Latest / Urantia Radio / Rick Lyon: The Future of Urantia Part 1
Transcript
- 0:00Well, we're back and it's time for another edition of the
- 0:02Urantia Radio Podcast, and I'm so glad that you have joined me.
- 0:06I'm going to have a very special guest on Rick Lyon, who has been
- 0:09a big part of of the Urantia book community for decades, he
- 0:14and his wife Susan. And so we're going to talk about
- 0:17his experiences both as a reader, as an administrator for
- 0:21his work with the Urantia Association, and what he's doing
- 0:24now with the Center for Unity. And all of these different
- 0:27wonderful things that are going on in the Urantia book
- 0:30community, including what Rick Line and others are using and
- 0:34harnessing the power of artificial intelligence to
- 0:38spread the teachings of the Urantia Papers.
- 0:40So we'll get to all of that and more.
- 0:42Also want to let folks know that I am in the final stages of the
- 0:46new website for the Urantia Podcast.
- 0:49The web address for that is urantiabookradio.com, your
- 0:54rancherbookradio.com, and that should be up and running by the
- 0:58first couple of days of March. And that'll be a great place for
- 1:01you to actually listen to the podcast and also if you want to
- 1:04comment and provide some listener feedback, all of that.
- 1:07And Rick Lyon, hang on, it's going to be joining us in just a
- 1:10moment. I'm really happy to have Rick
- 1:41Lyon on the program. Many of the people in the
- 1:43Urantia community, they've been around for a while, know Rick.
- 1:46He's was the Urantia Association International executive from
- 1:512008 to 2014, and before that he handled the study groups for the
- 1:55Ranch Association. So I want to get to some of
- 1:58that. We're also going to be talking
- 1:59about a paper that that was written by Doctor William
- 2:03Sadler, answering the initial criticisms that came from many
- 2:08people, mostly theologians, other philosophers, perhaps,
- 2:13because when you're the Your Ranch book was first published.
- 2:16I remember we're talking about a revelation here.
- 2:18We're talking about something that says that is, is as epical
- 2:23as Adam and Eve is as epical as even the life of of Christ and
- 2:28his appearance as the Son of God.
- 2:31So it's it's putting itself in a very high estate.
- 2:35And so it was natural that there would be some criticisms.
- 2:38So we'll go over that a little bit.
- 2:39But Rick, I want to just welcome you to the program and I thank
- 2:42you very much for coming on board today.
- 2:44How are you and how is everything going for you in the
- 2:47Urantia book are obviously you're still engaged, so tell me
- 2:50how things are going for you since you've left UAI and and
- 2:54now are sort of going solo as they say.
- 2:56Are you still heavily involved in the community?
- 2:59Oh, absolutely. I think I'm more busy today than
- 3:02I than I was back then, honestly, because in 2014 I
- 3:07stepped away from being the executive director with UAI and
- 3:10we started, my wife and I, we started Cosmic Creations, which
- 3:13is an online store that Wrench Foundation blessed us with
- 3:17permission to make, you know, merchandise with the circles on
- 3:20it and all that stuff. And that's been very successful
- 3:24and it's still going today after 11 years.
- 3:27And then now we're involved, excuse me, now we're involved
- 3:30with the Center for Unity since 2021.
- 3:34We got involved with that. So there's a lot of great things
- 3:37happening, a lot of exciting things happening.
- 3:39And we're blessed to be part of all of it, for sure.
- 3:42I may have to hit you up for a ring.
- 3:45I've I've I've seen there's a certain kind of urant and I
- 3:48don't wear jewelry but I would wear a concentric circle just to
- 3:52have it there in case. Either that or what?
- 3:54Wear a hat all the time That might be the way to go.
- 3:57Do you have a website for that that you could get people that
- 3:59want to buy your rancher related items?
- 4:03Absolutely. It's called cosmic creations dot
- 4:07BIZ. So it's cosmic creations kind of
- 4:09hold one word dot BIZ for business, so.
- 4:13OK, good. Because I remembered you had
- 4:15said that at a Zoom conference at one point and I forgot to
- 4:19write it down. So I'm, I'm so glad that you
- 4:21brought that up. So you're also part of the
- 4:23Center for Unity and we've had you and and other folks from
- 4:26Gabriel Reinberg, obviously one of the leaders and tell us again
- 4:30what Center of Unity is supposed to be about and all the
- 4:35different projects that are going on.
- 4:38Oh, my goodness. Well, the Center for Unity, our
- 4:41main goal is to bring the teachings of the Urantia Book to
- 4:44the young people of the world and to also let people know that
- 4:50the most important thing is their personal relationship with
- 4:52God. True religion is their personal
- 4:55relationship with God, and that's what's really important.
- 4:57So we've tried to use modern technology to bring the
- 5:01teachings to the young people of the world.
- 5:04You know, many of us that many times have said, you know, young
- 5:07people are not going to pick up a 2097 page book.
- 5:11They're not going to go to the library and try to find things
- 5:14like that. They're all nowadays, they're
- 5:15all online, they're on social media and places like that.
- 5:20They get, they get more out of a 5 minute video than they do out
- 5:24of a 2000 page book for sure. So that's what we've tried to do
- 5:27is use modern technology and they're primarily artificial
- 5:32intelligence right now, honestly.
- 5:34And we're using that to bring the revelation to young people.
- 5:39And I've often said, you know, when you go fishing, you go
- 5:42fishing where the fish are and you use the bait that they're
- 5:45looking for. And that's what we're trying to
- 5:47do with the Center for Unity, is bring this revelation and the
- 5:50teachings to the young people. And we have several projects.
- 5:56Probably our biggest project at the moment is discoverjesus.com
- 6:00and we've had several people, experienced Uranti Book
- 6:04students, put that together. There are over 500 essays on
- 6:08there about the people, places, dates, topics, events from the
- 6:16Uranti Book, and there are many different essays on there.
- 6:19And all those essays are connected together through this
- 6:22network that that Gabriel Reinberg created.
- 6:26And so you can go in there and basically it's a custom made
- 6:30learning experience for your auntie book.
- 6:32And you can go in there and search for people and then you
- 6:35can see all the places connected to that person, all the events
- 6:38connected to that person and all the dates of those events.
- 6:41So it really is a custom made learning experience for the
- 6:45ranch book. It also has an audio feature
- 6:48where, and I'll talk about that if you want, about the Your
- 6:52Ranch Book pod. But we've also use AI to create
- 6:55an audio feature for each one of those essays where not only can
- 7:00you read the essay, but you can hear a short about 5 minute
- 7:03discussion of that essay. And then also on, on
- 7:07discoverjesus.com. The other big thing is the
- 7:09beautiful artwork that Gary Tom created for us.
- 7:13And each one of the essays has a unique artwork that he created
- 7:18for us. And we're so blessed to have
- 7:19that because it really adds a visual aspect to the, to the
- 7:23website that that pulls people in.
- 7:26So there's that the and then I'll talk about the Urantia
- 7:31book, Urantia book, todd.com. That was a project that came to
- 7:36us very suddenly. It was, you know, one day
- 7:41Gabriel discovered that Google had this thing called notebook
- 7:45LM. And what you could do was upload
- 7:49text and it would make a podcast out of that text.
- 7:55And so we uploaded each paper and created your anti book
- 8:01pod.com. So we did it over period about,
- 8:04I don't know, two or three weeks or something like that.
- 8:06So it happened pretty quick, but it is the most amazing thing.
- 8:09It's a lot of fun. We listen to one of those
- 8:12podcasts each day and we've used it in study group and this AI
- 8:19couple talk back and forth. It's a man and a woman and AI
- 8:23voice. It's all generated through AI.
- 8:26And they discussed that particular paper and they'll
- 8:30tell jokes and they're kind of light hearted and they make some
- 8:33really deep comparisons. But it's a great way of
- 8:36introducing the book to new people in a, you know, in a less
- 8:42intellectual way. I'll put it that way.
- 8:44And so it's a lot of fun and we we use that in our study Group A
- 8:48lot. And then the other one is that I
- 8:52am so excited about is the Rancher book, tutor.com,
- 8:57rancherbooktutor.com. And So what that does, it's an
- 9:04AI program that's much more advanced than the AI we were
- 9:06using a couple years ago. You know, in the world of AIA,
- 9:10couple years is like ancient history type thing.
- 9:13So this one's much more advanced and you can put in a question
- 9:18and the real trick to it is learning how to ask the
- 9:21question. So you can, it's not like a
- 9:23glorified search engine or anything like that.
- 9:26It's a real conversational interactive AI discussion
- 9:32basically. And you can go in and ask a
- 9:34question and whatever question you can ask, you can say, well,
- 9:38can you tell me more about that? Or you can you explain it
- 9:41further? Or can you explain it in a way
- 9:44that a 10 year old child would answer it or would, would
- 9:47understand it? You can put in a, a Spanish
- 9:51question, you get a Spanish response.
- 9:53You can put in a French question and you get a French response.
- 9:57So it's multilingual also. And, you know, it's really this,
- 10:04the responses we get from it are just so profound and it can do
- 10:09in two or three seconds what would take you weeks and maybe
- 10:13months to research for a particular question.
- 10:16And I'm just so excited about it because I think it's going to be
- 10:19a really great tool. And it's so far it's proving to
- 10:22be a really great tool. What's you know, many people are
- 10:24out there using it. We had 80 experienced Your Ranch
- 10:28book students volunteer to help us troubleshoot it and go
- 10:32through the beta testing to find the bugs in it and things like
- 10:36that. So, but it's, no, it's doing
- 10:38pretty well and going well and everybody seems to be really
- 10:42enjoying it. I know I use it regularly.
- 10:43Like the other day I had a quote in my head and I searched for it
- 10:48through the normal search engine.
- 10:50I could not find that quote. And I, you know, it's one of
- 10:53those things, I know what it says, but I can't find it.
- 10:57So I put that into the ranch book tutor and I said, can you
- 11:00find a quote that says something like this?
- 11:03And boom, just like in, I don't know, two or three seconds there
- 11:06it was. So it's going to be a great
- 11:09study aid for individuals and really great for, for study
- 11:14groups. It's going to be good for
- 11:16anybody that wants to, you know, write a book or do a
- 11:19presentation or create some kind of secondary work at that sort
- 11:24of thing. So.
- 11:25Boy, the tools that are available today that were not
- 11:28available when you and I first encountered the book is
- 11:31astronomically advanced. And one wonders, you know, will
- 11:36this accelerate the growth of certainly will hopefully
- 11:41accelerate the awareness of the Urantia book and in ways that we
- 11:45never would have imagined even 25 years ago.
- 11:47So have you seen the transformative effect some of
- 11:51these things have had on people that are just now learning about
- 11:54the Urantia book? Oh, absolutely.
- 11:57Especially like discoverjesus.com, I keep track
- 12:01of the the analytics on things like that. discoverjesus.com is
- 12:06a little over a year and a half old now.
- 12:08We introduced it just shortly after the parliament.
- 12:10We were at the Parliament of World Religions in 2023 and we
- 12:15introduced this just shortly after that.
- 12:18But in like a year and a half or so, we've had over 23,000
- 12:23individual people visit that. And you know, that's from 100.
- 12:28And I think the last time I looked as 143 different
- 12:30countries. So, you know, we tend to think
- 12:33that the ranch book revelation, this revelation is kind of a
- 12:36small thing because we're so spread out.
- 12:38There doesn't seem to be many people around that study the
- 12:41book, but when you look at it on a worldwide basis and you see
- 12:45the reach that we've been able to have with using the new
- 12:48technology. You know, the AI is big part of
- 12:51it. Social media is a big part of
- 12:53it, videos a big part of it. And I remember the when the
- 12:58Internet came on and we were able to do search engines, we
- 13:00thought that was the greatest thing ever.
- 13:02And it was, well, this is going to another even higher level
- 13:06with, with the AI being able to not just be a, a glorified
- 13:10search engine, but to be something even exponentially
- 13:14better than that. So, yeah, we've seen just, you
- 13:17know, through our analytics, we see the we're reaching a lot of
- 13:21people all around the world. And this is growing.
- 13:23And you know, it's, it's an exciting thing to be part of for
- 13:27sure. So we are making a difference
- 13:29out there. We are reaching people beyond
- 13:31the Urantia community with this revelation, too.
- 13:34I, I'm almost afraid to encounter some of the stuff
- 13:37because then I'll just want to do that all the time and I
- 13:40wouldn't want to do anything else and get trapped.
- 13:43I mean, I, one of the things that have sort of caught my eye
- 13:45about AI is that they are in and, and it is a remarkable
- 13:49tool. And just like any tool, it can
- 13:51be abused for the wrong things, you know, and we've seen some
- 13:56examples of that, of people having their voice lifted or
- 13:59creating video and, and that kind of thing has, in your
- 14:04opinion, is it, is there any way that maybe somebody could
- 14:06corrupt the Urantia book teachings with some of this AI
- 14:10Or, you know, because we've heard that AI can sometimes it's
- 14:14kind of like Wikipedia, whoever is behind it can sometimes
- 14:17influence what the output answers will be.
- 14:21So is there any chance or possibility that AI could be
- 14:24corrupted or or or risk misrepresent some of the
- 14:27teachings of the Urantia book? Oh sure, absolutely any anything
- 14:32that's, you know, man made like that can corrupt anything.
- 14:36But for me, you know, I remember when the Internet, I'm old
- 14:40enough to remember when there was no Internet and then the
- 14:43Internet came on. When the Internet came out, you
- 14:45know, people were like, Oh my gosh, this is the end of the
- 14:47world. People are going to be out of
- 14:49work, you know, and the Internet was going to take over the
- 14:54world, basically. And now they're saying the same
- 14:56thing about the AI, the artificial intelligence.
- 15:00But for me, The thing is that it's just a tool.
- 15:04It's just another resource and good people are going to do good
- 15:08things with it and bad people are going to do bad things with
- 15:10it. And, you know, it's like the
- 15:12saying that all that's required for evil to succeed is a good
- 15:15people do nothing. And if we don't use these tools
- 15:19that God has given us to further this revelation, other people
- 15:23will. So we need to occupy the field,
- 15:26as my friend Gaetan Shalan often tells us, you know, occupy the
- 15:30field with within the AI to make sure that it is used for good
- 15:34and and that our good overshadows any evil or bad that
- 15:38comes from it. So yeah, it can.
- 15:41It can be used for those kind of least desirable purposes, but we
- 15:46need to be making sure it's used for good.
- 15:49I wonder if if it could be used in a way where it would help us
- 15:52substantiate some of the claims and and cooperate.
- 15:55For example, we know that the Urantia book talks about, you
- 15:58know, discovering in in some of the chapters where it talks
- 16:01about diseases and how human beings, because the Adamic
- 16:07default occurred, deprived us of, of full integration of, of
- 16:11some of the more potent disease fighting elements For the
- 16:16Urantia book readers, you know what I'm talking about.
- 16:18Does the Urantia book can you Can you cross reference and and
- 16:22and perhaps corroborate current scientific data with information
- 16:27presented in the Urantia book? Absolutely.
- 16:31I mean, that's one of the great features of using AI is it is
- 16:34able to do those kind of things that would take you and I weeks
- 16:38or months to to put together. It can put together those sort
- 16:41of things, you know, within seconds.
- 16:44And it has that broad reach. And it can take you, you know,
- 16:47even if you have an inquiry like that, it can even take you
- 16:50beyond that into related topics and subjects that will expand on
- 16:55the question that you asked it, you know, with some kind of
- 16:58scientific thing or whatever. But but yes, it can.
- 17:02It can be used to correlate that stuff from science to religion.
- 17:07Yeah. Including cross referencing
- 17:10biblical passages too. Oh, sure.
- 17:13Yeah, I haven't used it for that.
- 17:16Normally what I do when, when I've got something like that,
- 17:19where I want to see what the Bible says about, you know, kind
- 17:22of compare the ranch book to the Bible and vice versa, is I like
- 17:27to use the parimony. Parimony was written by a fellow
- 17:30named Dwayne Fall. And what it does, it's a book, a
- 17:36physical book that takes quotes from the Urantia book and then
- 17:40in a parallel column puts the corresponding Bible verse with
- 17:44it. So you can search from something
- 17:46from the Urantia book to the Bible.
- 17:48And then another part of the book, you can search for a verse
- 17:50from the Bible and see what the Urantia book has to say about
- 17:53it. Fortunately, somebody has taken
- 17:55that and I'm sure they spend a lot of time putting that on
- 17:59urantiabook.org and their resources tab.
- 18:02I think it is. But you know, that's an
- 18:05interesting question that I haven't tried, but I'll have to
- 18:08do that though. But I think it would do that.
- 18:12Well, I'm going to try it and I'm I'm sure that people
- 18:14listening to this podcast will probably try it too.
- 18:17And again, that's the it's called Urantia book tutor.com,
- 18:21urantiabooktutor.com. And then all the other things
- 18:25that you talked about too. We'll give sort of a rundown of
- 18:27some of those websites towards the end of this discussion I'm
- 18:30having with of course, Rick Lyon.
- 18:32And Rick, let's get to the Bill Sadler or William Sadler in
- 18:38addressing some of the criticisms that that early
- 18:41readers about the book and I know you're familiar with.
- 18:44Have you did you ever meet William Sadler or did you get AI
- 18:47guess? I did not.
- 18:48He had passed away by the time you knew about, but certainly
- 18:51you've met other people that knew him.
- 18:54Oh, does anybody what's, what do they say that he was like, what
- 18:57kind of I I heard he's a kindly gentleman.
- 19:00From, from what I've heard, he's a very kind gentleman, very
- 19:04intellectual, very intelligent person.
- 19:07And of course, his son, Bill Sadler Junior was extremely
- 19:10intelligent and, you know, he wrote the study of the Master
- 19:13Universe and which is a fascinating book in itself.
- 19:17And but yeah, Doctor Sadler is very highly regarded within the
- 19:21ranch community and well thought of.
- 19:22And obviously it was a a very curious mind.
- 19:26And I think that's so there was a reason why they chose him to,
- 19:29you know, lead this revelation back in, you know, the 1920s and
- 19:3330s and and all that into the 60s.
- 19:36So, but unfortunately I didn't know him personally, but I've,
- 19:40you know, met people who who had known him so.
- 19:44Yeah, and a lot of people don't know that during the 20s he was
- 19:47very influential in modern medicine and, and, and in modern
- 19:51psychiatry. And I believe he studied a
- 19:54little bit with Carl Jung at one point, perhaps.
- 19:57I'm not sure how I feel about Carl Jung or any of that, but it
- 20:01just goes to show you the stature of this man.
- 20:03Many people actually accuse him of creating and concocting this,
- 20:08you know, this book. And in fact, I think the the the
- 20:12harshest. Was from the great Mystery Cult
- 20:15book who I heard it hadn't even hadn't even read the Urantia
- 20:19book. You know, I think if anybody,
- 20:20anybody who actually has read, like there's anybody who
- 20:23actually has read the Urantia book knows that it cannot
- 20:26possibly be of human origin. You have to remember that this
- 20:30book is almost 100 years old. This is, this is one of my
- 20:33perspectives, I'll put it that way.
- 20:34This book is almost 100 years old.
- 20:37And so if you look at the just the language that is in the
- 20:42Uranti book and then you compare it to the language in the
- 20:46writings of that period, it's obviously much more advanced.
- 20:51And people didn't talk like that back in that day.
- 20:53They didn't write like that back in that day.
- 20:56And then, you know, to come up with all the different concepts
- 21:01and unique concept like you're talking about.
- 21:03I think you've got the 64 unique concepts from the Uranti book.
- 21:07If you look at just those, I don't see how they could imagine
- 21:12anyone human being in 10 lifetimes coming up with all
- 21:15that stuff, let alone, you know, in one lifetime.
- 21:18So I think the book itself proves that it's not was never
- 21:23written by Doctor Sadler or or anyone else for that matter.
- 21:27It's a by the. Way.
- 21:29Was the gentleman who wrote that?
- 21:30Oh, yeah. And it's unfortunate because
- 21:32many people when they first hear about the Urantia book, they do
- 21:35what a lot of people do when they hear something.
- 21:37They'll go on and and do a Google search.
- 21:40And then what comes up is one of the first things that pops up is
- 21:44this Martin Gardner book, which really attempts to discredit,
- 21:47discredit the Urantia book. Yeah.
- 21:51Well, I think that's why, I think that's why we've why the
- 21:56revelators never, why they never really wanted someone tied to
- 22:00the book itself, because we tend to Revere the author, I think,
- 22:07and we often tend to judge things by the author.
- 22:10So if there was a human attached to as the authorship with the
- 22:13Ranchi book, we would tend to judge the book by the author
- 22:17rather than judging the book for itself.
- 22:21And you know, you see that in in the world nowadays.
- 22:24You see, you know, I don't watch this movie because this actor,
- 22:28you know, was in there and I don't care for that actor.
- 22:30So I'm judging that movie. You know, it might be a great
- 22:33movie by the actor that was in it.
- 22:36Or even politics today. And politics is even worse.
- 22:39You know, I don't like your politics, therefore I don't like
- 22:42you type thing. Unfortunately, there's way too
- 22:45much of that in the world. But I think that's why that they
- 22:48didn't want some human tide to the book as far as like
- 22:52authorship and that sort of thing.
- 22:55You were kind of addressing some of the criticisms indirectly,
- 22:59but one of the chief criticisms I think probably comes from
- 23:02Christians is that it seems to contradict Scripture.
- 23:07But I, I have not found that to be be true at all.
- 23:10I I've actually found that it enhances some of the the more
- 23:13rudimentary stories. And for example, the story of
- 23:15Abraham is much more fully revealed in the Urantia book
- 23:19when it talks about his relationship with the sage of
- 23:22Salem, who is actually mentioned in the Bible numerous times.
- 23:26Melchizedek. Where is in this in the Urantia
- 23:28book it, it goes full board on the influence.
- 23:32Not only did that meant Melchizedek have on our planet,
- 23:35but also the other that are part of his team and and and it's a
- 23:39revelation to be told that they actually still play a big role
- 23:44in our development. It's just it's just an amazing
- 23:48book. Could be, I say I should say
- 23:50it's an amazing collection of teachings that are just so
- 23:55they're life changing. You know, this is a book that
- 23:57you're, it's not like a normal book that you're going to read
- 24:00once and lay it down and say, well, I've read that.
- 24:02That was a great book. This is going to be a book that
- 24:04you study for your entire life. You know, life is a struggle.
- 24:08Life is hard. And you know, but that's there's
- 24:12a purpose for that. You know, you read about the
- 24:14inevitabilities. And if you read the
- 24:16inevitabilities, it answers the question of why do bad things
- 24:19happen to good people? You know, and you know, recently
- 24:22I heard somebody say that your answer book was a love letter
- 24:25from God. And I thought that was really
- 24:27beautiful. But for me, the arrange book,
- 24:31you know, how many times have we all said, you know, I wish God
- 24:33had given me an owner's manual or instruction manual with for
- 24:36life and that sort of thing. But I really think he has, you
- 24:40know, yeah, it's not going. It helps us.
- 24:43It may not help us solve our mortal problems, our earthly
- 24:46problems, but it does help us deal with those problems.
- 24:50And you know, it's all about how we react to problems.
- 24:54It's really important and, and how we react and, and deal with
- 24:59other people. So I like to think that your
- 25:02range book is that instruction manual or that handbook for life
- 25:08because it, you know, it's like, OK, sure, you got problems in
- 25:11this border life, but this border life is just a blink of
- 25:14the eye and it's the kindergarten training ground for
- 25:17what's to come and what's to come.
- 25:20Don't worry, because what's to come is so beautiful and so
- 25:24meaningful and so important and so full of adventure and
- 25:29education and excitement. Don't worry about what's
- 25:32happening in this life. It's like Jesus said, what does
- 25:35it matter if the whole world crumbles?
- 25:38You know, we don't need to worry about that.
- 25:40Yeah, we have to deal with it. We have to solve our moral
- 25:42problems. We have to pay the bills and
- 25:44take care of problems. But your Auntie Book assures us
- 25:48that, you know, we are going to get through this and greater
- 25:52things are waiting for us. I think that for me, you know, a
- 25:58lot of people, that's usually the first thing a lot of people
- 26:00ask, well, who wrote it? Where'd it come from?
- 26:03And, you know, if you say, well, it came from celestial beings, I
- 26:06kind of look at you kind of weird.
- 26:08But for me, it's like a beautiful Symphony, let's say.
- 26:14I don't really care about how it how the composer came to put all
- 26:20that together, but I enjoy the Symphony.
- 26:23So it's not really, I don't really care where that Symphony
- 26:27came from or how it was created or that sort of thing.
- 26:31But I enjoy the Symphony and I think that's true for me.
- 26:35With your Angie book, you read it and it doesn't really matter
- 26:40where it came from, honestly. You read it and does it feel
- 26:45like it's the truth to you? Does it feel like truth, yes or
- 26:48no? If it does, then fine, just
- 26:51accept it. And yeah, you know, each of the
- 26:54papers has its authorship at the back.
- 26:56It tells of the celestial being that was the the author of that
- 27:00paper. And I enjoy that.
- 27:02I know many people do, especially, you know, longer you
- 27:05study this book, the more meaningful that authorship
- 27:09becomes. But I don't really think that's,
- 27:12you know, that's, that should affect our understanding or
- 27:17faith in the book itself or in the teachings, I should say.
- 27:23I remember 1 fellow that I talked to was he was
- 27:27disappointed that the Urantia book didn't talk about UF OS and
- 27:32aliens and that sort of thing. And after I explained to him
- 27:36that, well, it talks about celestial beings and, you know,
- 27:41it talks about life on other planets, and we talked about
- 27:43that in in depth. And finally he came to realize
- 27:46that, you know, maybe it's not talking about spaceships from
- 27:49Mars, but what it is talking about is something far greater
- 27:53than the UFO's that he imagined. And so that really helped him a
- 27:58bunch. And another thing I'll tell you
- 28:01is that my wife, Susan, she's part of the PERT program, the
- 28:07Prison Inquiry Response Team. And so we send your auntie books
- 28:11to people in in prison and we get some of the most beautiful
- 28:16letters from inmates of how the rancher book has changed their
- 28:22life. They're even having study groups
- 28:24in prisons and things like that. So the book makes a difference
- 28:29with individuals like that. And we didn't see like pastors
- 28:34and prisons are ordering books to put in the libraries and
- 28:36things like that. But I will, I'll share one
- 28:39experience with you that we had. This was more with the I will
- 28:45ask Jesus chat bot that we, that was our first AI project that we
- 28:49in 2023, we were at, we had a booth at the Parliament of World
- 28:52Religions in Chicago for the Center for Unity.
- 28:56And we set up a computer there and let people test the
- 29:01discoverjesus.com. And the other one was our Ask
- 29:04Jesus chat bot. And so this lady came forward
- 29:09and she's standing in front of me and she has a young child
- 29:13with her teenage type child. And the child was obviously
- 29:19distressed, wouldn't look at you, excuse me, wouldn't make
- 29:24eye contact or or even look up. And so finally I said to this
- 29:29child that, you know, I bet you're interested in artificial
- 29:32intelligence. And then they kind of perked up
- 29:35and said, we have, I said, we'll come over and try ours.
- 29:38So they came over and sat down and got the keyboard and they
- 29:43typed in who am I? And I said, well, I don't think
- 29:46it'll answer that kind of a question.
- 29:48They won't answer something that specific.
- 29:49But you know, let's just see what it says.
- 29:52So it came up with this. You are a child of God.
- 29:56You are loved and valued by the creator of the universe.
- 30:00You are part of a the family of God and the brotherhood of man.
- 30:04And it was the most beautiful, profound answer.
- 30:08And that child got up and said that was awesome.
- 30:12So they walked away and came back, I don't know, 5 minutes
- 30:16later and now this child is standing right in front of me,
- 30:19looking me in the eye and saying, can you tell me how to
- 30:22follow Jesus? Because I've just heard.
- 30:24How can you tell me how to become a Christian?
- 30:26Because I've decided I want to follow Jesus.
- 30:29And that right there is a demonstration of what we can
- 30:33accomplish when we use technology to take these
- 30:37teachings to individuals like that that would never have read
- 30:40the book otherwise. So those are just a great story.
- 30:43I've been blessed to be part of, of UA.
- 30:47I, I was, you know, when I was a vice president of the Overton
- 30:51Society. And I've been blessed to be part
- 30:53of many different projects and, and organizations with this
- 30:58revelation. It's just I'm, I'm truly a
- 31:01blessed person to be part of all of it for sure.
- 31:05The Urantia book does give us a lot of advice on how to fix
- 31:09things in our world today, especially in part three of the
- 31:13book where it talks about the different types of government
- 31:16and the optimal government and, and, and even its exposition of
- 31:20life on another planet that's very similar to our own.
- 31:24You know, you would think that this could be very valuable
- 31:26information for our leaders. Have you seen or are you aware
- 31:32of you don't have to name names or anything, but do you feel
- 31:35confident that there are enough smart people maybe in tech or
- 31:39maybe in, in in roles of government?
- 31:42Oh, I think so. I think, you know, the ranch of
- 31:46people in the ranch community and you know, several I know
- 31:48have made a certainly made a great effort to get the
- 31:52teachings to people in power positions.
- 31:55You know, from what I've seen, I suspect that the Pope has
- 31:59probably 300 copies of the Uranti book that he's received
- 32:02from Uranti book students through the years.
- 32:04But you know, the the current Pope is familiar with the Uranti
- 32:09book. And if you look at some of the
- 32:11daily things he put out, you know, on an app that they had,
- 32:14you can see almost direct quotes from the Uranti book there.
- 32:19And there's a story about how, you know, it was on the desk of
- 32:23Bill Clinton and things like that.
- 32:24But you know, and I know I've sent sections of the book to
- 32:29different scientists. I'll read something on the
- 32:31Internet about this scientific discovery or somebody's looking
- 32:33into it, this kind of research, and I'll actually, you know,
- 32:36copy and paste something out of your answer book and send it to
- 32:39them. So I think that's, you know,
- 32:41that's part of the, you know, outreach or the dissemination of
- 32:45these teachings as to do that kind of thing and get it into
- 32:48people's hands that are in the in the position to have
- 32:53influence over government. And, you know, once they read
- 32:57stuff like that, it's like my wife Susan often says, you know,
- 33:00once they see it, they can't Unsee it.
- 33:02So if we can get these teachings and things like that, especially
- 33:07with, you know, the celestial government and that all that
- 33:11into the hands of a real government people, it can only
- 33:16be good. And we'll continue our
- 33:20discussion with Rick Lyon talking about the Rancho book
- 33:23and the future coming up here on the Rancho Radio podcast.