Soul Matters, Book 2: Wrath of the Goddess
Chapter 1

“How dare you,” Phil began in a huff. He didn’t bother to imagine himself dressed in anything other than the cream-colored, terry-cloth robe. It sported a scripted ‘S’ on the left chest.

The Archangel Manuel laughed at Phil’s indignation and swirled in his white robes to plop on a marble bench. A fountain, gurgling water through its five-foot height, was to the angel’s left. A blank wall was to his right. Trees, hedges, blooming flowers, and flowering bushes filled in around them.

The patio was the size of a regular room -- maybe twenty feet by twenty feet. It seemed larger in some ways, since it was filled with all sorts of blooming plants. Overhead was a hazy ceiling of sorts that gave the place the feel of a cathedral.

Phil advanced across the grassy floor, not bothering to stay on the marble walkway, and restated his indignation, “How dare you.”

He couldn’t look directly at the blond-tressed angel, but he could unfocus his eyes and easily notice the changing colors of the aura surrounding the angel’s disturbing presence. Those colors, he knew, indicated the angel’s mood.

“How dare I?” Manuel chortled back, and his mirth carried the background accompaniment of a string quartet.

“Invading my dreams. Threatening me. Just who do you think you are?”

“The closest to God you’ll ever get,” the angel smirked. “Look. I don’t like this any better than you, but we’re stuck with one another. Make the best of it.”

Phil halted his advance and demanded, “Stuck? How? We both have free will -- you made that abundantly clear during my first psychotic break.”

“So that’s it,” the angel surmised. “You’ve convinced yourself I am a mere madness in your mind.”

Phil continued to exude an authority born of outrage, “I’ve been seeing a counselor, one from the church. She said I just made you up as a projection of my own doubts about God.”

Even though Phil bought this as a convincing explanation at the time, now his voice began to waver in uncertainty.

“If it’s true, then cancel my existence by owning your projections,” Manuel invited. “Then, there’s always pharmaceuticals. You may be able to drug me gone.”

Ignoring those solutions, as well as his mounting uncertainty, Phil asserted, “She said meditation opens channels to the Devil.”

“Oh, so he gets to exist, but I don’t,” Manuel’s sarcasm was woven with strong strains of humor. “How convenient. Have you examined the logic here? If meditation opens a channel to the spirit world, then why is the Devil the only person waiting at the other end?”

Phil didn’t bother to answer, since that was one of his unanswered questions as well.

The angel went on, “It’s stupid, Phil. Meditation opens channels, all right, but you get to choose whom to contact. It’s the free will thing you were just ranting about. Does she charge you much for this ‘counseling’?”

“None of your business,” Phil snapped, but the dollar amount already formed in his mind.

Manuel could read his mind, and instantly the angel laughed. The string quartet trilled as he did so. “I’m in the wrong business,” he muttered.

“Stay out of my head,” Phil commanded. According to the counselor, the command was supposed to work. It was called ‘thought-stopping,’ she told him. Now he was supposed to be able to replace the thoughts creating Manuel with new thoughts generating a different reality. It didn’t seem to be working. Manuel was still there.

“Drugs are your only hope,” Manuel said, apparently not heeding Phil’s command to stay out of his mind.

Phil took a breath and let it out in mute acceptance of his fate. If he meditated, the only place he could go was to Manuel’s patio. If he ceased his practice of meditation, Manuel now threatened to be a plague on his dreams. There was only one conclusion: He was going crazy.

“You know what ‘crazy’ really is, Phil?” the angel’s voice was less sarcastic. “It’s trying to deny your Divine origins. You are a child of God. Deal with it.”

Phil approached and sat on the bench next to the angel. He sighed, “The psychotic break started with those kinds of grandiose thoughts. It’s called ‘megalomania’.”

The string-accompanied laughter sounded again, and Phil breathed deeply of the perfumed air, which produced a calming effect. Too bad his delusions of grandeur paired him with Manuel -- an angel the other angels considered incompetent. You would think, Phil mused, delusions of grandeur would have him paired with somebody important.

The angel’s delight in Phil’s situation continued, “This counselor convinced you that all we’ve been through is because of ego-inflation? And I’m a bit player in your soap opera? Tell me it’s not true!”

Phil smiled. His weak chin, high forehead, and piercing dark eyes lit up with a deeper, barely submerged mirth -- an unresolved adolescent glee, which came from his hippie-self wanting to stick it to the Man. His smile slowly settled into a lopsided grin as he said, “It’s true. And you’re an agent of evil filling me up with all kinds of heresies.”

Manuel snorted, “She’ll get a real kick out of the latest one. Jeremiah’s show-stopper.”

Phil scratched the bald spot on his head and wondered, “Am I really going crazy?”

“If you follow her lead, it’s a sure bet,” the angel answered.

They sat in silence as Phil’s internal battle, between his yuppie and hippie selves, settled into an armed truce.

Success on Earth, according to his yuppie-self, equated with religious salvation. The road there required dogmatic conformity and professional competency. The resulting comfort-zone extended to his personal, spiritual, and professional lives. Conformity gave him peace as well as the assurance of being among the Chosen come Judgment Day. If, in fact, there was such a day. Although, he was an insurance salesman, so planning for it was eminently logical.

Success in Spirit, according to his hippie-self, equated with over-turning the status quo in favor of a world that worked for everyone. Nobody ever figured out the details about how to accomplish it, especially so since ‘everyone’ would include dictators like Hitler or Putin, but ‘saving the world’ was the only real game in town.

The angel broke in, “How did you end up in a counselor’s office in the first place?”

Phil winced at the memory of his last day with Manuel. “That Gog-character burned me with red-hot iron pokers. When I came out of the meditation, there were welts on my physical body. It scared me enough to get some spiritual advice.”

“Gog Sheklah,” the angel reflected absently. “We use him to help addicts hit bottom. He’s the angel of no-mercy -- sort of our version of tough love.”

Phil grunted in response. He wasn’t sure he wanted any more details. After he spurned the temptations of Hell, the torture began -- he had nightmares until he saw the counselor.

The angel was saying, “I’m surprised you ended up with welts. I didn’t think there was that much integration between your human and spiritual natures.”

“Imagine how creative I had to get to hide them from Betty.”

The angel laughed again. Then he turned serious, “How much of what you accomplished here was undone by this counselor?”

“Well, she reminded me evolution was only a theory.”

“So is gravity.”

“And liberal college professors are working to bring everyone to the kind of apostasy you were promoting.”

“The institution of Education is inherently conservative,” Manuel rejoined, “because it enshrines the past.”

“She further reminded me, even though God is fully beyond our ability to comprehend, he has inspired countless people over the ages with the same message: There is a Divine Plan. That Plan culminates in God’s glorious reign over his chosen and professed subjects.”

“Try telling it to Jeremiah,” Manuel laughed again. “Although, I will agree there is a Plan. However, the Plan is for you to discover the Divine-within rather than waiting for some codependent rescue from Big Daddy.”

With his simple answers for life destroyed, Phil brought his mind to the deeper meaning of Manuel’s argument. He tried out his conclusion, “You are making a distinction between salvation and knowing God.”

“No shit, Sherlock,” Manuel clapped his hands in sarcastic response.

Phil didn’t feel celebrated, or even ridiculed. He quickly realized, though, his yuppie-self was content with salvation. It was a project he could fit into his busy schedule. Knowing God, conversely, was a more full-bodied commitment.

“It’s a full-time job,” Manuel said, once more peeking into the Phil’s mind. “And, by the way, the reason hippies couldn’t figure out the details about how to change the world is because those details are indigenous to a higher level. Periodically, you and others of the Boomer generation visited the next plateau, but you haven’t been able to take up residence there.”

“Why not?”

“It’s as Azazel told you before,” Manuel shrugged. “It’s a shit-load of work.”

Then Manuel launched into a telepathic aside: Of course, you remember Azazel, the desert devil who was intent on eating your soul. He actually filed a formal complaint against me after you escaped Hell. Beelzebub, on the other hand, thought the whole thing was funny. Still, I don’t think we’ve seen the last of Azazel.

Phil grimaced at this reminder, then turned more thoughtful. He asked, “What about punishment? The counselor spent a lot of time describing what happens to people who deny the infallible word of God in the Bible.”

“Rats!” Manuel exclaimed. “I was hoping we wouldn’t have to deal with that stupid notion.”

“How is it stupid?”

“Well, why would anyone punish anyone else?”

“To help them correct their behavior.” Phil knew as much from being a parent of two children.

“Punishment is corrective,” Manuel confirmed. “What would be the point in punishing someone for all eternity?”

Phil’s high forehead frowned in response. Then he remembered what his spiritual counselor told him, “It’s their just reward for apostasy.”

“It’s not corrective anymore?” Manuel queried, and Phil knew the angel was setting some kind of logical trap for him to fall into.

“Well, after so many chances, they have to get what they deserve.”

“And you don’t see how stupid it is?” Manuel asked, springing the trap.

“Not really,” Phil answered defensively, then tried to salvage something of his argument. “In fact, it has a compelling logic. I mean, we put criminals in prison because they deserve it.”

“To separate them from society for two very good reasons: First, so they don’t commit more crimes or hurt more people. Second, so they can be rehabilitated. Neither of those reasons applies if you were to sentence someone to eternal damnation.”

Phil gave up this line of reasoning and headed in the direction Manuel seemed to be avoiding, “Why don’t you want to deal with the idea of punishment?”

Manuel heavy-sighed and answered, “Because I really didn’t want to tell you the story behind the Flood. It’s a bit embarrassing. However, the story fully illustrates the Divine Purpose behind punishment.”

“And I need to know it, I suppose.”

“Yep. It’s the next closet in your mind we need to clean out. Much to my dismay,” Manuel said with no enthusiasm. He seemed to have immediately bowed to the inevitable. The question of punishment in the Divine Order, no matter how embarrassing it may be for Manuel, was what he was now prepared to teach. sᴇaʀᴄh thᴇ (F)indNƟvᴇl.ɴet website on Gøøglᴇ to access chapters of novels early and in the highest quality.

“Well, let’s get started,” was Phil’s upbeat response. He was looking forward to Manuel’s promised embarrassment.

“Next time,” the angel delayed. “First, go read the account in Genesis about it.”

“Okay. I can do it today. What are you going to do?”

“I think I’ll pay a visit to your counselor,” Manuel grinned. Then he added, “Well, not ‘pay’ in the literal sense of the word, of course, but we’ve pretty much established literalism as a dead horse we ought to stop flogging anyway.”

Phil stared at – well, toward the angel. “If you’re planning on doing something to her, I’d appreciate it if you waited until after my next appointment with her. I think I owe her the courtesy of a last meeting before I terminate counseling.”

“That’s honorable. You surprise me, Phil. Your usual response to conflict is to avoid it.”

“She did help me get rid of the nightmares.”

“You could have done that yourself with lucid dreaming. Your unconscious is on your side, you know. Confronting the dream figures and finding out what they were trying to tell you would have been the way I would have ‘counseled’ you.”

Phil frowned at that. “I was too afraid to come back here.”

“I guess that makes sense,” Manuel allowed. “Okay. I’ll wait to visit your counselor.”

Phil smiled a faint smile and ended the meditation. He opened his eyes to his study on the ground floor of his house. He was sitting cross-legged on a large leather pillow. The ambient light from street lights filtered into the room, giving it a soft glow.

Manuel was back, and he brought a level of craziness that Phil wasn’t sure how he coped with the first time. The warm assurances of his counselor did give him a sense of sanity after the violent and chaotic end of his first adventure in Spirit. He had no intention of repeating the experience.

Yet, Manuel was back. Deep down he knew it was real, regardless of what the counselor told him. And if Manuel and all that he went through the last time were real, Phil was bound for an education in Spirit that would make him unfit to his peers.

His hippie-self was plenty okay with that agenda. His yuppie-self was horrified by it.

For his part, though, Phil actually liked the Archangel Manuel – sort of like admiring a rogue uncle because he was filled with irrepressible energy and optimism. Of course, he would never let Manuel know that. Even so, Phil would rather this adventure in Spirit end right now, regardless of how much he might like Manuel. There was too much to lose if he went down that merry path. On the other hand, Manuel would just invade his dreams until he complied.

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