My main guru, the late Alan Watts, in a series of podcasts entitled "The Relevance of Oriental Thinking," points out the jarring contrast between our dominant mythology and genuine democracy. We worship a King of Kings, Lord of Lords (titles borrowed from Persia), yet American democracy requires that we govern ourselves as sovereign citizens.
(http://alanwatts.libsyn.com/index.php?post_id=401115# Latest series: "The Religion of No Religion.")
Joseph Campbell called it "mythic dissociation:" mistaken belief that we are forever apart from the divine. In that world, the best you can hope for is to stand in the proper relation to the proper authorities. :-]
Christ preached the greatest heresy of all: "I and the Father are One." Campbell called this "mythic identification." Christ's good news, Watts says, still hasn't gotten out.
Compare the following graphic illustrations of the feudal world view and our new worldview.
[[[Absolute Supremacy / Common Weal///[[[{{{Absolute Subjugation}}}]]]]]
As we can all plainly see, a dominant group asserts privileged access to our Common Weal, simultaneously denying access to a subjugated group. We can see all the illusory walls that divide Us, the indivisible. The original wall is the illusory self / other divide. From there, it's just a matter of density.
beloved/UNION/Beloved
As we can also plainly see, this is our more perfect Union. There is no absolute Other! Only relatively beloved.
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