Chapter Nine : Sending on Spirits in Transition 29

Pak Chebong asked, “What benefit accrues to the spirit of the deceased from holding deliverance services for seven seven-day periods or a memorial service commemorating his nirvana?” The Founding Master said, “In heaven and earth, there are principles of sublime, reciprocal response. When we plant seeds and give them fertilizer, the amount of crops harvested will be different even though the ground is insentient, seeds are insentient, and the fertilizer is insentient. If even insentient crops are responsive, how can human beings, who are the most perspicacious of all, not respond to sincere devotion? If everyone singlemindedly engages in mental affirmation, offers supplications, makes donations for the spirit of the deceased, and has a spiritual mentor give a dharma discourse, then there will occur the mutual transmission of mind to mind and the mutual response of energy to energy, and the spirit of the deceased would immediately be able to receive deliverance; or in case it has fallen into an unwholesome destiny, it may gradually advance. Also, if one died after accumulating heavy debts during one’s life, these may be repaid by utilizing the donations and carrying out works for public welfare in the deceased’s name. For those who were not in debt, too, blessings could also be accumulated impalpably. To put this principle of reciprocal response differently, it is like electrical currents flowing one into one another.”