Contingent eternality (ICA)

This is an awareness of life beyond the grave and before birth. It is not some mystical trick to avoid the unavoidable, but rather the state of existence in which an individual grasps, in the present moment, the utter reality of life's limits and the supreme worth of life within those limits. The grave is not victorious for no six-foot hole could contain the life he has experienced. It may be compared to Martin Luther King declaring he had " seen the promised land"; or to the end of the movie "2001 - A Space Odyssey" when the old man and the foetus become one; or to St. Francis of Assisi's awareness of everything as awe-filled reality. It is the knowledge of living beyond the limits of temporal life.

A dimension of this experience is a sense of awe, that is fear and fascination. Everything is awe-filled; all events and things engender wonder and there is a foretaste of heaven. The person is sheer presence, he and Being are one reality and he knows himself to be God's messenger. He decides to say yes to the wonder of life and death – in a sense he is beyond decision; not passive or fatalistic but rather that the cares of this world that require "decisions" have been transcended. He knows that all history has conspired to create this moment and he is responsible for it.

This state is number 64 in the ICA Other World in the midst of this World.