(Following a telegram from PL. announcing that he has been "excluded from the retinue" accompanying the Pope to the Geneva assembly.)It seems to me to be a conflict between the Pope and the cardinals .... Have you got his letter? Not yet. He simply says he has been 'excluded.(After a silence) A. has told me that the two preceding popes had made considerable changes. I know that one of the changes was to recognize that life on earth was "purgatory" .... And apparently that was so much ground down and twisted that it all disappeared! Nothing remained. page 216 - Mother's Agenda , volume 10, 11th June , 1969 |
(Then Mother speaks of the new Pope, Paul VI, who was elected a few days earlier:) Sri Aurobindo seems to have taken interest in the Pope's successor ... because two nights ago (not in the night, at four in the morning), I was with him - I spent a half hour with him (a half hour of OUR time, which is very long), he had just returned from a "tour," in Italy especially. We didn't directly talk about it, but some people were there (there were all kinds of things, many things), and from his comments to this or that person, or on this or that, I knew he was returning from Italy, where he had gone for the nomination of the new Pope. And he said something like: "It's the best that could be done under the present circumstances." That is, he appeared satisfied on the whole. I told you, didn't I, that I saw the death of Pope [John XXIII] without even knowing he was ill? ... One night, I suddenly saw inthe mental atmosphere of the EARTH quite an awesome movement, that is to say, quite global: there were great mental waves (nothing but mental), great waves of anxiety, as though all human thought were very upset; but it wasn't the anxiety of the believers, it was a very global movement - the earth's mental atmosphere was stirring with great movements of upheaval and anxiety (Mother draws waves in the air). I thought, "What's happening?... What's happening that can so upset men?" (as would happen, for instance, with a world war or events of that kind), "What's happening that can draw the attention of the whole earth's atmosphere, its mental atmosphere?" And the next day, I was told that just at that time, the Pope died. So I thought, "Indeed! ..." Afterwards (because I am not concerned with all those things), I learned what he was doing: his "Ecumenical Council" and all his reforms, his attempt, in short, to bring everyone together as much as he could (all the Christians, at least), and the fact that he had become a friend of the Russians, etc. So then, I concentrated, because according to natural logic (the logic of Nature's actions), the next Pope should be a horrible reactionary - in a word, it didn't bode well. I concentrated and tried to make things work out for the best. And I see that Sri Aurobindo did find the thing important, since he concentrated over there. According to the little popular wisdom, it seems his successor is a man with still more progressive ideas. I saw his photo ... (but it's a newspaper photo, they're generally very bad: you can't have any contact, you only see this much [gesture on the surface]). The thing that struck me most is a sort of insincerity. A benevolent and ecclesiastical insincerity - if you know what I mean? Very well.There was also the photo of the cardinal of India (the first and only cardinal in India), a straightforward man and a wholehearted believer - he must be a fanatical Catholic, but with a sincerity, a fervor. The other fellow is very intelligent - oh, he has a mouth I cannot look at, dreadful. Anyway, we'll see what happens. It seems Kennedy is Catholic. That is a serious matter. They say he was the first person the Pope saw after his ... what's the word for Popes? Investiture? I don't know. When he first appears in public: "Here is the Pope!" Anyhow, after the ceremony of investiture, he saw Mr. Kennedy: the first person. page 189-190 - Mother's Agenda , volume 4 , 29th June 1963 |
At any rate, Sri Aurobindo is interested in world events, which means he considers the Pope's election has a certain importance. page 192 - Mother's Agenda , volume 4 , 29th June 1963 |
(This conversation took place a few days after the new Pope, Paul VI, was enthroned. Mother had asked Satprem to erase the recording, except for a few fragments, but he thought it fit to retain at least its integral transcription.) Here, your flowers [roses]. A magnificent color.... Then I have another photo of the Pope (Mother shows "Time" magazine). It seems it's the photo he chose himself for the press, to announce his election. It's better than the last one. (Mother hands the photo to Satprem) So, what do you have to say?You should be the one to say!I have to say. I have to say that I know this man. I have met him several times. I don't know whether he is conscious, I mean I don't think he remembers when he returns to his body. But for a long time (not recently, certainly at least for a year, maybe two), the man has been involving himself in world affairs, which means he takes interest in global movements.[[Occultly speaking, Mother means. ]] I met him in this connection. I cannot say we've had interesting "conversations" or anything of that sort, but he is part of the organizations. I hadn't seen that at all in the other photo [published by the daily newspapers] ... it's his eyes. The mouth is bad as in the other photo, but bad in another way: he looks almost malicious. But the man has power - real power; not a Pope's power, I mean: real power, inside him. Vital power, you mean, or spiritual?Not spiritual! Not spiritual: power. Power - which means a somewhat higher mental capacity along with a vital realization. He's a man who, were he not the Pope, would have no scruples. But he happens (laughing) to be obliged at least to appear good! I get a sense of hardness.Very hard. Just the opposite of the other one [John XXIII]. But he has publicly pledged to continue what the other one had begun. Only, the other one had no power whatsoever: he was simply a good man on earth. This one isn't a "good man"! He's an effective power in the terrestrial organizations. And now he has a position. It's a bit outdated [the papacy]. But not so much as one may think. I saw that when the other one died, oh, how it stirred the earth's mental atmosphere, it was considerable. Which means that many, many human beings are still governed by that. But I never concerned myself with that domain. Even when I saw the Pope, the one before the last one [Pius XII], who came to offer me the Keys (I told you the story, didn't I?), even with him, who had a SPIRITUAL rapport with the universal Mother, I never concerned myself. I never did anything for him, I never concerned myself with him. This time, for whatever reason, there is something that keeps pulling and pulling me in that direction. I don't know, maybe something decisive is going to be achieved? I don't know.... But is his power of organization a power for the "good," if I may say so, or what?I tell you, it's a power of domination. But now he is the Pope, so his domination will have to be at the service of his position, you understand. But maybe ... The very fact that I met him (he may have been already thinking of becoming Pope, I don't know), but anyway, long before anyone except him thought of it, the fact that I met him while seeing to certain terrestrial arrangements shows that, probably unconsciously (I told you right away: I don't think he is conscious in his body), he is nevertheless under the influence, if not the control, of the higher forces. Why is my attention drawn all of a sudden in that direction? Generally, I am not interested in all those things. For the action, I am concerned only with the little field of experience I have been given, and my terrestrial action is of quite another nature; it's on a higher plane, very independent of individuals. I find there are three noteworthy points: First, this man was already concerning himself with terrestrial affairs when he was a mere cardinal in Milan (in Milan he was very involved in labor problems - there are many workers in Milan - and that interested him, he liked to solve workers" problems). Then there is the continuation of the other one's work: the rapprochement, so to say, with Russia, which is truly interesting. Last, there is the fact that Kennedy is Catholic. And also, that all this is happening just now, I mean when AT LEAST (I don't say at best, I say at least) the foundation of the new world is being prepared.... The foundations are being prepared. We shall see. (Mother looks at the "Time" magazine photo again:) With these photos it's very interesting, I have intriguing experiences: all at once I'll see crystal clear (much clearer than I see physically), I'll see the individual very clearly - he comes alive, the eyes speak to me - and I'll say, "Oh, he's like this and like that...." Everybody brings me photos, because I am used to reading people's characters in their photos, that's very easy for me, elementary; but sometimes when I am given a photo, suddenly I see somebody and I say, "Oh, but it's such and such person, he's like this and like that...." But if I am shown the SAME photo a few days afterwards, it's just a photo and I see nothing. It's a method that's used to "let me know" certain things, and once I know them, it's finished. For instance, the first time I saw this photo of the Pope, when they brought it to me, I saw the man (I know him, you see) JUST AS I see him over there. But if I look at it now - it doesn't evoke anything in me any more, only the kind of things you see in a photo: a mouth that's not good, far from it.... Certainly, that he chose this photo means he LIKES authority - he wants to be seen in his aspect of authority. The odd thing is that he is seated [in the photo], while all the time I see him standing. He is seated with his hand on the armrest, but I keep seeing him standing - holding his head high, facing life, standing. He must be fairly tall: the man I know is fairly tall, he looks very much like this one. It's unmistakable, I mean, when I saw the photo I saw the man I knew. But I think ... not "think," I see that his belief is, first, simply a question of habit, because he was born in that religion, and then a question of political necessity - I don't think he has the conviction that it is the pure Truth. Whereas the previous Pope really believed in it. This one knows too much in his supraconscient to believe that Christianity is the pure and exclusive Truth. Only, you see, when you're lucky enough to be the Pope, you've got to believe that the Pope is the Pope! Try to imagine, look at the global situation from a distance: of course the whole world isn't Catholic, but there are Catholics all over the world. What seems ... bizarre to those who have gone beyond the petty, purely terrestrial limits - human terrestrial limits - is that belief in a SINGLE divine manifestation on the earth; all the religions are based on that, everyone says, "Christ was the only one," or "Buddha was the only one," or elsewhere "Mohammed was the only one," and so forth. Well, that "only one" is something IMPOSSIBLE as soon as you rise a little above the ordinary earth atmosphere - it appears childish. You can understand the thing and accept it only as a sort of recurrent movement of the divine Consciousness on the earth. Of course, officially there is only Christ; maybe for this man [Paul VI], he is still the greatest, but I would be surprised if he thought Christ was the only one. Only, Christ "has to" be the only one - you'd cut out your own tongue rather than say he's not! I don't think the question bothers him much (!) His concern is how to exert his power and keep people in it, so as, maybe, to prove his superiority. This much conviction they still have, you see, that their religion IS superior to all others, their power is superior to all others, and therefore they have to be more powerful than the others. That's the main idea: "To be the most powerful." And what's the way, now, for them to gain that all-powerfulness? Already for two or three generations, they have understood the necessity of a broadening: the narrowness of their dogma gave them too many weak points.... But he [Paul VI] understands maybe even better. We'll see what happens. But he seems to me by far the most interesting Pope in a very long time. It's strange, I got a sense of repulsion.Repulsion? The only danger with these people is a spirit of Inquisition, but is that possible nowadays? I don't think so. No, but under the cover of a "synthesis" or a broadening of the doctrine, they may very well be trying to expand further the power of Catholicism over the world.Of course. Oh, but it's obvious. That's their intention. Only, there is always an irony in things: if they grow too vast, they'll be engulfed in their own magnitude! It cannot be otherwise. If, out of the need to enlarge, the Pope accepts, for instance, all the different sects (they've already started to accept the Protestants), if he accepts all those sects, (laughing) little by little they will either break apart or be drowned! You follow, if we look at it from above ... Let's even assume it's an Asuric power - it isn't ... (Mother hesitates) it isn't clearly and distinctly an Asuric power, because by his very position, the Pope is OBLIGED to recognize a god higher than himself; that god may, of course, be an Asura, but ... I have a sort of memory - the memory of a very ancient story no one ever told me ... in which the first Asura challenged the supreme Lord and told him, "I am as great as You!" And the answer was, "I wish you would become greater than I, because then there will be no more Asura." This memory is very living, somewhere.... If you become the Whole, it's finished - you see, the Asura's ambition is to be greater than the supreme Lord: "Become greater than I, then there will be no more Asura." On a very small scale, it's the same thing on the earth. In a certain state of consciousness, it becomes absolutely impossible to worry about what may happen [[Mother is referring to Satprem's "worries" in the face of Catholic expansionism. ]]; everything becomes visibly, obviously, the work of one and the same Force, one and the same Consciousness, one and the same Power. So that sense and will and ambition to be "more" - more powerful, greater - is again the SAME Force which pushes you to expand to the Limitless. As soon as you cross the limit, it's finished. Those are old ideas - the old ideas of two powers opposing each other: the power of Good and the power of Evil, the battle between the two, which of the two will have the last word.... There was a time when children were entertained with such stories. They're just children's stories. page 199-203 - Mother's Agenda , volume 4 , 3rd July 1963 |
Immediately afterwards, I had a visit from the Pope! The Pope [Paul VI] had come to Pondicherry (he does intend to visit India), he had come to Pondicherry and asked to see me (quite impossible things materially, of course, but they were perfectly simple and straightforward). So I saw him. He came, we met each other over there (in the music room), and we actually did speak to each other. I really felt the man in front of me (gesture of feeling), felt what he was. And he was very worried at the thought of what I was going to say to people about his visit: the revelation I would give of his visit. I saw that, but I didn't say anything. Finally he said (we were speaking in French, he had an Italian accent; but all this, you see, doesn't correspond to any thought: it's like pictures in a film), he said, "What will you tell people about my visit?" So I looked at him (inner contacts are more concrete than pictures or words) and I simply answered him, after staring at him intently, "I will tell them that we have been in communion in our love for the Lord...." And there was in it the warmth of a golden light - extraordinary! Then I saw something relax in him, as if an anxiety were leaving him, and he left like that, in a great concentration. page 26 , Mother's Agenda - volume 5 , 15th Jan 1964 |
In the Illustrated Weekly they have published photographs of the Pope's visit to Palestine, and there is one in which he is prostrating himself: he is kissing the ground on the Mount of Olives, where Christ, as the story goes, was informed that he would be crucified. It put me again in contact with that man. And his intention is clear: to make religion quite real, in the sense that it isn't a myth, it isn't a legend - it's truly God who came, and so on. So, to him, this is "human greatness" prostrating itself before the "divine sacrifice." There is another photograph in which he is embracing the Patriarch of the Orthodox Church - heretics formerly, now they embrace each other. And all the people around him (they are well-dressed, you know, with modern suits) look like puppets, mon petit! Oh, it's awful! ... Awful. He at least has a force - or a will, at any rate. And he has a plan, he knows what he wants. (silence) He is also the first Pope to travel by plane, so they took his photograph in the plane - he gives a "broad smile," he looks very happy.(long silence) In sum, it is the glorification of physical suffering as a means of salvation. page 36-37 , Mother's Agenda - volume 5 , 22th Jan 1964 |
A little later Have you seen the latest Illustrated Weekly? You know that the Pope is here, in Bombay, for the "Eucharistic Congress" - but what's the Eucharist, mon petit? It's the Communion.Ah, that's just what I thought!... There is in the Illustrated Weekly the history of those Eucharistic Congresses, and it seems a French lady was behind the origin of the first Congress (not so long ago, in the last century, I believe). And then (Mother smiles), there's a magnificent portrait of the Pope with a message he wrote specially for the Weekly's readers, in which he took great care not to use Christian words. He wishes them ... I don't know what, and (it's written in English) a celestial grace. Then I saw (he tried to be as impersonal as possible), I saw that in spite of everything, the Christians' greatest difficulty is that their happiness and fulfillment are in heaven. Instead of a celestial grace, they read to me, or I heard, a terrestrial grace! When I heard that, something in me started vibrating: "What! But this man has been converted!" Then I had it repeated and heard it wasn't that but really a celestial grace. This is the whole point. Exactly.They believe in a divine realization, but the divine realization isn't terrestrial, it's somewhere else, in a celestial world, that is, immaterial. And that is their great obstacle. page 305 , Mother's Agenda , volume 5 , 2nd Dec - 1964 |
The Pope announced he was going to publish a message for non-Christians; I have asked to see it. Because in my mental conversations with him, two things have remained very precise.... He has a sort of political attachment. He is a very political man, in the sense that he does things for a reason, with a precise goal calculated according to his own understanding so as to make him most effective towards that goal - a political man. He has a political attachment to the dogma. For instance, after one of my conversations (I had a good number of conversations with him, three or four, on the mental level, and perfectly objective because his reactions were unexpected; to me they were very spontaneous, in the sense that I received answers that weren't at all those I might have expected - which proves it was genuine), but for example, before his election, I met him once (there is a part of his mental being, a higher intelligence, that's very well formed, conscious, individualized), and I had a spontaneous conversation that I hadn't sought and which was very interesting. But at one point, I replied to something he said, and I told him with the force I have there [on that higher plane], "The Lord is everywhere - even in hell the Lord is there." And then it caused such a violent reaction in him that, pfft! he vanished. I found it very striking.... I don't know the dogma, but it seems that in hell, according to the Catholics, what's worse than suffering, the fire and all that, is the absence of the Lord. It seems it's a dogma that the Lord is absent from hell; and me, I was speaking of universal Oneness and I told him that. There is another thing I remember very clearly, which struck me. It was after his election (but long before his trip to India was decided upon): he had come to India and he came to Pondicherry to meet me (not to meet me: he had come to Pondicherry, then he came and met me). Once in Pondicherry, he came and I saw him there, in the room where I receive people. We had a long conversation, a very long and interesting conversation, and suddenly (it was towards the end, it was time for him to go), when he rose, he was preoccupied by something. He told me, "When you speak to your children about me, what will you tell them?"... You understand, the ego showing itself. So I looked at him (Mother smiles) and said, "I will only tell them that we have been in communion in our love for the Supreme." Then he relaxed and left. It struck me. These things are very objective. But these are the little turns of the nature. Otherwise, his dream is to be the potentate of human spiritual unity. page 307 , Mother's Agenda , volume 5 , 2nd Dec - 1964 |
Have you heard of the Pope's conversion? The Pope's conversion! No!I was very happy because it showed me that our conversations hadn't been in vain. I was wondering if he was conscious; I don't know if he was conscious mentally, but in any case it's interesting, you can read (Mother holds out a newspaper cutting to Satprem). Vatican City, September 26 The Pope, in an article published here last night, has said his journey to India in 1964 was "the revelation of an unknown world." The Osservatore Romano published in an article excerpts from a forthcoming book of conversations with the Pope by a lifelong friend, the French philosopher and academician, Jean Guitton. "I saw, as is said in the Apocalypse, a limitless crowd, a multitude, an enormous welcome. In those thousands of faces I read, stronger than curiosity, a kind of indescribable sympathy," the Pope said. "India is a spiritual country. It has in its nature a sense of the 'Christian virtues'.... "Christian," he sees everything through his Christian word, but never mind. "If there is any country in which the Beatitudes of the Sermon of the Mount could ever become a reality for the mass of the country, that country is India," Pope Paul added.... Can you imagine! "What is nearer to the souls of Indians than poverty of spirit, sweetness, peace, mercy, and pureness of heart?" he asked. "While the leaders of the West are politicians, in the land of India they are mystics and sages.... Yes. "Life runs in contemplation. People speak in a low voice. Their movements are slow and liturgical. The country is born for the spirit," the Pope said. Still, it means he is receptive. And it explains the manner in which he received P. when he went there. P. [an Indian disciple], as you know, paid him a visit; he was taken there by an Italian who had come here (a very nice boy who showed him around Italy and took him to the Pope). The Pope gave him a private audience, and after talking, asking questions, replying (it was a whole conversation), he said to P. with a smile, "And now what will you give me?" (They spoke in French.) Then P. said, "I have only one thing, which I always keep with me and is infinitely precious to me, but I will give it to you," and he gave him Prayers and Meditations. And the Pope answered, "I am going to read them." So it all fits together. It's interesting. But this, a Pope saying this, is a new thing. It's new. And I had that mental contact with him perhaps just three weeks before he came to India (of course his thought was turned to India). We had a very interesting conversation, and all I said came to: "Spirituality is much vaster than a Church, and as long as you limit spiritual realization to a Church or a religion, you will be in complete Falsehood." He listened. And when he came to India, that's what he said! But I told you he was bothered by something. When he left, when it was time for me to get up and we had to leave each other, he looked at me with a sort of anxiety in his eyes, and said to me, "What will you say to your disciples about our meeting?" I smiled and said, "I will tell them that we were in communion in the ..." (not "identical" or "common," I forget the words) "love for the supreme Lord." Then his face relaxed and he left.... "We were in communion in the same ..." It wasn't "same" but ... I don't know, something expressing that both of us had been in communion in "the love for the Supreme Lord." And I said it like that, with a smile, which means it was Sri Aurobindo who spoke with his sense of humor.... His face relaxed and he left.
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