What I Now Think the Future of the Baba World in the West Is

I've been watching this Baba world since I was four years old when our family heard about Meher Baba from another family of Baba lovers, the Rileys. 

When I was six years old, our family moved to Myrtle Beach, South Carolina where we rented a house for a year as our new house was being built on the Meher Spiritual Center. We all moved in when I was seven. Here is a picture of me and my three sisters right after moving in.

Me and my three sisters in our new house on the Meher Center, 1966

It has been 60 years since that time. I have watched a lot happen and have some thoughts. Of me and my three siblings I am the only one that today believes in Meher Baba. I wrote a straightforward philosophical argument for why I still believe in Baba which you can read here. 

But the subject today is where I think the future of the Baba world -- the world of people who take Baba as the Avatar -- is headed in the near future. My idea of where it is going may surprise some people. 

The world is moving from a time of Empires and centralized world powers vying for authority over the planet to a time known as the multi-polar world. This is a world of unity in diversity, a time when small and large nations respect one another, and respect each other's sovereignty. How long it will take this new fairer world to materialize no one can say, but we are well into that transition. We are bound to see bumps along the way.

I see the same happening to Baba's followers. Rather than continued efforts to corral each other under a centralized authority, groups of followers of different stripes will feel free to go their own way, and interact peacefully with other groups. This is how mystical schools have always conducted themselves. Religions quarrel. Mystics share notes.

Take Sufi orders for example. Google says:

There is no exact official number of Sufi orders in the world today. While there are dozens of major, historically recognized orders, sub-branches and localized lineages mean the true count runs into the hundreds.

Why don't they fight? The reason is simple. The motivation to rule over others simply is not found in the mystical temperament. 

I see Baba groups of the future like this. This means that different groups may interpret Baba in different ways. Some may take Baba as a prophet, others as the Avatar, others as a philosopher. Others may see themselves as Christian, yet adopt parts of what Baba taught -- gradually integrating some of his teaching into their own.

As for the Meher Spiritual Center where I grew up, I see maintaining such a huge unnecessary piece of property increasingly impractical. I can easily see future generations selling off most of that beach front property, worth billions on the commercial market, and donating it to charity. That would be an event that would garner headlines, and set an enormous precedent for the kind of selflessness and compassion Baba's teaching inspired in his followers. I imagine a couple acres of it, adjoining Briarcliffe Acres and encompassing Dilruba, Meher Abode, and a relocated Saroja reading room remaining as a small easily maintained place of pilgrimage -- not a place where you stay and pay rent.

That is the sum of my personal vision. When I think of what Baba left behind of great importance, I think of his teachings. Baba devoted more than half of his Last Will and Testament to the copyrights of his written works. I see the future as a time of study and consideration of his words, of many schools of thought cooperating, sharing guest speakers, and generally getting along.

What of any groups that tried to establish themselves as a centralized authority? I see them as immediately derided as clownish imposters. For there simply is no way to get around the fact that Baba clearly stated he did not want such a thing. The newsreel of Baba stating this below is one of the most famous films of him ever recorded, and one of the only ones with sound.

 

Paramount screened the newsreel in 500 cinemas in England and more than 3000 in America. The first showing was in London on 14 September 1932.

So that pretty much sums up my opinion about the future of the Baba world in the West 

Obviously Baba's Trust in India will continue to perform its stated mission to preserve his teachings, maintain his samadhi as a place of pilgrimage, provide charitable, medical, and educational services, and advance his message of love, oneness, and compassion. 

So, why couldn't people do such a simple thing in the past? Until quite recently, say the last 200 years or so, most people in the world were illiterate. And books, when they were available, were extremely expensive. In lieu of people owning books, most devotional people memorized hymns and prayers. That and attending churches and mosques and listening to sermons.

But today, 4 out of 5 people in the world can read and write. And books are very inexpensive and even available for free in libraries. Baba's writing can be viewed on almost any cell phone simply by going to the Meher Baba Trust free online library. So the time when people had to amass together and rely on literate scholars and priests to tell them what Baba said and to interpret it is gone. Of course, there will always be a place for those who have studied certain works more closely, or who have an education that adds further context to what Baba wrote. But, such experts have always played a roll in mystical traditions.

As for the bulk of humanity who are not so inclined to study or learn new ideas, there will always be the major religions, along with churches, mosques, priests and imams. And of course there will always be atheists.