Heart and Lungs Part 2

This is the second part of Brian's essay on what the church would do if it were aligned entirely with the correspondence of the heart and lungs. The first section can be found here. -Editor

In the first half of this article last week, I launched a discussion of the true meaning of the place of the church specific—meaning the church which has the Writings of Emanuel Swedenborg—as the heart and lungs of what we call the Grand Man, the human form of society.

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Heart and Lungs

Brian explores what the essential actions of the church ought to be in light of what the heart and lungs correspond to in Swedenborg's writings. This essay is the first of two on this topic. The second part is found here. -Editor

About fifteen years ago I fell into a late-night New-Church-camp conversation with two cousins of mine—who were, like me, church-indoctrinated from birth—and Martie Johnson. Martie would go on to become a minister and Navy chaplain, but was at the time still a rather wide-eyed newcomer to Swedenborg and the concepts in his Writings, and was probing us for information.

At some point, one of us mentioned the Grand Man, and Martie stopped us.

“What’s that?” We explained how heaven is organized in the human form, with societies performing functions that correspond to the various parts of the body, and how that same human form is reflected in the earthly church, human society, nature, and creation itself.

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Move Over, Einstein: How a little-known Swedish theologian predicted modern science a quarter of a millennium ago

Brian compares Swedenborg's fundamental concepts about the nature of God and his operation in the universe with evolving scientific theories of reality, only to find they are converging. Brian wrote this as an introduction for a book for the General Church Bridge Books competition. He invites you to offer feedback, questions and encouragement towards the completion of the book. -Editor

An M Theory Thinker in the Age of Newton

When Isaac Newton published the Principia Mathematica in 1687, he changed the whole course of human history.

Before Newton, the best answer to most scientific questions was “because that’s the way God made it.”

Why did the planets revolve around the sun? Because that’s the way God made it.

Why didn’t we fall off the bottom of the earth’s great sphere? Because that’s the way God made it.

Why did throwing a stone at a certain speed and a certain angle make it land where it did? Because that’s the way God made it.

Why did levers work, and pulleys, and wheels? Because that’s the way God made it.

Why did plants grow; why did water flow; what turned rain to snow? It was all God.

Then Newton unleashed his masterpiece, identifying the force of gravity and issuing three profound laws governing the motions and forces of objects.

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