The Atua Man

by John Stephenson

  “Welcome, ladies and gentlemen around the world, to this very special broadcast from the St. John Ministry’s Media Center on the Nature of Apparitions. What are they? Who sees them? Are they ghosts? Here to answer some of these questions are representatives from the five major religions in Britain, and our host, Mr. Jason St. John. Seated from my left is Reverend Cyrus Germaine from Hope Chapel, representing the Evangelical movement.”

  Reverend Germaine nodded and smiled like a politician.

  “Sheikh Tariq Qamarussaman, Imam of the London Central Mosque, and our representative from the Muslim faith.”

  This elicited a polite nod from the imam.

  “Bishop Walter Eastman, our Anglican representative.”

  The bishop offered up a smile and wave. “Cardinal Lionel Richards, the Catholic leader here in London.”

  The cardinal gave a quick three-finger blessing.

  “And Rabbi Aaron Levinson of the West London Synagogue, one of the oldest in the city.”

  The rabbi treated the viewers to a casual salute.

  “And, in the center of the group, who I’m sure you all recognize, is Mr. Jason St. John.”

  Jason smiled at the camera and looked a little like Daniel in the lion’s den.

  “After the startling news a few days ago that Jason St. John appeared to a young girl at Royal Marsdan Hospital,” Spencer continued, “and healed her and the other girls in the room of cancer, the world would like to know if Mr. St. John actually transported himself by some transcendent means to the hospital, or if the girl just imagined seeing him—thereby experiencing an apparition. On the one hand consider this statement from Albert Einstein: ‘It is entirely possible that behind the perception of our senses, worlds are hidden of which we are unaware.’”

  Ever the showman, Spencer paused, letting the weight of his words sink in.

  Tony, in the control room, nodded his approval. This was beginning the way he had hoped.

  Spencer continued; “People all over the world claim to have been visited by holy people sacred to many of the world’s religions. The Virgin Mary at Fatima, Our Lady of Guadalupe are two that come to mind. Millions of people a year visit the Grotto of Massabielle in Lourdes in hopes of being healed. Is this just a Catholic phenomenon? Do other religions accept holy visitations from their saints and gurus?”

  Spencer took a breath and looked right at Jason. “Are these apparitions, or can people—living or dead—appear out of thin air? And if they can, for what purpose?”

  Spencer had been approaching Jason during that speech and stopped at the desk, less than a foot from Jason’s face. “Mr. St. John, did that girl at Royal Marsdan Hospital see an apparition, or were you actually there?”

  Jason took a moment before answering, letting a calm infuse him that he hoped would be perceived through the camera. “What is real seems rather obvious, but is it? We accept what our senses tell us without much question. We expect others to see what we’re seeing, and often what we accept as real is illusory; a mirage being the most common example. My healing courses are based on a reality that does not give power to illusion, no matter how real it appears or how many people see it. My courses are based on the premise that there is a universal unity to all life, in mystical terminology, oneness, and those programs show that the spiritual essence of all life is omnipresent, meaning filling all space.”

  “That’s not in the script!” Tony yelled into his headset. “Tell them you were not there!”

  Gary, who was standing right behind Tony, watching what the directors and sound engineers were broadcasting to the world, said, “I told you you couldn’t control him.”

  “Damn it, Jason! Stick to the script!” Tony was so focused on Jason he barely noticed Gary.

  Gary didn’t like any of it.

  On the floor of the studio Barbara got the message from Tony and motioned to Jason to “cut it,” but Jason ignored her.

  “When I experience spiritual consciousness, I’m not in time and space…” Jason made air-quotes with his fingers when he said time and space. “I’m in the now moment, one with the universal presence that fills all space. We all can experience that. We have that ability within us if we would take the time to develop it. If I’m in the present moment and still enough to be aware of the universal consciousness, and another person, for whatever reason, is receptive to that same consciousness—remember, from the mystical point of view there is only one—either of us could experience the presence of the other and perceive them to be real.”

  “So, you’re saying that you were not there? And what that girl saw was an apparition?”

  “I have no idea what the girl saw. I’m just giving you a spiritual principle.”

  “If the girl saw you as an apparition,” the cardinal asked, “wouldn’t that put you on the level of our Holy Mother?”

  “I don’t think we’re talking about the same thing here,” Jason answered.

  Spencer turned to the Catholic leader; “Are all apparitions the appearance of saints? Cardinal?”

  “God sends the Virgin Mary to help people have faith. She is the most common vehicle He uses because she has the authority, as a mother would, to gently discipline and cajole her children to do the right thing, to bring them into the arms of the church, where they are safe. I don’t think Mr. St. John has that purpose.”

  “Let me pose the same question to Rabbi Levinson. Are all apparitions saints?”

  “Mr. Spencer, we don’t have the tradition of holy visitations in Judaism. The closest we have to that idea are angels, which function to help man do the will of God.”

  “Would you consider Mr. St. John an angel?”

  “The healing talent is a gift from God, so in that context you could say he is an angel. I believe his books and courses are based on a spiritual premise…”

  “But they have nothing to do with God, Rabbi,” Reverend Germaine interrupted. “He does not mention God, or Jesus at all, and assumes that we all can perform magic like he does.”

  “When is healing magic and when is it spiritual?” asked Spencer.

  “Only God can create miracles.” Germaine was adamant. “Man, with all of his scientific education, can only treat symptoms.”

  “Would you say all healing is spiritual?” Jason asked.

  “Nothing happens without God. He knows even when a sparrow falls. He knows the number of hairs on your head. It’s foolish to think that a mere man can change anything. True healing is an act of grace.”

  “Would you say, Reverend Germaine,” asked Bishop Eastman, “that the absence of healing is the absence of God? Does God turn his back on the prayers given for children suffering and dying of cancer?”

  “God is a righteous judge. Unfortunately, there are sinners who will not experience divine grace until they repent.”

  “Sheikh,” Theodore Spencer said, turning to the imam, “do Muslims believe God can heal?”

  “Like all the Abrahamic religions, we believe in the oneness of God, Allah, the all-powerful and all-knowing. If it is Allah’s will, it will happen. If it is not Allah’s will, it will not happen. We are taught to do Allah’s will by obeying the Holy Koran. The pain and suffering in this life is rewarded in the afterlife to those who have done the will of Allah.”

  “Is there nothing to relieve the evils of the world?” Bishop Eastman asked.

  “Bad things happen to good people,” replied the sheikh. “It is not for us understand the ways of the Divine. Look at the Prophet Joseph …” a nod to the rabbi, “a man all our religions honor. He was betrayed by his brothers and sold into slavery. But the Hand of God was with him and he saved Egypt from starvation. Had he not been a slave, Joseph would not have fulfilled his destiny—or Allah’s will.”

  “Well said. But we are drifting off our subject of apparitions. What is your teaching on that subject, Sheikh Qamarussman?” asked Spencer.

  “We are closer to our Jewish friends there. We don’t have saints who appear to people. We believe
Allah can send prophets to Earth to deliver Divine Messages, but it’s a rare occurrence for our people.”

  “Cardinal Richards, why doesn’t the Catholic Church heal?” Spencer asked.

  “We’ve had many healing miracles in the church. Even today, with technology and a godless pop culture diverting our young from the church, prayers are answered, and people are saved. You know our Lord performed only thirty-seven miracles. The Church is not about healing mortal bodies, it is about saving souls.”

  “Reverend Germaine, what about healing in your faith?”

  “Only Jesus heals. We have healing services where we invite Jesus to enter our hearts to bless us with His healing power. When He graces us with His presence, we have witnessed many miracles. But Jesus was very specific about how this happens. He said, ‘I am the way’ and ‘only through Me can you enter the Kingdom of Heaven.’”

  “He was speaking as the Christ!” Bishop Eastman reminded Reverend Germaine.

  “Absolutely! Jesus is the Christ.”

  Bishop Eastman continued; “When Saint Paul said, ‘I can do all things through Christ’ he was speaking about the Divine Spirit within him, not Jesus.”

  “If we do not personally accept Jesus as our Savior, that Divine Spirit is not part of us, Bishop!”

  “That’s right!” said Cardinal Richards. “Man is born a sinner, and until he’s baptized, and has the stain of original sin removed from his soul, he will not see the face of God.”

  Jason slowly shook his head and looked down at the table so the camera couldn’t catch the sadness in his eyes. “Can you describe the Kingdom of Heaven and is it attainable here on Earth?” Jason said without looking up.

  “I’ll quote our Master,” said the Bishop: “‘The Kingdom of Heaven is within you.’”

  “So, if you can access that inner kingdom, have you entered heaven?” Jason looked up at Bishop Eastman and glanced at the others around the table.

  “No. No. No,” said the Cardinal. “Without intersession, without a spiritual guide, the individual would be lost. We can only know God in a state of transubstantiation, when the body and blood of Christ is made flesh in Communion and comes alive in the faithful.”

  “The outward act of Communion is a metaphor for our inner commitment to the Christ, to letting the Christ be born in us spiritually so that we may live a Christian life,” stated the Bishop.

  “You are leaving out our Jewish and Muslim friends,” Jason replied. “Isn’t there a universal spirituality that can be accepted by all?”

  “They have to accepted Jesus, or they will never enter heaven.” Reverend Germaine couldn’t control his zealousness. “But in the last days, in the final battle between good and evil when Lucifer is defeated…” a pointed look at Jason, “the redemption of the world will be achieved by the Second Coming of Christ, through which all people will be saved, including our Jewish and Muslim friends, and Christ will reign forever and ever.”

  Spencer stopped a moment before saying anything, looking at the rabbi and the sheikh for signs of anger.

  “What if the world doesn’t end?” Jason said. “Shouldn’t we be more concerned with making the world a better place to live for everyone today? Wouldn’t it be more beneficial to obey the Sermon on the Mount and love our enemies, forgive seventy times seven, and turn the other cheek?”

  “That’s not possible for human beings. Christ was talking about the Kingdom of God when he said that,” Reverend Germaine informed the others.

  Jason looked directly at Germaine. “The instructions from Jesus were to “Resist not evil.” It’s in the Bible. It’s the basis of all healing. You should study how Jesus healed. Nowhere in scripture does Jesus call upon God to heal someone. ‘What did hinder you?’ He knew there was no power in the illusions of this world. ‘Judge not by appearances.’ ‘Greater works than these shall you do.’”

  “He was not referring to the average man!” Germaine argued.

  “Then to whom was he referring?”

  “He warned us against the Great Liar who would come and do miracles and lead the world to destruction.” Germaine looked pointedly at Jason.

  “Actually, Reverend Germaine, that was Paul’s and John’s thinking.”

  “What you do is evil. It’s the Devil’s work leading the faithful away from the truth.”

  “I simply teach people how to have dominion over their lives. We’ll never have peace when we judge one thing good and the other evil. It’s only when we have an ecumenical view of life and society that we can begin to practice what religion teaches. I believe everyone at this table accepts the oneness of God. So how can one God be so different to so many people?”

  “There is no dispute about the oneness of God,” Sheikh Qamarussman stepped in. “There are differences in our approach to Allah, but that is all about man, not Allah. Allah is unchangeable.”

  “To quote Rabbi Maimonides from the thirteenth century,” Rabbi Levinson added, “‘the only image of God is man, living and thinking man, and that man acts as the image of God only through worshipping the invisible or hidden God alone.’”

  “Well, that’s rather esoteric,” Spencer said. But the Rabbi wasn’t finished.

  “If Jesus alone was the messiah,” Rabbi Levinson talked over Spencer, “Christ to use the Greek word, why then hasn’t there been peace on Earth for the last two millennia? That’s the promise of the Messiah. It is more important for us to find our individual connection to God alone, in our hearts, than to bicker amongst ourselves.”

  “Again, we’re drifting off point,” Spencer said. “Let’s get back to apparitions, and visitations of holy people. Many people claim to see spirits, dead people, ghosts… Are apparitions a Catholic phenomenon? Can non-Catholics experience them?”

  “Or are they relevant to anyone but Catholics?” Reverend Germaine added.

  “Every reminder to put God first is relevant to all mankind,” replied the cardinal. “That the Virgin appears mostly to Catholics is because of our special relationship to Her. Her blessings touch not only those who see her but spread beyond those ordained by her presence to the whole world.”

  “Using that reasoning,” Spencer said, “perhaps that girl, being so aware of Mr. St. John as a healer, brought about an apparition of him instead of someone else.”

  “I don’t think a parallel can be drawn there. With all due respect to Mr. St. John, he doesn’t have the status of the Virgin Mary.”

  “For one thing, he hasn’t been dead for two thousand years,” said Rabbi Levinson. The cardinal took that as an insult. The others suppressed a chuckle.

  “What do we really want to discover here?” Jason said. “The world has a hard time accepting how natural transcendental healing is. There seems to be only two accepted paths to alleviating pain and suffering: the scientific-medical path, or the path of miracles. I don’t perform miracles, and I have always invited the scientific community to watch my healing practice and put what happens into scientific terms. To even use the word spiritual for what I do is not completely accurate because that has a religious connotation. There are nonmaterial ways to affect our material world, and those ancient practices take on the patina of the supernatural, even though they’re a natural part of life.

  “Recent research on the historical Jesus revealed that there were many messiahs during that period of the Roman Empire, and also many healers. To categorize the healings Jesus did as miracles elevates them beyond the normal and gives Jesus special power. Why him and not the other healers throughout the empire? There’re some who stigmatize what they can’t do or don’t understand. To make a judgment about whether or not I appeared to those girls in the flesh is irrelevant. To judge me good or evil according to my work only benefits the judgmental and their supporters; it cannot change the healings people have had, or the principles behind those healings—principles everyone is capable of grasping.”

  Reverend Germaine jumped up and turned to his colleagues on the panel. “That is the greate
st blasphemy ever broadcast to the world! You should all condemn this man. He insults all people of faith by denigrating our Lord and making himself a god. ‘And I stood upon the sand of the sea and saw a beast rise up out of the sea, having seven heads and ten horns, and upon his horns ten crowns, and upon his heads the name of blasphemy.’ Revelations chapter thirteen, verse one

  “Reverend Germain! Please…” Spencer interrupted.

  Germaine barreled on; “St. John is a surfer, having risen up out of the sea, and his every healing is blasphemous. Even his name is blasphemous! He is not a saint! It’s an outrage that we’re in the presence of the Antichrist.”

  The reverend leaned over, pounded on the table, making sure the camera was on him, and gave the world his famous look of righteous indignation.

  Spencer drew the camera to him and addressed Jason. “Mr. St. John, I heard you were shot yesterday. … In Baghdad. Would you please comment on that?”

  The panel jumped to their feet, all shouting in disbelief.

  Spencer continued while Jason retreated into his long-practiced attitude of divine indifference.

  “This will be on the news tonight,” Spencer said directly into the camera. “British soldiers reported seeing Jason St. John in Bagdad, yesterday, in Sadr City, in the house of Iraqi insurgents. He was shot and then disappeared.”

  Tony Bass bolted for the phone, never taking his eyes off the television monitors. At the same time, Gary shouted a stream of invectives into his handheld radio and ordered all security personnel to the highest alert.

  Barbara signaled her director to cut the video feed. A moment later she heard Tony shouting in her earphones, “Keep it rolling. Mr. St. John needs to respond. It can’t be left like this!”

  The rest of the panel were standing around Jason, waiting. Jason, still seated, closed his eyes to the chaos to gain some peace.

  “This is not about apparitions, or angels, or people hallucinating,” Theodore Spencer shouted. “It’s about you, Jason St. John! Who are you? What are you doing?”