from an average of 67 beats per minute during the first three months, to 61-62 beats per minute post-yoga. The participants also reported feeling less anxiety and depression. Anxiety scores fell from an average of 34 (on a scale of 20-80) to an average of 25.

According to the authors:⁴

“There was significant decrease in heart rate, and systolic and diastolic blood pressure before and after yoga... In patients with paroxysmal AF, yoga improves symptoms, arrhythmia burden, heart rate, blood pressure, anxiety and depression scores, and several domains of quality of life.”

Yoga’s Impact on Your Mental Health

In related news, Duke University researchers recently published a review⁵ of more than 100 studies looking at the effect of yoga on mental health. Lead author Dr. P. Murali Doraiswamy, a professor of psychiatry and medicine at Duke University Medical Center told Time Magazine:⁶

“Most individuals already know that yoga produces some kind of a calming effect. Individually, people feel better after doing the physical exercise. Mentally, people feel calmer, sharper, maybe more content. We thought it’s time to see if we could pull all [the literature] together… to see if there’s enough evidence that the benefits individual people notice can be used to help people with mental illness.”

According to their findings, yoga appears to have a positive effect on:

• Mild depression
• Sleep problems
• Schizophrenia (among patients using medication)
• ADHD (among patients using medication)

Some of the studies suggest yoga can have a similar effect to antidepressants and psychotherapy, by influencing neurotransmitters and boosting serotonin. Yoga was also found to reduce levels of inflammation, oxidative stress, blood lipids and growth factors. As reported by Time:⁷

“Embracing yoga as a complementary treatment for mental disorders is not uncommon. Yoga is a feature in many veterans’ centers throughout the country, backed by research funded by the Department of Veterans Affairs. The Huffington Post reported that many troops use yoga as a form of treatment for PTSD, for example, with companies like Warriors at Ease training instructors in yoga techniques specifically catered to those in the military. A study published earlier this month of 70 active-duty troops found daily yoga eased anxiety and improved sleep.

The researchers say there’s enough evidence to warrant a larger study on the effects of yoga on mental health, and it should be considered as part of treatment for more disorders...

'What we are saying is that we still need to do further, large-scale studies before we are ready to conclude that people with mental illnesses can turn to yoga as a first-line treatment,' says Doraiswamy. 'We are not saying throw away your Prozac and turn to yoga. We’re saying it has the promise and potential. If a large national study were done, it could turn out that yoga is just as good and may be a low cost alternative to people with unmet needs.' In the meantime, he says it doesn’t hurt to add yoga to existing treatments so patients can take advantage of any potential benefits.”

Is Exercise the Best 'Drug' for Depression?

Some psychologists swear by exercise as a primary form of treatment for depression, anxiety and other mood disorders. Research has shown again and again that patients who follow aerobic-exercise regimens see improvement in their depression -- improvements comparable to that of those treated with medication. The results really are impressive when you consider that exercise is virtually free and can provide you with numerous other health benefits too.

Exercise not only relieves depressive symptoms but also appears to prevent them from recurring. For example, one study conducted by Duke University in the late 1990's divided depressed patients into three treatment groups:

• Exercise only
• Exercise plus antidepressant
• Antidepressant drug only

After six weeks, the drug-only group was doing slightly better than the other two groups. However, after 10 months of follow-up, it was the exercise-only group that had the highest remission and stay-well rate. In another study,⁸ which involved 80 adults aged 20 to 45 years who were diagnosed with mild to moderate depression, researchers looked at exercise alone to treat the condition and found:

• Those who exercised with low-intensity for three and five days a week showed a 30 percent reduction in symptoms
• Participants who did stretching flexibility exercises 15 to 20 minutes three days a week averaged a 29 percent decline

Yoga for Weight Loss and Health Maintenance

The following video, featuring Arthur Boorman, a disabled veteran of the Gulf War, is perhaps one of the most inspiring yoga success stories I’ve ever seen. His injuries had put him on a downward spiral for 15 years, and his doctors had told him he'd never be able to walk unassisted again. Due to his injuries, he couldn't perform high impact exercises, but one day, he came across an article about yoga, and the rest, as they say, is history...

If you've ever doubted the transformative power of a low impact exercise such as yoga, I urge you to take a look at this video. It's a truly remarkable story. Not only did he rapidly start losing weight, he also gained tremendous strength, balance and flexibility — to the point he proved his doctors' prognosis wrong by walking unaided in less than a year!



Interestingly, research⁹ published just last year discovered that yoga has a beneficial impact on leptin, a hormone that plays a key role in regulating energy intake and energy expenditure. According to the authors, novice yoga practitioners had 36 percent higher leptin levels compared to experts, leading them to theorize that regular yoga practice may benefit your health by altering leptin and adiponectin production:

“We compared adiponectin and leptin data from novice and expert yoga practitioners. Leptin plays a proinflammatory role, adiponectin has anti-inflammatory properties. Leptin was 36 percent higher among novices compared to experts. Experts' average adiponectin to leptin ratio was nearly twice that of novices.”

Both insulin and leptin resistance are associated with obesity, and impairment of their ability to transfer the information to receptors is the true foundational core of most all chronic degenerative diseases. Leptin tells your brain whether you should be hungry, eat and make more fat, whether you should reproduce, or (partly by controlling insulin) whether to engage in maintenance and repair. In short, leptin is the way that your fat stores speak to your brain to let your brain know how much energy is available and, very importantly, what to do with it.

Therefore, leptin may be on top of the food chain in metabolic importance and relevance to disease. If your leptin signaling is working properly.

When your fat stores are "full," this extra fat will cause a surge in your leptin level, which signals your brain to stop feeling hungry, to stop eating, to stop storing fat and to start burning some extra fat off. Controlling hunger is a major (though not the only) way that leptin controls energy storage. Hunger is a very powerful, ancient, and deep-seated drive that, if stimulated long enough, will make you eat and store more energy. The only way to eat less in the long-term is to not be hungry, and the only way to do this is to control the hormones that regulate hunger, the primary one being leptin.

Aim for a Comprehensive Fitness Program

Yoga and other simple restorative exercises tone and strengthen your body, increase circulation and oxygen flow, energize you for the day and help you unwind in the evening. However, while recent studies support the use yoga to improve atrial fibrillation and common psychiatric disorders (along with many other health benefits, such as promoting flexibility and core muscles, alleviating back pain, and more), I think it’s important to incorporate a variety of exercises into your routine for optimal health results.

Ideally, you’ll want a comprehensive fitness program that includes aerobic, anaerobic, and resistance training as well, in addition to flexibility and core-building exercises like yoga, or Foundation Training.

Foundation Training, created by Dr. Eric Goodman is another simple and elegant approach that can be particularly useful for those with back pain and/or those who are too infirm for yoga.  Foundation training is all about your core.  As Dr. Goodman explains, your core is anything that connects to your pelvis, whether above or below it and this includes your hamstrings, glutes, and adductor muscles. Foundation Training teaches all those muscles to work together through integrated chains of movement, which is how you're structurally designed to move.  It also teaches you structural breathing, which will help improve your posture, especially when seated.  For more information about Foundation Training, check out my previous article and interview with Dr. Goodman.

David Icke - The Dream & The Dreamer

From jay4louise2 - Feb 23: 2013

http://www.davidicke.com

The Understanding of Spirituality

image

From Waking Times - Feb 22: 2013

By Belsebuub

Lots of people search for something spiritual in one way or another, but the term “spiritual” is broad and encompasses a wide range of activities, and can sometimes be elusive.

Spirituality often remains as an interest or a belief, but to reach further means practicing spiritual exercises seriously. If you do nothing about it, you will gain nothing. Nature’s laws in themselves don’t bring about the kind of inner change that leads to awakening.

To understand spirituality you have to practice it, to gain experience, and know the truth. There are things which happen in the world of the spirit which are unseen here and are acting upon every single individual right now. These require an awakening of consciousness to perceive. If you are out of the body you may see something of what’s going on, if you have the required entry level to get to the knowledge.

A person can live two kinds of lives: one of nature or one of the spirit, but can never live both. Either the energies an individual has goes to nature’s purpose, or they go to awakening. If insufficient energies go towards awakening, there is none.

Whoever wishes to fulfill the laws of the spirit has to defeat the laws of nature.

All actions bring consequences and karmic debts are incurred. Being alive is more than being a living physical body; it’s the experience of consciousness in matter, and it’s the destiny of consciousness that really counts.

Each person is a speck of consciousness that is attempting to awaken and return to its point of origin, to the source. That is life’s true journey and story. Consciousness comes into the world of three-dimensional form in order to experience, pay karma, live, suffer, learn and potentially awaken. A true picture of life is multidimensional; everything is temporary here.

To find knowledge gain esoteric knowledge if you are able to. If you want true knowledge you will have to go through initiations with their tests, because a path exists to awakening. Most deny that this path exists, but those who have walked along it can testify that it does. It’s very real, and life is centered around it. But few are interested in it. To get to true knowledge, you must walk along that path.

The world doesn’t want esoteric knowledge, nor the path to enlightenment, most are content never to search, even though the lack of knowledge and diminished spiritual principles means they live in communities of misery.

Great sacrifices have to be made to be able to awaken. It’s intensely difficult, and whoever wishes to awaken consciousness must be prepared to suffer adversities to be able to walk along that path. If they don’t, they will not meet its requirements.

Many love to flutter from one spiritual or religious idea to another, or to skip through different practices, groups, or philosophies, eventually settling upon ideologies or religions that fit their ways of thinking, but those who walk along the path are few.

 To those who have never walked upon the path it’s just an idea, another belief that can be dismissed. Those who walk along it change, they are no longer the same; their personality is the same, their body is the same, but their consciousness is different and they feel different, and the way they use their mind is different. That’s unseen to those who are outside of it. No one can understand what the path is unless they walk it, but few are prepared to make the sacrifices that are required to do it.

Choosing the path of nature leads to despair in the long run, because life has an end, and living outside the path, a person depends upon external things, which change and decay.

You can create an illusion of a spiritual ideal and live it, while inwardly nothing fundamentally changes. You can have all the ideas you want about enlightenment, you can feel “in the now,” but that’s not to awaken.
The path is for those who want to awaken; everything else is for those who don’t, who are content with other things. The step of getting onto the path is a hard one and if you do get onto it, keeping going is even more difficult.

Something lower is sacrificed for something higher and that enables the work to crystallize within. In alchemical transformation, lower matter is sacrificed for the creation of new. In awakening, what is animal in a persons psychology is sacrificed to enable the spiritual to be within. In returning to the source awakened, all spiritual principles and forces are re-absorbed, forming the one, and the one is absorbed into the source.

About the Author  

Belsebuub is the author of a number of books on out-of-body experiences, dreams, self-knowledge, and esoteric wisdom including A Course in Astral Travel and Dreams which became a bestseller in its genre. His book Gazing into the Eternal was finalist in the Best Book Awards 2009 in spirituality, and he has appeared on over 60 radio and television programs internationally.

Mississippi Finally 'Officially' Banned Slavery -- But It's Alive and Well in America and the Rest of the World

© Alternet

From Alternet - Feb 20: 2013

By Laura Gottesdiener

Modern-day slavery is still a thriving industry.

In a major step forward, Mississippi banned slavery this week. This type of definite legislative action is ostensibly the type of thing to be excited about in an era of unprecedented political foot-dragging, so congratulations Mississippi for finally ratifying the Thirteenth Amendment. Sure, the state is a little behind the curve on this one, given that the nation is a full 148 years past the official end of slavery (more on that, in a second). But Mississippi isn’t the only state that took awhile to warm up to the idea that people shouldn't own, sell, beat and rape other people in a nation that is largely (and perhaps falsely) recognized as one of the most civilized in the world.

Delaware waited until the turn of the twentieth century to ratify the Thirteenth Amendment, while Kentucky waited another three-quarters of a century, finally ratifying the legislation in 1976. That left Mississippi the last holdout state until it ratified the amendment in 1995. But this leap forward in Mississippi history didn’t become official until earlier this week, mostly because the state forgot to tell anyone--particularly the U.S. archivist--about its 1995 ratification. After a few Mississippians saw Lincoln, they noticed online that their own state wasn’t actually part of this historic ratification, and thus this week’s action. 

A lot of people are pretty excited that Mississippi has decided to join the rest of the nation in outlawing human bondage. But in these celebrations, we seem to have forgotten one thing: Modern-day slavery is still a thriving industry, both in Mississippi and in the rest of the nation. 

In fact, Mississippi is something of regional slave transportation hub, according to the state’s special assistant attorney general Heather Wagner, who explains that the easy highway access to nearby major cities and the Gulf Coast ports make the state a trafficking corridor. The state recently passed rules requiring longer prison sentences for people caught enslaving and trafficking humans, such as the two Mississippi men who were recently indicted for selling or buying of children after being caught with a video that shows them enslaving and raping a girl about three years old. 

To be fair, human and sex trafficking isn’t unique to Mississippi. According to the Department of Homeland Security, this industry--which the website describes as “ modern-day slavery”--is thriving across the United States. Recent examples abound: The 17 young women from Mexico who were brought to the U.S., held in captivity in New York State and forced to work as prostitutes; the firefighter in Baltimore who allegedly enslaved women in a brothel; the 20 Togolese women or girls who were transported to the U.S. and forced to work in hair salons in New Jersey. Nationally; an estimated 244,000 American children are at risk of being enslaved and forced into sex work alone--that doesn’t even include the thousands of additional people who are transported to the U.S., held in captivity and forced to work picking tomatoes or strawberries for WalMart. Globally, slavery recognized as one of the most lucrative illegal industries. An estimated 27 million are enslaved, generating $32 billion annually. 

And that’s just illegal slavery; state-sanctioned bondage is another thriving industry with that entraps millions of people and generates billions of dollars. With one of the most punitive states in the nation, Mississippi is a model of the incarceration nation. As a Time magazine article writes, “Since the mid-1990s, Mississippi has become one of America's most aggressive incarcerators — a difficult feat, in a nation of jailers.” A few years ago, the state had the second-highest rate of incarceration, with a full 22,646 people imprisoned. Nationally, nearly two and a half million people--mostly minority men--are held against their will in prison in a system that has been described as something between modern-day slavery to the New Jim Crow. 

Recently, Mississippi began taking steps to reduce its prison population and punitive criminal justice system in a move that--like recent passage of the Thirteenth Amendment--is being hailed as a leap into the present. Chris Epps, the commissioner of the state’s department of corrections told Time magazine, "I'm proud to say we're moving Mississippi into the 21st century."

Still, as we herald these types of legislative leaps and bounds happening in Mississippi, maybe it makes more sense to deal with the reality of present-day slavery, rather than pretending the practice is alive only in movie theaters screenings of Lincoln.

Laura Gottesdiener is a freelance journalist and activist in New York City.

Effects of Bullying Last Into Adulthood, Study Finds

© unk

From Sott.net - Feb 20: 2013

By Catherine Saint Louis | New York Times

 Victims of bullying at school, and bullies themselves, are more likely to experience psychiatric problems in childhood, studies have shown. Now researchers have found that elevated risk of psychiatric trouble extends into adulthood, sometimes even a decade after the intimidation has ended.

The new study, published in the journal JAMA Psychiatry on Wednesday, is the most comprehensive effort to date to establish the long-term consequences of childhood bullying, experts said.

"It documents the elevated risk across a wide range of mental health outcomes and over a long period of time," said Catherine Bradshaw, an expert on bullying and a deputy director of the Center for the Prevention of Youth Violence at Johns Hopkins University, which was not involved in the study.

"The experience of bullying in childhood can have profound effects on mental health in adulthood, particularly among youths involved in bullying as both a perpetuator and a victim," she added.

The study followed 1,420 subjects from Western North Carolina who were assessed four to six times between the ages of 9 and 16. Researchers asked both the children and their primary caregivers if they had been bullied or had bullied others in the three months before each assessment. Participants were divided into four groups: bullies, victims, bullies who also were victims, and children who were not exposed to bullying at all.

Participants were assessed again in young adulthood - at 19, 21 and between 24 and 26 - using structured diagnostic interviews.

Researchers found that victims of bullying in childhood were 4.3 times more likely to have an anxiety disorder as adults, compared to those with no history of bullying or being bullied.

Bullies who were also victims were particularly troubled: they were 14.5 times more likely to develop panic disorder as adults, compared to those who did not experience bullying, and 4.8 times more likely to experience depression. Men who were both bullies and victims were 18.5 times more likely to have had suicidal thoughts in adulthood, compared to the participants who had not been bullied or perpetuators. Their female counterparts were 26.7 times more likely to have developed agoraphobia, compared to children not exposed to bullying.

Bullies who were not victims of bullying were 4.1 times more likely to have antisocial personality disorder as adults than those never exposed to bullying in their youth.

The effects persisted even after the researchers accounted for pre-existing psychiatric problems or other factors that might have contributed to psychiatric disorders, like physical or sexual abuse, poverty and family instability.

"We were actually able to say being a victim of bullying is having an effect a decade later, above and beyond other psychiatric problems in childhood and other adversities," said William E. Copeland, lead author of the study and an associate professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at Duke University Medical Center.

Bullying is not a harmless rite of passage, but inflicts lasting psychiatric damage on a par with certain family dysfunctions, Dr. Copeland said. "The pattern we are seeing is similar to patterns we see when a child is abused or maltreated or treated very harshly within the family setting," he said.

One limitation of the study is that bullying was not analyzed for frequency, and the researchers' assessment did not distinguish between interpersonal and overt bullying. It only addressed bullying at school, not in other settings.

Most of what experts know about the effects of bullying comes from observational studies, not studies of children followed over time.

Previous research from Finland, based on questionnaires completed on a single occasion or on military registries, used a sample of 2,540 boys to see if being a bully or a victim at 8 predicted a psychiatric disorder 10 to 15 years later. The researchers found frequent bully-victims were at particular risk of adverse long-term outcomes, specifically anxiety and antisocial personality disorders. Victims were at greater risk for anxiety disorders, while bullies were at increased risk for antisocial personality disorder.

Decolonize the Consumerist Wasteland Re-imagining a world beyond capitalism and communism.

From Information Clearing House - Feb 19: 2013

By Arundhati Roy

Here in India, even in the midst of all the violence and greed, there is still hope. If anyone can do it, we can. We still have a population that has not yet been completely colonized by that consumerist dream.

We have a living tradition of those who have struggled for Gandhi's vision of sustainability and self-reliance, for socialist ideas of egalitarianism and social justice. We have Ambedkar's vision, which challenges the Gandhians as well as the socialists in serious ways. We have the most spectacular coalition of resistance movements, with their experience, understanding and vision.

Most important of all, India has a surviving adivasi (aboriginal) population of almost 100 million. They are the ones who still know the secrets of sustainable living. If they disappear, they will take those secrets with them. Wars like Operation Green Hunt will make them disappear. So victory for the prosecutors of these wars will contain within itself the seeds of destruction, not just for adivasis but, eventually, for the human race. That's why we need a real and urgent conversation between all those political formations that are resisting this war.

The day capitalism is forced to tolerate non-capitalist societies in its midst and to acknowledge limits in its quest for domination, the day it is forced to recognize that its supply of raw material will not be endless, is the day when change will come.

If there is any hope for the world at all, it does not live in climate-change conference rooms or in cities with tall buildings. It lives low down on the ground, with its arms around the people who go to battle every day to protect their forests, their mountains and their rivers because they know that the forests, the mountains and the rivers protect them.

The first step toward re-imagining a world gone terribly wrong would be to stop the annihilation of those who have a different imagination – an imagination that is outside of capitalism as well as communism. An imagination which has an altogether different understanding of what constitutes happiness and fulfillment. 

To gain this philosophical space, it is necessary to concede some physical space for the survival of those who may look like the keepers of our past but who may really be the guides to our future. To do this, we have to ask our rulers: Can you leave the waters in the rivers, the trees in the forest? Can you leave the bauxite in the mountain? If they say they cannot, then perhaps they should stop preaching morality to the victims of their wars.

Arundhati Roy is a celebrated novelist. This article is excerpted from her recent book, Walking with the Comrades in which Arundhati reflects on her time spent with Maoist guerrilla insurgents in India.

This article was originally posted at

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How Our Machine-Based Way of Life is Not Only Destroying Nature, It Is Also Destroying Us

Photo Credit: Shutterstock.com/OtnaYdur

From Alternet - Feb 12: 2013

By Salvatore Folisi

In a society with little time for rest, our sense of self is identified with anxiety and accomplishment instead of our true being.

The following is an excerpt from Eros Over Logos: A Revolt of the Instinctual Mind Amidst the Madness of Modern Life.

We're so engaged in doing things to achieve purposes of outer value that we forget that the inner value, the rapture that is associated with being alive, is what it's all about. —Joseph Campbell, The Power of Myth

As human beings living in the modern world, we must ask ourselves, “How does our being coexist with all our going?” It‘s an important question because every day we are constantly and simultaneously moving in multiple directions so rapidly that we rarely have the opportunity to connect with the being of our human nature. Being is not the same as doing, and we live in a culture of non-stop acceleration, of continual, frenzied, anxiety and competition-driven, on the go action.

Even our foremost pastimes, the movies, television shows, and sporting events we view—things we do to recover from all our work and busyness—exemplify this glorification of non-stop, nerve-riveting action, of violence, crime, sexual exploits, and destruction.

Continue reading..

Balancing Outer Sciences With Inner Wisdom

From Amirmourad - Feb 16: 2013

http://www.shunya-yoga.com/ Amir Mourad talks about the importance of balancing the outer sciences with inner wisdom, and explains that the more power that becomes available to man is the more the need for responsibility and raising human consciousness. Taken from a satsang on February 9th 2013.

2013 Year of the Snake – New Year Message of Hope

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From Waking Times - Feb 15: 2013

By Hua-Ching Ni

Editor’s Note: This message comes from the revered Taoist master, Hua-Ching Ni, teacher of The Integral Way. His works are numerous and noble and his timely message of hope about the condition of mankind is worth reflecting upon. 

Beloved friends of the Integral Way,

New Year 2013 is the year of the snake. The ancient Chinese used the animal signs to signify changes within the natural cycles, whereby each sign carries a promise from Nature and the possibility of further transformation. In this system the snake symbolizes flexibility and constructive transformation.

First, I will wish you great progress in this progressive world during the coming New Year. I have worked in the West for 36 years and, from my viewpoint, a new stage for the world has arrived and opened the possibility for a New Faith, New Life and New Hope. So, here are some of my New Year wishes and hopes. (Please check the COT or IW websites for the full message.)

Hope for a Universal Agreement in this world despite our many differences.

We all live under the same sky with one sun, one moon, one Northern Star and twenty-eight constellations, which form a unique umbrella that shelters the earth. Such supportive connections with the sky can enable people to recognize we are all related, regardless of various small matters. These ‘small matters’ are different cultures, governmental systems, life emotions, lifestyles, customs, and so forth. People set themselves apart for this reason and build blockages that hinder and prevent them from coming together and understanding one another.

We all share this large umbrella in the stream of the Milky Way and its vast celestial background. In this context I hope that all people can now come to a Universal Agreement despite their minor differences.

Hope that all human cultures can detoxify by removing their conceptual poisons.

People have become increasingly divided by insisting on their own cultural creations. The reality is that these creations, which were once seen as ‘life saving medicine’, contain hidden poison that people ignore, or might not see. Most people never question these customs or perceived differently that sometimes they separate us, or cause harm. How many people are aware that these practices are slowly poisoning the health of humanity as a whole?

The Way of a universally sound life is the real ‘medicine’, and is a free gift from Mother Nature. It is the highest medicine, though people do not value it, but for the sake of human survival please try the Way and recognize that all life is precious and comes from the same origin – Mother Nature.

 Hope for the spiritual purification of all people.
 
Today, the world has created a heavy poison at all levels of life, and many people have been poisoned by shallow cultural beliefs, or a narrow understanding of life. Yet all people could learn the Way to return to Mother Nature, and embrace the basic truth that we are all one life. My recent work, The Path of Constructive Life, is derived from the Way. Could the Path of Constructive Life be the salvation of the world if each person and all nations behaved constructively, rather than imposing the destructive side of their nature on other people and Mother Nature?

Hope that future civilization can be led by the Feminine Principle.

We follow two things in the Ni family teaching. First, put the feminine principle above the masculine principle for the survival of humanity. Second, value the female spiritual image of water over the male spiritual image of fire to form a new culture in the world.

It is now time for the spiritual awakening of a humanity that knows when to ignore gender differences, but in the masculine dominated world of today there is a real need to be rescued by a Goddess. A feminine divinity would support life, not fighting and bloodshed. The feminine principle should also guide future global relations among all ethnicities and nations, as the world badly needs leadership from the motherly nature of true humanity.

Hope that we learn to embrace all healthy lives just like Mother Nature.

The sun, our physical God, has a spiritual nature that includes generosity, openness, and straightforwardness, but this great body of light was created by Mother Nature. This means that the Sun is not only our Heavenly Father, but the agent of Mother Nature in our corner of the galaxy. There is also the moon that reflects the sun and relates to our mind, and has long been a spiritual inspiration to humanity. This feminine image evokes and reflects the true femininity that accomplishes all by offering assistance and attention to detail, while being receptive, motherly, sisterly, helpful, and caring.

Though people have evolved from the lower to the higher stages of life they continue to retain some of the tendencies of the lower animals. This means we need to subjectively improve ourselves through spiritual cultivation to reach a higher level of development and ensure our own survival.

 Hope that we all learn to appreciate the real meaning of the yin-yang principle.
 
The yin-yang principle can be constructively applied to demonstrate the reality of life, and manage the world. This principle illustrates mutual existence, such as competition and cooperation, where neither side can operate without the other. That is why the Way is not presented in a shallow or religious manner, for it is the potency of universal life that operates within the subtle law of no extremes. Blessings and misfortune are our partners in life, and overly extending in either direction invites the other side.

Hope that we fulfill the Global Mission of the Way.

Today we need the masculine principle to support our worldly needs, but the feminine principle is more proficient at the level of spiritual and global connections. As a spiritual image of the feminine principle, the Mother Ocean of Eternal Wisdom would help the spiritual condition of the modern world, which needs softening after the longstanding over- expansion of the impulsive male principle.

The Integral Way embraces all sages as the spiritual pioneers of human progress, and does not want to replace any religion, but encourages people to stay with the constructive side of their faith, while cleansing any narrow corners in their minds. The loss of spiritual unity in the world is the greatest loss to humanity. To mend that shortcoming in the deep heart of humanity we should not create any more separation, but encourage people to embrace universal spiritual harmony.

Hope that the Integral Way is able to continue the Ageless Way of the early leaders. 

The Integral Way continues the Ageless Way from the early sages that always offers a service and never seeks personal gain. It has taken me 36 years to produce this new medicine for my fellow earthlings after witnessing that many problems with the human spirit, and in the world, can be cured by the Ageless Way.

Love from your spiritual friend,

Om Ni

Telepathy Between Couples: Is It Real?

From Sott.net - Feb 12: 2013

By Sheila M. Eldred | Discovery.com

When Julie Beischel met Mark Boccuzzi at a conference and agreed to participate in an experiment on telepathy, she didn't immediately tell him about the powerful connections she'd felt to him; after all, they were strangers.

Now married, however, Beischel and Boccuzzi credit telepathy for helping them meet and fall in love.

"It was like nothing I had ever encountered," Beischel said.

The data from the experiment backed up her perception, however, and the couple eventually asked Dean Radin, senior scientist at the Institute of Noetic Sciences (IONS) that conducted the summer study program, to marry them. Now, they are co-writing a book, Psychic Intimacy: A Handbook for Couples, that will highlight practical applications of telepathy for couples. In fact, they've suggested that Radin turn the experiment into a dating service.

The field of parapsychology can be tricky for scientists to navigate. At best, they're known as a fringe group; at worst, they're lumped together with astrologers and fortune tellers. NIH funding is hard to come by. People were often surprised that Beischel, a "hard-core" scientist with a PhD in pharmacology and toxicology, wrote a book about mediums.

But Beischel, Radin and many others are confident in their ability to answer most skeptics' question affirmatively: Is telepathy real?

Radin tells the story of Hans Berger, the German who recorded the first human electroencephalogram (EEG) in 1924, who fell while riding a horse and was almost run over by a team of horses racing down the road inches from his head. His sister, many miles away, sensed the danger and insisted that her father send a telegram to find out what was wrong. She had never sent a telegram before, and the experience left Burger so curious that he switched from studying math and astronomy to medicine hoping to discover the source of that psychic energy.

About 100 years later, the explanation is still largely a mystery, but about 200 published experiments reveal mental connections that are "way beyond chance," Radin said. Not knowing how it works, though, is uncomfortable for many scientists.

"Looking at the experiments and the data, it's very clear something is going on," Radin said. "There is doubt because we don't have a good explanation for it yet."

Still, even his most skeptical friends have shifted their thinking; while they may not believe it's real, they no longer feel as strongly that it's not, Radin said.

Take the experiment that started Beischel and Boccuzzi's relationship, which is typical of the type of research parapsychologists conduct: Beischel was in a room by herself, unable to see Boccuzzi. Boccuzzi was instructed to gaze at her intently on a closed circuit screen that showed her image intermittently.

The data showed Beischel's physiological responses increasing when Boccuzzi could see her, and spiking the second he couldn't -- as if her body was saying, "Oh, where did he go?" she said.

And subjects who are emotionally close usually show a greater effect than strangers.

Radin's Love Study, published in 2008, showed that directing intention toward a loved one (in this case, cancer patients) can activate the recipient's nervous system.

In British expert Rupert Sheldrake's studies of telephone telepathy, emotional closeness was shown to be a stronger predictor of success than physical closeness. Participants were given a pool of four friends who may place a phone call; when the phone rings, the recipient guessed which one it is. Because those experiments are done at a distance between the subjects, it eliminates forces that could be involved like electromagnetism or gravity.

In the late 1980's, a debate raged over the results of an technique used to test for telepathy called the Ganzfeld.

"[Pyschologist Ray] Hyman and the other skeptics simply lost the Ganzfeld debate," said Chris Carter, author of Science and Psychic Phenomena: the Fall of the House of Skeptics. "Telepathy is a fact, regardless of what the deniers will tell you. A central point of my book is that the controversy is not really about evidence. The 'skeptics' simply ignore the evidence; when they can't ignore it, they deny it, and when they can't deny it, they try to suppress it."

Meanwhile, with the rise of quantum biology, Radin can start to tug at the beginning of an explanation for the correlation that rises between people who are physically separated. Telepathy, he says, looks something like quantum entanglement: When things are correlated at a distance without energy transferred between the two points.

"We don't have an explanation, but you can almost see a road map for how an explanation could come about," Radin said. "At least it's no longer seen as impossible."

Be Free to Express Yourself Spiritually – The Suppression of Esoteric Knowledge in Society

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From Waking Times - Feb 13: 2013

By Belsebuub

If sometimes you feel like there’s a taboo in discussing non-mainstream spiritual issues, it’s because there is. Most people just don’t seem to get it, and in a conversation you can end up getting nowhere, worst still, if you pursue it enough through society and various social structures, you’ll discover an evil that wants you to keep quiet, and doesn’t want you to know.

Evil is the best term to use here. I haven’t used it much as you get into the good and evil don’t really exist argument, but no, by evil I mean evil, and I’m sure you know what I mean.

Against the search for higher spiritual knowledge often comes the average person who doesn’t really know what metaphysics is about, they don’t know, they don’t care, and to them you look silly. Then there’s the bigoted religious believer who believes it’s not gods work and has to be stamped out (and god will thank them for it). Then there’s the bullies who find a poor person trying to explain about things no-one can see (the non-physical) – what an easy target, a victim handed to them on a plate. And then there are those who know what higher knowledge is about and have their own esoteric agendas and want to stamp out the alternatives. Sometimes these use esoteric knowledge, but inverted; these can be truly evil, but they work in secret and are hidden.

It’s difficult anyway for most people to comprehend higher spiritual truths; the non-physical is beyond their realm of experience. But if you do the right kinds of exercises, you can experience metaphysical things most people will never understand. When you do experience higher knowledge, stand by it, and be intelligent in how you express it, knowing when you can speak and in which way.

When you know you should speak, overcome fear and be courageous, and if you can, join with others who also want their voices to be heard.

Ignorance Attacks Truth 

For a long time, people who have spoken about spiritual cosmic realities have been attacked, which is why there used to be secret esoteric schools and societies.

If you’re likely to be put in danger by speaking freely about spirituality, then of course it’s best to ensure your safety first, and remove yourself from danger. If you’re in a country where you can speak freely by law, then still expect to come up against a deluge of insults – don’t be put off by them.

If you communicate things of mostly a non-physical nature, you’re in a vulnerable position. People will enjoy putting you down and demeaning you. Some even embark on a hate campaign against you with a missionary like zeal.

Many people have beliefs without realizing it, or have a religious belief, and attack what they think are threats to their belief.

There are subtle ways of influence that permeate society that you should look into and be aware of. Amongst these are bigoted generalizations such as the use of the word cult, wacko, or non-mainstream, which have been mirrored many times in the past by witch hunts, inquisitions, purges of heretics, etc.

Atheism Crossing Over into Spirituality

Today in the western world religions can be put into a box and tolerated or embraced by wider society, depending upon what society it is, while at the same time atheism is increasingly supported. Modern atheism occasionally crosses into spirituality with science but it never reaches the esoteric as it doesn’t contain personal experience beyond the physical realm in its dogma.

It therefore condemns the esoteric as a figment of the imagination and, where it reaches spirituality, it draws up comforting theories about the oneness of consciousness, the interconnectedness of existence, multi-dimensions, psychic phenomena, etc. But it studies them from the outside as conventional science does, ignoring the inner science, and arrogantly supposes to know cosmic truths.

Atheism is the ultimate expression of self-righteousness as an atheist believes there is no one or nothing above them. Ridicule and suppression are the tools of atheism.

Those who do have non-physical (out-of-body) experience of higher truths and of higher realities are inevitably attacked and often left without a voice in society.

It’s easy to draw conclusions based upon what is seen in the three-dimensional world, but much more difficult to actually experience realities beyond it. The physical body is capable of seeing only a fragment of reality; there’s much more to be seen beyond the body.

There is a Suppression of Esoteric Knowledge in Society 

You can guarantee that those who so forcibly argue their point against non-physical knowledge won’t do what it takes to get metaphysical experience themselves, and will often do what they can to dissuade others from getting it.

Esoteric knowledge is powerful; elites know that, and so they keep the majority blind to it, and influence the masses so that they oppose it.

There are also people who want to erase every last fragment of esoteric knowledge from the world, so that the world thinks like them. They are so numerous and aggressive that if you want to have the right to know and express cosmic spiritual truths, you will have to stand up and fight for it. Don’t hide your head in the sand and fall into the obscurity of mediocrity. Don’t let higher spiritual knowledge be wiped off the face of the earth. If you value it, fight for it.

Those Who Are Asleep Want You to Be Like Them 

Many have agendas, either openly or in secret and try to put down people with higher knowledge by demanding they think like them, accusing them of megalomania and trying to make them conform to the norms and values of the structure of society. Just as the church wanted to make everyone subservient to its hierarchy, maintaining that no one could experience divinity outside the church’s limited box, effectively cutting people off from the communication with divinity, and ensuring that no one rocked the church’s boat.
Citing humility, those without experience of higher worlds sometimes try to silence a person with higher experience, by inferring that no-one knows no more cosmic truths than anyone else, and therefore no-one should speak as though they know higher truths – but that is a trap to deny the value of personal experience.

Don’t conform to those sleepers – know truth, and express it where you can.

The ceremonies of the solstices and equinoxes I’ve created revive the ancient knowledge of our ancestors – amongst other things, if you do them, you are publicly making an act of defiance towards all the stifling hierarchical institutions and narrow minded individuals today and through the ages, who have tried to suppress this cosmological wonder and have tried to deprive humanity of its natural birth right. Everyone thought this knowledge was lost. It was, but now it’s coming back.

It’s your birthright as a human being, as a spark of divine consciousness, to know truth and to search for it. It’s your right to return in oneness to the source consciousness – it’s what the whole universe was created for. Don’t let anyone take away your right to do what you were created for.

About the Author Belsebuub is the author of a number of books on out-of-body experiences, dreams, self-knowledge, and esoteric wisdom including A Course in Astral Travel and Dreams which became a bestseller in its genre. His book Gazing into the Eternal was finalist in the Best Book Awards 2009 in spirituality, and he has appeared on over 60 radio and television programs internationally.

Belsebuub is the name of his spirit/soul/consciousness, everyone has their own unique spiritual name, it’s a matter of knowing it. Please visit his excellent website, Belsebuub.com.