O thou beloved of the Sacred Heart of Jesus Christ, I am come in the radiance of his Presence. And I would draw you close to his heart/my heart, for we are one even as you are one in God.

Therefore, O beloved, as you have come out of the churches and will also return unto them, I desire to speak to you on the state and the mission of the Church today. May you be seated in communion with the Holy Ghost.

The purpose of Church, ekklesia, the “community of the called-out ones,” is [for Lightbearers] to be called out from society to keep the pillars of faith and of hope and of charity. The Church is the place where souls can ascend to a higher plane of communion because priest or priestess at the altar does keep a flame that does become a magnet whereby the soul can rise week upon week back to her Source.

The Church must elevate. It must not degrade. It must not seek popularity and to move to the level of the descent of the light [in the populace]. Let there then be an understanding that the Church has always been the avenue for the soul to reach out for holiness, to be sanctified, to receive the Body and Blood of our Lord. The Church is the open door whereby those who would may move toward sainthood.

Let it be understood that there are many secular institutions, that there are many places for social activity, but the Church has come down from the traditions of the ancient temples of God where a living flame did burn upon the altar, where the flame was tended by devotions, by hymns and prayers and mantras, sustaining, then, upon its altar in this physical octave some portion of the Spirit above.

The harmony of the spheres held in body temple must be for the protection of all communicants of God upon earth. As sound is the very means of creation, so sound itself must reflect the heavenly sound and not the sounds of Death and Hell. Therefore let rock music and its rhythm and all forms of perversion of music be removed from the churches! They are not of a design that can hold the highest light of the living Christ. Not only do they cause the degeneration of the Light of the Divine Mother in the temple but they also cause the descent of the soul into lower vibration.

Those who cannot stand at the altar and be an example of the path of walking in the footsteps of Jesus Christ ought to step down for a season and go through the purging and cleansing of their souls that they might offer a transmission of light to their parishioners.

How shall there be a chalice of light when the light is gone out in those who have not kept, as wise virgins, the light of the sacred fire? How can it be, beloved, that a social gospel and even the advocacy of socialism and World Communism does replace the true spirit of individualism, which Jesus taught?

Let charity abound but let not the Vicar of Christ promote World Socialism <1> as the leveling of wealth and as the means to the ascent of the soul! It is good and necessary to feed the poor and clothe the naked, to do all these things but not to do so by mandatory state socialism. This is a betrayal of the true teaching of Jesus Christ and the parable of the talents. <2> Let each one multiply his light and substance and share it with all. Let freedom in the economy and freedom in government and freedom within the Church prevail, as each individual is accountable to his God.

There is vast compromise at all levels of the churches today. Where a standard is held, society may rise. Where standards are leveled, all shall go the way of the downward spiral of civilization.

Thus, let there be places for those who want reinforcement of their humanness and let there be places for those who seek reinforcement of their Christhood. And let the Church be distinguished as that body that does support [the soul in her ascent to God], that does have leadership who are so in touch with God that they may be the instrument of healing by the Holy Ghost, of exorcism of possessing demons by the Holy Ghost.

Thus, not [mandatory] celibacy but the requirement [that those who serve at the altar hold the light] in the body temple. But this [mastery of the raising up of the light] is acquired by celibacy, beloved, else it is acquired through moderation in all things. You cannot squander the light in all directions and still have it on the altar on Sunday, or in the pews.

There is indeed a compromise of doctrine this day, and this is a liberating thought and not a statement of condemnation. Let those who oversee the churches of Christ, therefore, be willing to give freedom [of thought], freedom that is spiritual yet within the confines of the great laws of God that have gone forth.

Simply put, churches are not fulfilling the role of conveying holiness nor are all ministers of the Gospel so cleansed that they might wear the seal upon their foreheads [that was worn by] the ancient Levites: HOLINESS UNTO THE LORD! <3> This [conveys the] understanding [that the LORD’s servant] attributes to God the holiness that might rest upon man and woman in service at the altar.

The Church must be there to receive souls and their aspirations [after God] and there must be a profound understanding by true shepherds of the mysteries of Christ, the mysteries of God. It is not merely by the so-called apostolic succession that there is the blessing of the wine and the bread, but that blessing may be enhanced and multiplied by the very fire so contained [in the heart chakra] of the pastor or minister.

Jesus did [at times] use physical substance, such as the clay mixed with the spittle for the [transfer of light in the] healing of blindness. <4> The alchemy of the Holy Spirit does require that substance of the bread and the wine [for the transfer of the essence of Light]. But who shall be the instrument of the conveyance [by the Holy Spirit] of the promises of Jesus that this is indeed the Body and Blood of Christ?

The ministry is not a perfunctory service. Let your Light shine and let that Light lighten the Gentiles even as you do go after the lost sheep of the house of Israel. <5> This is the house of Divine Reality. It does not merely apply to the “lost tribes.” It applies to those who keep their covenant with I AM THAT I AM, who keep the commandments of God and are servants of the people and recognize that their Lord is the Christ who dwells in his own and that when they serve any part of life, they serve him in that body to his glory. Let there be the extolling of good works but let there also be the extolling of prayer and perpetual prayer for the saving of souls.

Blessed hearts, if the Church goes to the street in order to receive all [and all states of consciousness], then where is the standard and the standard-bearer? Where is the banner of the Faithful and True? And who will qualify to join the armies of heaven in the battle of Armageddon?

To wage warfare against Death and Hell for the saving of youth, for the putting down of the murder of the child in the womb, for the rescue of all souls, there must be a sense of [soul] need for immersion in God to be washed clean by the waters of the living Word! There must be a sense that “I must be the fount of the living Christ, dispensing true holy water to those who come. I must know the Source if I would ‘spend and be spent.’”

Let the Church teach the joy of sacrifice, teach souls to welcome pain, to enter it, to surmount it and to transcend that state. Knowing that pain is bliss, transcending pain and entering into the bliss of communion with Christ is to be crucified with him and to be resurrected.

Some metaphysical movements affirm the nonnecessity of bearing the cross in order to receive the crown of Life. Their concept of true religion is simply a life of pleasure blessed by Jesus. But this belies his example and the necessity for leaving behind the pleasures of this world for the bliss of the next.

The greatest lie taught by the churches today is automatic salvation through Jesus Christ and the confession of him. This confession is necessary for anyone to take the first step on the path of reunion with God but it is by no means the last. Guaranteed salvation as a doctrine is another work of the Devil. But I have written, “Every man shall bear his own burden,” <6> for my Saviour taught me this law when he received me <7> and prepared me for my mission.

You bear the burden of karma and of suffering and the burden of light both, as carrying water on [both] shoulders. Shun not this responsibility but teach your children it is the true Way and the Truth and the Life.

The condition of the churches today is no better than the condition of the leadership and that of the followers. If there be no aspiration to godliness, walking in the footsteps of Christ, affirming one is made in the image and likeness of God, then what can come forth except the paltry teaching to recite a few words and then go thy way [and the way of all worldliness], for Jesus has taken it all[—all sin, all karma—]upon himself [and there is nothing the supplicant is capable of doing for himself to atone for his misdeeds—according to the false theology of the day].

You do not realize how the ramifications of these doctrines affect every aspect of life, people’s goals and their goal-fittedness. The idea that life should be lived solely in fun and pleasure, else hard work balanced by the same, does not promote a spiritual path whereby the soul might attain to the highest levels of heaven upon transition.

Many souls who do pass on are shocked to find that things are not as they have been taught. But alas, it is too late for them to recognize the wolves in sheep’s clothing who, from the pulpits of the world, have led them astray and therefore deprived them of the greater glory in the resurrection that they might have known under [their diligent application of] Christ’s true teaching.

The condition of society today testifies to the condition of the churches. Where are the clergy who will take their stand against abortion as the aborting of the life of a soul of God and her opportunity to embody?

This insensitivity to the life that is God in the womb [on the part of some clergy] creates universal insensitivity to other parts of life. Where are those [men and women of the cloth] who should rally in this nation against the leaving of the helpless Kurds to the hands of that fallen one and evil spirit of Saddam Hussein? <8>

The entire world should maintain its outrage at the unchristian conduct in which this nation is being led! And let those who support him also be known as betrayers of freedom. And let those who lead the nation in the nonbinding of this oppressor of the people understand that the blood of these innocent victims is upon their own hands and upon their own karmic record, and no leadership can deny that this is true. <9> And the high and the mighty who have led this disgraceful deed [by the disgraceful decision not to intervene to save human life] shall give accounting in the day of judgment.

May your voice be heard, beloved, as you challenge injustice and take up the cause of the poor in spirit, the widow, the fatherless, the orphan and those who are oppressed by fallen ones in their nations. Were the churches performing their duty, the pastors would be resounding with the power of the Holy Spirit in denunciation of world leaders and American leaders in these actions.

Where is the fire of a moral responsibility to protect human life? It is wanting! And therefore, where is the leadership who will show the people what must be done?

I am the apostle Paul. I would move with you and through you in this hour. But I come with a resolution in my heart that I will give and convey to each or any one of you—who will call to me, the Ascended Master Hilarion, for that empowerment of the Holy Spirit—[that grace] whereby you will be able to do something to change this world, to save the youth and to establish once again the priority of [life]: the very survival of the soul itself.

But I tell you, should you call to me for this, beloved, you will be no exception to the rule of discipleship whereby you must submit to the living God and his Christ and be willing to surrender your [present] allegiance to the non-will or the anti-will [of the fallen self]. No man or woman or child will enter in to this calling in God without meeting the requirements of the Law to officiate at God’s altar. Many who serve this day are surely the false priests wearing their masks yet denying the true Light <14> wherever it appears [in the true and humble servants of God].

I counsel you, then, to seek that “worthiness unto the LORD.” For inner resolution will come as you wrestle with the not-self, as you are willing to do what Jesus did, to sweat, as it were, great drops of blood in your own Gethsemane—as you are willing to drink the cup that is required of you even though it may not be your will to do so, to surrender to the will of God and say, “Nevertheless, Father-Mother God, not my will but thine be done!” <10>

If you will take each step of the Path as it comes, you will know the presence of God whereby you may fulfill your desire to truly minister to life, to truly have your chakras filled with light to convey the highest healing.

Beloved ones, an evangel is an angel of God who does go before the Christ who comes. May you all be angels of the Lord who prepare the people for the coming. And as John the Baptist did, you may also say to those who persist in their anti-Christ actions, “Ye generation of vipers, who hath warned you of the wrath to come?” <11>

Thus, they would come to be baptized. They would come to receive the sacraments. They would come to offer burnt offerings. But, beloved, this they do out of fear of the coming judgment of their souls and not out of love for the living Christ.

I would continue to speak to your hearts beyond this dictation as your souls take their rest this night. Therefore I invite you to come to my retreat, <12> where I would tell you of the path of apostleship in this age, where I would tell you of the reform that is needed in the churches in order for Christ to prevail in the temple in this hour. There is much work to be done and many souls have gone astray, corrupting not only their bodies but their souls by drugs, by addictions, by infestations of foul spirits.

May the army of the Lord increase swiftly and may you who see the degradation of youth and age alike recognize that unless there be true shepherds and apostles and teachers who shall go forth, many will indeed be lost ere the century has turned.

May you understand that the Church is not the place of compromise but it is the place of divine compassion, and that love, when it is the Holy Ghost in you, will be for their conversion away from all of the downward pulls of this world. May you know that souls need assistance in order to make it to the next world of Light and not be caught in the maelstrom of the astral plane and the lower levels where demons yet howl and where souls are yet imprisoned.

Yes, beloved, there is a reality to the afterlife and it is the role of the Church to prepare every soul for that calling beyond the grave to the octaves of Light. This is not an automatic process wherein sinner becomes saint in heaven by a deathbed confession. It is a step-by-step climb, and it is not easy but it is entirely possible.

May you therefore gird up your loins for the battle, for Armageddon must be fought and won by you in the citadel of your own consciousness! Here or hereafter, sometime or somewhere you must do the work that you did not do under the tutelage of the false pastors. This universe is a universe of Love but many have betrayed that Divine Love and distorted it.

I am sealing you now in a light that the Saviour has given to me to convey to you for your protection as you pursue the mysteries of God and your soul’s bonding to the living Christ. Seek it early, beloved, for that bonding does secure safe passage to the Infinite One.

Lo! He is come to save you in this hour. Though you know not that you need saving, yet I tell you it is true. The angels of the Lord Jesus are here and they surround you. They tend you and answer your heart’s call. May you pray in this hour and know surcease from the pain of Death and Hell yet retain the conviction that [in order for you] to overcome the lesser state, pain is necessary till it be transcended.

I am in the victory of your flame. May you come with me this night that you might know in my retreat the mysteries of Christ Truth. Visualize yourself arriving in Crete. And in the etheric octave over that place, you will attend my university of the Spirit <13> and [you] may do so successively night after night to be prepared for your true Mission and Calling.

As I serve the Lord Christ Jesus, so I serve your soul in his name. Abide in love and know the communion of saints in heaven and on earth, for we are one Mystical Body of God, as Above, so below. In the name Jesus Christ, it is done and it is finished.

This dictation by Hilarion was delivered by the Messenger of the Great White Brotherhood Elizabeth Clare Prophet on Friday, April 26, 1991, at the Whole Life Expo, the Concourse Exhibition Center, San Francisco. The dictation followed the Messenger’s lecture “The Lost Teachings of Jesus on Women’s Rights 3.” The Messenger discussed Jesus’ revolution for woman, which he initiated through his preaching and through his break with the traditions that bound the women of his day. She examined misinterpretations of the teachings of the apostle Paul that became the foundation for women’s two thousand years of submission to a male hierarchy in Church and State. Drawing from Buddhist manuscripts, Gnostic texts, the New Testament and scholarly works, the Messenger gave Jesus’ message on the right of woman and the soul (the feminine potential of both man and woman) to be the disciple of the living Word and the repository of the sacred mysteries. She traced the decisions of Church councils and the orthodox clergy that have denied the legacy of women’s rights championed by Jesus. She also discussed the Roman Catholic Church’s mandate for clerical celibacy and the doctrine of original sin. The lecture is available on two audiocassettes A91068). Hilarion’s dictation is available on videocassette (62 min., HP91062) and on audiocassette (62 min., B91065). [N.B. Throughout this Pearl, bracketed material denotes words unspoken yet implicit in the dictation, added by the Messenger under Hilarion’s direction for clarity in the written word.]

1. The pope on socialism. Pope John Paul II, who has been described by some as the first socialist pope, has repeatedly criticized capitalism and promoted the benefits of planned economies, the rights of the laborer and the priority of labor over capital. In “Laborem Exercens,” his 1981 encyclical on the role of work in shaping the person, he condemned both capitalism and Marxist socialism, suggesting that the model for economic development is a socialist middle ground. He wrote of the distribution of wealth and poverty among the nations and the need for “a leveling out and a search for ways to ensure just development for all.” In an article, “The Vision of a Socialist Pope,” in the June 20, 1983 issue of Newsweek, Kenneth Woodward explains that the pope believes there are democratic forms of socialism “that can liberate workers yet incarnate the values of Christ.” He writes: “For the pope it is the human person who gives value to the work, and it is his dignity as a laborer that economic systems ought to serve.” Woodward points out that John Paul has almost reversed the tradition of his papal predecessors who condemned socialism as atheistic. In 1984 Pope John Paul II denounced unrestrained capitalism in his tour of Canada. He stated that the prosperous nations of the north are responsible for the material and political suppression of the suffering south. However, on May 2, 1991, one week after Hilarion’s dictation, the pope partially endorsed the market economy when he issued his encyclical “Centesimus Annus.” In the encyclical he addressed the economic changes in the countries of Eastern Europe where Communist regimes had collapsed. He acknowledged the value of the free market system but stressed that it must be oriented toward the common good.

2. Matt. 25:14-30.

3. Exod. 28:36-38; 39:30, 31.

4. John 9:1-15.

5. Matt. 10:6; 15:24.

6. Gal. 6:5.

7. The apostle Paul went to Arabia following his conversion on the road to Damascus. (See Gal. 1:11-18.) During this sojourn, Paul’s soul was tutored at Jesus’ retreat on the etheric plane over Arabia. See Mark L. Prophet and Elizabeth Clare Prophet, Lords of the Seven Rays, Book One, pp. 201-4.

8. In her lecture “Prophecy for the 1990s and the Middle East Update,” delivered May 4, 1991, in Seattle, Washington, the Messenger analyzed how President Bush stopped the Persian Gulf war too soon, leaving Saddam Hussein in power and enough of the Republican Guard intact to defeat the Kurds and Shiites. She explained that this was an example of President Bush’s agenda for a “new world order,” which is the power elite’s plan for a totalitarian one-world government. She gave additional examples of how through “managed conflict” the power elite have attempted to destroy those fighting for freedom, including the Lithuanians, Hungarians, Cubans, Tibetans, Afghans and Nicaraguans. The Messenger exposed the Soviets’ plan for a nuclear first-strike attack on the United States and simultaneous invasion of Western Europe as well as the United States’ vulnerability. She also reviewed Saint Germain’s philosophy on preparedness. The lecture “Prophecy for the 1990s and the Middle East Update” is available on audiocassette (89 min., B91066).

9. During the Persian Gulf conflict, President Bush encouraged the Iraqis to rise up and oust Saddam Hussein, but when they did rise up he gave them no assistance. He allowed the Iraqi military to attack both military and civilian targets with helicopters and fixed-wing aircraft when the U.S. forces could have easily shot them down. Thousands of Kurds and Shiites were massacred and about 2 million Kurds were driven from their homes. When asked about his responsibility, President Bush replied that the United States should bear no guilt.

10. Matt. 26:36-46; Mark 14:32-42; Luke 22:39-46.

11. Matt. 3:7.

12. Hilarion’s retreat, the Temple of Truth, is on the etheric plane over the isle of Crete.

13. Universities of the Spirit. See p. 168 n. 1.

14. the true Christ Presence