Progress is a religious directive

Traditional religion can be blamed for many of the problems of the material world simply because religion was at least formally absent from material concerns. They looked back to preindustrial times, or all the back to Eden where men were supposedly spiritual and not material. Yes, the Christian West led the world in material progress but that was in spite of their spiritual teachings. And the East was even more successful in holding back material progress—until recently.

Material and technological progress are not necessarily a bad thing. But we do need to evaluate progress in terms of human evolution and devolution. Give the inventors and creators total freedom but then accept their creations based on whether they advance human beings or not. Our concern about technology is not merely ecological concern, such as the “bright green revolution,” although we do affirm this direction. We agree that we can build a sustainable technological civilization. But most importantly, progress is a religious directive toward human evolution, because we are activated by the Spirit Within to evolve , materially, to Godhood.