What The Urantia Book Means to Me - Hara Davis
What The Urantia Book Means to Me - Hara Davis
By Hara Davis, Scarborough, England
The Urantia Book means everything to me! I found it when I really needed it, at an incredibly stressful time of my life. It has provided me with a framework that satisfies my heart, soul, and intellect, and it answers existential questions that other texts leave vague or unanswered. I feel a more personal and living connection with Jesus, and his portrayal in the book aligns with my inner sense of truth and justice. The book outlines a vast and meaningful cosmic journey—from this life to Paradise, which is deeply comforting and inspiring.
Christianity was an important part of my life growing up, but after asking God all sorts of questions and not seeming to get any replies, I decided, while in my late teens, to give it all up. My career took me to many parts of the world, and I always investigated the new religions I was exposed to. I related well to Buddhism as it was concerned with how to live daily life in the best way, and my husband and I nearly joined a Buddhist community. However, nothing really seemed to make sense until my husband had an incredible life-changing breakdown experience (another story!). After this we decided to retreat to the English countryside and study everything we could about spirituality. We read and made notes on hundreds of books and started seriously practicing meditation.
Our big dream was to live ecologically and grow our own food. We eventually bought a farm on Tenerife in the Canary Islands, which is where I found The Urantia Book just over 25 years ago. My husband came home one day from the English Library and said he had seen a weird book in the religious section that he thought I might like. He thought it weird as he had opened it at the paper about life on a neighboring planet. So, the next time I was there, I found the book and took it home. I couldn't believe what I was reading and made lots of notes and drew maps as I didn’t know how to get a copy of my own. I had no internet or computer then.
At that time, the local council was threatening to pull down the wooden house on our farm. The house was totally legal, but we hadn’t bribed the mayor, who was later indicted for corruption. We fought it for years but eventually had to pull it down and leave. The Urantia Book helped me cope with all the pain, stress, and uncertainty of that time, for the book teaches us that sometimes the fulfillment of a dream may be denied us in order that an even better one may take its place.
The perishing of those ambitions, in fact, is how my first study aid came about. I attended a Urantia Book conference in the United Kingdom and showed people my maps and notes. They asked me if I could put it all on a computer. I had just finished a computer design course and bought my first laptop, so that was the start of my study-aid booklets.
The knowledge of having a fragment of God within, and all the amazing circuits available to us, is such a comfort. I can’t imagine living life without this spiritual certainty. I am now retired and work hard to help make The Urantia Book and its teachings available to more people. I am grateful for my study groups and Urantia Book International School for keeping me connected with readers all over the world. The Urantia Book has given me the assurance that life is part of a greater design, and it has helped me feel less alone and more purposeful.
Spirit-born individuals are so remotivated in life that they can calmly stand by while their fondest ambitions perish and their keenest hopes crash; they positively know that such catastrophes are but the redirecting cataclysms which wreck one's temporal creations preliminary to the rearing of the more noble and enduring realities of a new and more sublime level of universe attainment. 100:2.8 (1096.5)
