False orthodoxies

This author is a second-generation reader and grew up hearing the generally accepted so-called correct understanding of The Urantia Book long before he could or would read the text himself. Upon reflection while trying to humbly practice courageous and independent cosmic thinking he began to compile this list of widely held (i.e., orthodox) doctrines/beliefs among readers of The Urantic Book that, upon more or less careful inspection, are not supported by the text.

Luciferian

• My soul is self-saving
  • I can freely take have my salvation "taken for granted" per [188:4.9]
  • No! indeed no! This is one of the principles of the Lucifer rebellion. Have you not read that Lucifer contended that "resurrection was natural and automatic"? [53:3.5]
  • "Righteousness is not automatic in freewill creatures." [21:3.14]

Disastrous

• Universalism
  • Weak form: Everyone since Pentecost survives death and wakes up on mansion world #1
  • Strong form: Everyone eventually fuses with their Thought Adjuster and reaches Paradise, because no one would possibly choose iniquity once exposed to the the mansion world.
• God loves us unconditionally
  • The phrase "unconditional love" (or any variants) never occurs in The Urantia Book. But it is shot through the majority or readers' thoughts and writings.
  • God's love exists in the context of law--the Paradise Trinity.
• "Judge not" said Jesus, so we need to just go easy and it's all good.
  • No. Every reference to not judging Jesus made is immediately followed by a reminder that judgment still exists.
  • [174:5.7] "I came not to judge the world..." and yet in the next sentence "they who reject me and refuse to receive my teaching shall be brought to judgment in due season..."
  • Judge not the person. But their actions? Yes, judge them.

Tragic

• All you need is The Urantia Book.
  • The Urantia Book expects you to read most of the Western Canon if you want to deeply understand its advanced truths. Those who read only The Urantia Book and nothing else (not even the Bible, the single largest sourcework for The Urantia Book) will suffer more or less distortion of meaning
• The soul only gets the good stuff copied into it.
  • This cannot be, since among many other things we're told mortals arrive on the first mansion world with “varied defects of creature character and deficiencies of mortal experience” [47:3.8] (emphasis added). And character is a high word.
• Light and life is just around the corner: "quivering on the very brink of one of its most amazing and enthralling epochs of social readjustment, moral quickening, and spiritual enlightenment."
  • The ancient Hebrews were so primitive. [146:2.3] Jesus quotes Zecheriah
• Many statements in The Urantia Papers are just soft, flowery poetry meant to be cooed over.
  • Be ye perfect... perhaps more than all others. But no. This is a mandate, command, etc. Nothing soft or fuzzy about it.

Minor

• Jesus told the Parable of the Wise and the Foolish Builders.
  • Perhaps, or perhaps not. It's in Matthew 7:24-27 and Luke 6:48-49, but it's not in The Urantia Papers.
• You have to raise 3 children before you can ascend past the local system level in the ascension career.
• Cellular life started 550 mya
• All the people I care about (especially myself) are "3rd circlers" and are therefore not subject to group resurrection.
• Individual ascenders wake up after just 3 days on the mansion world
  • Transport serpahim only travel 3 times the speed of light. In 3 days they could only travel no more than 3% of a light year, far less than the nearest star.

How did these things get set up?

• Study group culture.
• A small handful of elders seen as master interpreters of the text.
  • Sadler Sr held sway
    • His genetics seems to incline him to mystic notions we might today call "New Agey"
    • Although he battled against these notions in his professional life, he eventualyl got old
    • Later in his life, the genetic drift back to woo-woo was strong.
    • His understanding of TUB was diffuse. Didn't even recognize E=mc^2 is in the book
  • Before you cast stones: how much exactly like Sadler Sr are you, as well? What's your genetic inclination?
    • Ever tried on mystical "new age" notions of spiritism? Sadler was inclined to that sort of thing, too.
• The general drift of mass Western culture in the 20th century
  • Baby boomer mass culture
  • Western secular culture
  • Mainline Christianity's teaching and culture, particularly as it drifted to a diffuse universalism in the 20th century.
• The loss of true philosophy through the 20th century and a failure to sufficiently set apart the Urantia movement from the world at large.
• Casual readers who only ingested (read) The Urantia Papers, who did not digest (study and live) them.
  • An unconscious neo-gnosticism of sorts that prioritized arcane intellectual knowledge over living truthfully.