Mystical Experiences

Is Gary Renard and

The Disappearance of the Universe for Real?
by William Evans, M.D.

Just a couple of days ago I had the great honor of reconnecting in person with Jon Mundy for the first time in about 10 years. And it has been way too long of a time my friend. In addition to obtaining a copy of his new book, Missouri Mystic, which I have heard amazing things about, I had the opportunity to thank him in person for writing a review of Gary Renard’s book last year in Miracles, which initially alerted me to the publication of The Disappearance of the Universe.

In signing my personal copy of Missouri Mystic, Jon wrote in part, “To my friend William Evans, fellow mystic and miracle worker….” If the definition of a mystic is someone who has mystical experiences I would confess to his accuracy, and, before I share some comments about Gary’s book, let me share some personal experiences.

I AM THE SOURCE OF YOUR BEING….. is how the Voice for God began a series of three statements to me on an Easter Sunday at exactly 12 noon Eastern time nearly twenty years ago. The Voice for God sounded as if it came from both without and within simultaneously. I was accustomed to miracles and honestly felt at the time, “Why has it taken so long to hear the Voice for God?” My personal fertile ground for mystical experience had been carefully cultured over the preceding two days intensely and for the previous 12 years in general. Around 5:00 pm on Good Friday of that Holy weekend about 20 years ago, with a small group of people, I had begun participation in an “intensive” weekend of spiritual training with a great spiritual master I had been very close to for a few years. He was preparing to leave his physical body - while in perfect health interestingly enough - and wanted to put most of what he had to offer the world in his version of a course in miracles-like workbook, a very compact intense package of spiritual techniques which he would impart through the day and long into the night to us through-out the Easter weekend.

My experience of the Voice for God came during his emotional and inspired statements as he closed the formal part of the weekend a couple of days later that Easter Sunday at noon.

Even though this very advanced enlightened teacher was not a formal guru as such, he conceded one day in conversation with me that he was serving as a spiritual mentor to me. I had heard of this “great soul” a few years before when a respected spiritual friend of mine with extensive personal experience in Eastern meditation and gurus from India said he knew of an American man who was as advanced or more advanced in his state of enlightenment than any of the more well known Gurus from India.

With some knowledge and experience in such matters myself, I did not necessarily believe this would be true, but, kept an open mind, and, would come to agree wholeheartedly with this assessment over the few years leading up to the above mentioned Easter weekend.

During this particular Holy weekend together years ago, I, among many other spiritual techniques, successfully practiced the ability to helpfully look at - and only with the other’s permission - the illusory “past life” scripts of someone interested in forgiving long repressed events. It was amazing to have success with this new gift. Despite years of other spiritual experiences, I was somehow very surprised at my success.

Having dinner with this great teacher in his home after this weekend, I experienced, for the first and only time in my life, direct mind to mind communication with someone in the illusory physical body, or at least my first “mind to mind” communication so startlingly auditory and clear.

The mind to mind communication experience occurred when I began to ask a metaphysical question aloud at dinner, and this great spiritual friend and mentor answered in my head before I could open my mouth. And when I began to think in my mind a follow-up question, he answered that in my head before I could open my mouth, also! As an ACIM student, I might reframe the experience as the Holy Spirit actually answering my questions when the answers only appeared to be coming from my great mentor and friend.

Once, while traveling with this master and a few of his friends in Europe in 1984 on a spiritual mission, I had several other mystical experiences. I was doing prayer and meditation work for six hours a day minimum on this trip – three two hour segments within a 24 hour daily schedule and one of my three regularly scheduled times in the 24 hour daily schedule between one and three in the morning every night.

After several days of this immersion in spiritual disciplines, I entered a state of deep Peace of mind and began to literally experience the constant Reality of the ACIM teaching, “there are no accidents, God’s plan is too important to be left to chance” in literally my every interaction.

While walking around all day in this persistent state of “right mindedness” and while still wrapping up this spiritual adventure in Rome in the fall of 1984, I decided to go off alone from our group and have a lunch in complete silence and just enjoy my newfound “Peace of mind.” During my solitary meal, this great spiritual master I was traveling with appeared abruptly at my table in a remote quiet corner of the restaurant where I was seated alone, and, said, “I just walked in and saw all this Light coming from you and wanted to come over and welcome you to ‘superconsciousness.’” Having spent a lot of time with this “great soul,” I knew he had made this comment about reaching “superconsciousness” in the past in reference to only a couple of people in previous years and he would later repeat the whole story to our small traveling spiritual group much to my embarrassment.

Any and all ego investment in my newfound fragile attainment in right mindedness on my spiritual trip to Europe was quickly lost, however, after returning to Boston from Rome when the ride my wife arranged for me at the airport was two hours late, my impatience prompting a rude shift back to my choice for the habit of wrong mindedness.

In the early 1980’s, several individuals, knowing I was a psychiatrist interested in spirituality, would ask if I had heard of A Course In Miracles. The information in ACIM I was told was from Jesus! After a few people had approached me over time in this manner about A Course In Miracles, I thought I would take advantage of my enlightened mentor’s advanced spiritual attainment - he had the ability to ask the “Voice for God” anything, and, get an answer - to explain to me what he was told by the Voice for God about A Course in Miracles.

So, one day when alone with him I took the opportunity to ask, “What is A Course in Miracles?” He simply replied, “It is a gift from Jesus to the world.” And then he went on to say that the “7 steps of effective prayer” that he taught was a simplified version of “the Course.”

Not long afterwards, I was at home in the Boston area in the early 1980’s when I would receive a call one early March evening after work from Chuck Regan who, as I remember, was a scientist at MIT’s prestigious Lincoln Laboratory. This was our first and only contact and I did not know Chuck prior to his impulse to call me that evening. He said he had heard about the small spiritual group I ran once a week and wanted to say hello and began to talk to me about A Course In Miracles.

Mind you, I had never heard of this man or spoken to him before. We had a nice conversation, and, after speaking for a few minutes, he said, “I have an extra copy of the three hardbound set edition of ‘the Course.’ Why don’t I give them to you tonight?” Without asking for reimbursement for the books, this stranger drove 25 to 30 minutes from his home on a weeknight, dropped of the three hard bound edition of “the Course,” and left.

My first chance to look at these books comprising A Course In Miracles was on the following Saturday morning. I awakened early before my family and quietly went downstairs and collected first the hardbound Text volume of ACIM, a good place to begin I assumed, and settled into my favorite chair to see what Jesus was going to be saying. I opened to the first page of the Text volume, and, literally, a perfect rainbow appeared on the pages, arching, in perfect measured proportion, fitting precisely across both the pages I had opened to! It was quiet beautiful and quiet miraculous. I smiled to myself and said, “OK, I get the message. This must be important.”

Prior to the 1980’s, in 1973, I had been initiated into the practice of Transcendental Meditation. The mechanics of TM, interestingly enough, are compatible with the essence of advanced forgiveness, the practice of the TM technique actually resembling a combination of two or more of the workbook lessons found in ACIM. In short, thoughts [or sin] are not made real, or fought, or struggled against, before being overlooked and then easily turning to the mantra where the “attraction of Love for Love,” eventually draws one beyond the ego into transcendental Beingness.

By 1978 I became a member of the first group of non-teachers allowed to have successful experience with the famous TM “levitation” Sidhi. I put “levitation” in quotes because this form of “levitation” at that time was experienced as a kind of involuntary “blasting off” into the air from a meditation sitting position.

As the Indian saint, Paramahansa Yogananda describes in his classic book, The Autobiography of a Yogi (another book given to me in a miraculous manner), this level of levitation is experienced as a kind of “yogic hopping” with the body being propelled into the air over and over.

In my experience the “levitation” is not something that can be replicated physically with muscle exertion, and, one cannot sustain the antigravity experience once airborne because of the residual impurities of the ego. At least I couldn’t.

My very first success with this involuntary “blasting off into the air” was immediately followed upon landing by involuntary, inexplicable tears streaming down my face, and, I can absolutely assure you that success only took place after I was able to release all ego investment in this personal attainment.

This discussion of mystical experiences brings me at last to my friend Gary Renard’s book, The Disappearance of the Universe. I was fortunate to read Gary’s book over a year ago, having obtained a copy immediately after reading a review Jon wrote in Miracles. Because his book had only been available for a very few months, Gary was not as yet bombarded by the time consuming details of being a successful author who was then only beginning to “reluctantly” promote his book – Gary’s very shy as many of you know. Gary and I developed an extensive email relationship and I spent the day after Thanksgiving 2003 having an enjoyable lunch alone with him in Maine.

Later, he asked me to fly into Virginia Beach, VA, to attend a lecture he gave at the Association for Research and Enlightenment at Edgar Cayce’s organization last March and we had dinner there afterwards. I have since been to more of Gary’s functions and have had a couple of other intimate dinners with him.

Recently, I began to get the strong intuition that there was no accident, indeed it may be a major part of my purpose in life, that I was in a position of being a psychiatrist knowledgeable of Yogananda’s documentation of experiences similar to Gary’s, and, friendly with Gary in a personal manner. Certainly, being a psychiatrist with some special interest in diagnosing clinical delusional disorders and distinguishing them from other clinical psychotic disorders, I am in an expert position to assure you that Gary is not delusional when he relates his story of the actual physical manifestations of the ascended masters, Arten and Pursah [not their real names as many of you have read his book now know].

More good news for fans of Gary’s book is that “Arten and Pursah” have once again begun to appear to Gary on a regular basis beginning on December, 21, the feast of St. Thomas day, 2003, and the visits will result in another great book to look forward to.

I have read very carefully and very slowly - I am now more than half way through the process for the third time - line by line the words of Arten and Pursah in Gary’s book, taking extensive notes, and would remind everyone that Pursah states, on page 242 of The Disappearance of the Universe, that, together, Arten and Pursah, are One voice - the Voice of the Holy Spirit.

Arten and Pursah have not only nailed the essence of “the Course’s’ teachings, but, do so with a uniquely Divine “beyond our thought system” grasp of ACIM principles, conveying the principles in at once an intimate casual and concisely profound manner beyond the abilities of anyone not an advanced vehicle for the Voice for God. I for one certainly now consider myself a student of both complementary bodies of information, ACIM and Gary’s book.

As I continue to study and contemplate the historical and spiritual importance of the contributions of Arten and Pursah, I am, also, both impressed and personally pleased “the Voice for God” decided to give these wonderful words to Gary through the physical manifestation of “ascended Masters” rather than Gary having a “channeled” experience of the Voice for God.

The physical manifestation not only sets apart the information in a unique manner from what now seems like an abundance of channeled information, but, also, in reality, if one thinks about it, represents one of the most singular spiritual events recorded in the history of direct communications by actual physical manifestations of the Voice for God. It would be a mistake, in my opinion, to interpret the casualness of the dialogue between Gary and the ascended masters as setting a tone suggesting less significance.

I might add that those of you freaked out and turned off by the unusualness of such material manifestations of ascended masters might read the credible accounts of such manifestations occurring in India’s great spiritual history and recounted for the ages by a spiritual paragon, Yogananda, whom I mentioned above. Indeed, he, Yogananda, personally had such a physical manifestation occur to him.

Instantaneous translocation, like Gary’s, from his home miles away, into downtown Portland, Maine, by Arten and Pursah, have been recorded before in India, also, and, such an experience is also recounted in Yogananda’s classic autobiography. For those of you who overcome any initial fear, skepticism, and resistance to the miracles associated with Gary’s book, The Disappearance of the Universe, you will discover the words recorded within are truly the Voice for God, and, a gift that keeps on giving.

I like to recall these passages from ACIM when thinking of Gary’s experience [Text, Chapter 1, The Meaning of Miracles, I. Principles of miracles]: “1. There is no order of difficulty in Miracles. One is not ‘harder’ or ‘bigger’ than another. They are all the same. All expressions of love are maximal. 31. I inspire all miracles, which are really intercessions.

They intercede for your holiness and make your perceptions holy. By placing you beyond the physical laws they raise you into the sphere of celestial order. In this order you are perfect …. and [T.15.iv.9.1] “The necessary condition for the holy instant does not require that you have no thoughts that are not pure.” Gary should get a laugh out of that last one. The Disappearance of the Universe is a monumental spiritual gift and in regards to the physical manifestations of Arten and Pursah, as ACIM states, [T.16.11.5.4,6] “Miracles are natural to the One Who speaks for God….Let His understanding of the miracle be enough for you, and do not turn away from all of the witnesses that He has given you to His reality.”

- Dr. William Evans practices adult psychiatry in Derry and Manchester, NH