The Resurrection is a second-hand miracle, and for that reason a bit disappointing. Spirituality is about first-hand experience, while organized religion is forced to begin with the second-hand. How strange that the literal fact of the Resurrection remains controversial. This country was founded in the Age of Enlightenment, when a new, more rational religion -- the kind typified by Thomas Jefferson -- was supposed to replace archaic superstition and church dogma. Spiritually, throwing out the bishops was as American as throwing out the King politically. The revolution took hold, and now as children of the Enlightenment, our society is overwhelmingly secular and scientific. But this didn't heal an aching wound, the longing for redemption that the Resurrection symbolizes. For the Resurrection to be real, it must be the key to salvation.
I think there are three ways to interpret the Resurrection and remain Christian in every sense of the word.
1. Jesus of Nazareth literally arose from the dead.
2. The divine Resurrection as the core of Christian theology.
3. The resurrection of the spirit whenever a person attains higher consciousness.
The first two versions are easier to accept because you aren't responsible for the miracle. Faith and acceptance are good enough. It goes without saying that fundamentalists demand allegiance to the first version and devout Catholics to the second. But at its root Christianity is about personal salvation, which is a first-hand miracle. It begins by following Jesus's teachings inwardly, finding the Kingdom of God within. This leads to a radical shift in consciousness, and when your allegiance shifts to allow divine truth a place in daily life, personal resurrection occurs. The "death" from which you are saved is symbolic but very real: it's the inert, selfish, lonely ego isolated from God.
I am speaking as someone outside the Christian faith, but it's my belief that Jesus belongs to the world, The promise of resurrection is also universal. If Jesus was in God-consciousness, he must have opened the same path to his followers. He told them that through God they would accomplish things as great as he did and even greater -- isn't that what we should take literally? If we don't, the awe of Christ's victory over death will remain, but the possibility of a first-hand miracle becomes far more remote.
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