This book is a sequel to A Vision of the Aquarian Age first published by Coventure Books in 1977. In that volume discussion of the meaning and role of the Christ Impulse in our present age was somewhat deliberately suppressed for fear of drawing negative reactions in certain quarters. Many readers did however detect the omission, which stands like an empty hole in the argument of the book. In the present volume I have tried to set this right. My hope however is that this in no way makes the book sectarian in its nature. It is concerned with the holistic world-picture and its application to current problems, for axiomatically the Oneness Vision must touch and colour every aspect of our living. It is concerned with the coming of the Light, the prospect of the redemption of mankind by the forces of higher intelligence in the living universe. This implies God ubiquitous and in action. Furthermore it implies the Blakean conception of a spiritual sun behind the physical sun, the focus of operation of the Elohim, the highest beings of spiritual Light. The Lord of all these is known in esoteric knowledge as the Christos and by other names in other religions. But all recognize this over-lighting source which can reach and be in personal touch with all souls of every race and creed, just as the physical sun warms all our bodies. Thus the concept of the Cosmic Christ is central to the holistic vision and this has little to do with any sectarian thinking in any particular church. It must be a vital strand of our world view, and my hope is that it will not be taken as narrow dogma. I have also referred not infrequently to the thinking of Rudolf Steiner, since this is the approach which I personally found most meaningful and inspiring. Again my hope is that even for those who are not anthroposophists, these comments will help clarify basic issues in our dramatic time. Steiner achieved an intensification of intuitive thinking which enabled him to explore into the spiritual worlds in a manner consonant with scientific method, and to give us his findings in a great structure of clear thoughts which in no sense have a mediumistic character. Thus in our age of breakthrough, when spiritual knowledge is flooding from so many sources, the body of Steiner's thinking may stand as a kind of touchstone which can prove of deep significance to many different movements concerned with the spiritual awakening of the New Age. Ours is an age of dramatic and even sensational change. The great theme is that there can be no renewal without a dying process, no death without resurrection. Thus events in the coming two decades are likely to be apocalyptic in nature. This implies what I have called 'Operation Redemption', a supreme hope that tribulation and cleansing change are a prelude to a new dawn.
