WORLD & I
INNOVATIVE APPROACHES TO PEACE
Review of Destiny Unveiled, Spring 2007
Gordon L. Anderson ACT TWO FOR THE AMERICAN NATION
Destiny Unveiled Sylvia Clute Richmond, VA: New Founder’s Press, 2006 308 pp., $28.95
Destiny Unveiled is a timely book about seven spiritual principles for governing a people. Written as fiction, it is a thinly veiled account of the author’s own quest (she is a Virginia lawyer) to transform the United States into a true world leader rather than a sole superpower that acts unilaterally and alienates much of the world. It is a story about Christie, a Washington, D.C., lawyer who becomes disillusioned with her job of defending wealthy clients who have committed serious crimes. Her conscience can no longer bear the moral duplicity of her work. In the background setting of the story, the United States is the sole superpower, and its President Powers is attempting to control the world’s resources by force. The explosion of a radioactive bomb on Wall Street early in the book and the fictitious plot to invade “San Ricaro” parallel the events of 9/11 and the U.S. invasion of Iraq.
Christie has her own spiritual destiny of discovering, or rediscovering, some eternal truths about human life and politics. She leaves her job and purchases an old farmhouse in Virginia. From one of the hills on her land, George Washington’s home, Mount Vernon, can be seen. Through intuition and “destiny” she acquires an old walnut table and a painting of George Washington and returns the table to the same spot in her house where meetings of Freemasons were held during the Revolutionary period. She also finds Masonic regalia used by Washington hidden in the wall alongside the fireplace.
This sets the stage for Christie and her blind law partner, Hap, to “witness” a meeting in which the spirits of the Masons return for a meeting in which Washington forgives Benedict Arnold. Thereafter she receives periodic visits from George Washington, who over time reveals to her the seven spiritual principles for governing a people. Time is required for her to learn these principles, because old habits die hard, and Christie’s mind is constantly engaged in a battle between the ways of the old age and the coming New Age.
Love, not fear These seven principles are alluded to in the Declaration of Independence and are consistent with some of the tenets of Masonry; they are still being perfected as humanity evolves. Christie learns that the Novus Ordo Seclorum, (Latin for “New Order of the Ages”) referred to on the dollar bill, the “Age of Aquarius” of the contemporary New Age movements, and the prophecies of many cultures, including the Native American, explain a coming time when the entire world will be able to live in harmony based on a new level of human spiritual evolution. The United States is destined to usher in this new age, and she is to be one of its prophets.
The first spiritual principle, which is foundational, is “Fear shall not be used to manipulate the people.” There are, she is told, two human responses to danger and the unknown, fear and love. Fear, a negative emotion, protects, separates, defends, blames, and leads to the attempt to control and dominate others and one’s environment by force. Love, a positive emotion, recognizes and promotes the interconnectedness and oneness of all things. Love heals, resolves conflict, and seeks the well-being of everyone and the harmony of all things. Love is the basis of true power, whereas control, based on fear, is the attempt to gain power that oppresses others. Fear creates escalating cycles of violence or economic depression love is the foundation of peace and prosperity.
Though it is not cited in this book, the famous quote from Franklin Roosevelt’s inaugural comes to mind: “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.” Roosevelt himself was a Freemason, and the “all-seeing Eye” appeared on the dollar bill in 1935, while he was president.
When one understands the first principle and the others that follow in the book, the author hopes, one can look at the rhetoric of politicians and transparently understand their true intentions. Further, if the general public can learn these principles, politicians will no longer be able to control through fear or in other ways mislead the public, even though they may attempt to carry out their actions in secrecy.
The second principle derives from the first: “Justice shall be delivered without judgment.” Here, justice describes two contradictory forms of resolution for a wrong. Justice as love, which is the ideal, brings about healing, restoration, and reconciliation. It is based on digging beneath the physical events to the spiritual source of the wrong actions. It sees everyone as interconnected and the actions of one person as having a spiritual effect on everyone. In contrast, justice as vengeance seeks to eliminate, separate, or use further violence to pay back for an initial act of violence. These two forms of justice are confused in the world today, and one of Christie’s tasks is to learn to sort them out.
The other five spiritual principles flow from the first two and from the view that there is one God, the source of all, who created all people free and equal and capable of governing themselves, and also created the world. Evil is ultimately separation from God. E Pluribus Unum—the many are one—is a principle that applies not only to the United States but to the entire world. The destiny of the United States is to practice these principles—a perfection of the founding principles—and bring them, by way of example, to the rest of the world.
A vision, not a blueprint In this book, the actions of the United States and its officials never rise above the levels of self-centeredness, power tripping, fear, warmongering, and corruption. But this is not unexpected, for a government is made up of a people and is a reflection of the people themselves. Thus, to change the way things are, the people must first change themselves. Destiny Unveiled is a call for us to learn to live by these spiritual principles and to transform the nation-state. Americans have this opportunity, thanks to the Constitution and the political framework bequeathed to them by the founders.
It is natural that a book like this should arise in a period in which the United States, like ancient Rome, has veered from being perceived as a just republic admired by all to a selfish empire feared and hated by others. Like the writings of Cicero, this book reflects on the goodness of the old laws and virtues, which have been abandoned by people caught up in greed and the lust for power.
Destiny Unveiled is a vision of new beginnings, not a blueprint. It is a plea for us to transform our ways and find solutions that allow us to achieve a life of freedom and happiness as envisioned in the Declaration of Independence. The book is not always clear on whether the philosophy of an “eye for an eye” is the opposite of “turn the other cheek” or a necessary step in the evolution of human consciousness. It does not discuss in detail any corresponding physical principles for governing a people, which are enshrined in the Constitution, especially checks and balances on power. It does not discuss continual consolidation of federal power at the expense of the states or amendments to the Constitution that have removed some of the checks and balances the founders put into place. Nor does it discuss the rise of the transnational economic institutions with more power and wealth than many countries and religions. Any practical politics or a sound platform for a political party that can put the nation on such a spiritual course needs to address these issues.
However, as a vision of the spirit of the society we should seek and principles that we should each apply in daily life, Destiny Unveiled rings true. From the moment the nation was founded, men have sought to abuse it, profit from it, and corrupt it. The persistence of slavery, the inequality of women, and other problems that existed despite that vision confirm that the founding was only a beginning. Freemasonry provided an enlightened worldview in which all were created equal by a single Creator. It sought to subject governments and courts to the laws of the universe and to shape human laws that were a reflection of these higher laws. This philosophy gave the laws far greater legitimacy in an earlier America than the current laws, convoluted and packed with self-interest and inequity, have for Americans today.
By the 1820s, the Second Great Awakening was in full swing. It promoted narrow doctrines of salvation that separated people from one another, as institutionalized religion so frequently does when it is based on “control” rather than the true power of love. Anti-Masonry and other forms of religious persecution were common, and the Enlightenment principles, though centered on a transcendent God, were frequently compared with atheism. Seeds of religious division were sown in the name of goodness using principles of fear, much as today’s seeds of political division are sown in the name of security using principles of fear. These events have obscured the nation’s founding spirit, and its history has been rewritten in ways that explain its founding as being based on the politics of control.
Destiny Unveiled calls people to a new beginning—one that develops and goes beyond what the founders of the United States were able to accomplish, that purifies and heals the wounds of the past, and that creates a culture in line with universal spiritual principles which, when understood, lay bare the motives of political leaders. This book will stimulate readers to think about how they can improve themselves, their relationships, and their nation. I highly recommend Destiny Unveiled to readers of all ages.•
Gordon L. Anderson is secretary general of the Professors World Peace Academy. He lives in St. Paul, Minnesota.
This review is at http://www.worldandi.net/spring07/reviews.html
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