Religion conceived that Source or God was outside the Self, living in some remote dimension of space, fully separated from the human condition. Human beings were not really worthy of God, but religion, in its self-enlightened state, gave humans the concept of faith. By having faith, God will come down and save you from the human condition, provided, of course, that you have faith and apply His commandments.
Ascension came along, not so much from religion, but rather spiritual-mystic sources, and posited that humans did not need to be passive in the application of faith, but rather they could ascend to the Source.
In other words, instead of waiting for God to come to you, you could go to God. Humans, under the proper tutelage of masters could learn how to ascend and attain the Godhood, and become a master of their own, serving God and His universe as an emissary of the Light.
Religion and spirituality really had the same idea, the only difference was that religion used passive faith while spirituality used active practices.
The First Point of ascension is the yearning for a Source outside the Self, hence division and disconnection.
Any First Point that begins in separation is pulled into the Human Mind System’s gravitational field and is lost in the deceptions therein.
Thus, ascension is not an aspect of the Sovereign Integral state. As written in my previous answer:
You are here and always have been and always will be. There is no where to go outside of yourself to find yourself or God or Light or enlightenment or ascension. Look at it this way, if you are self-contained, if the Sovereign Integral is indeed within you at all times, then where exactly do you need to ascend?
It is realization, not ascension. And realization has, as its First Point, the unconditional oneness, equality and truthfulness of Self in all life expressions. (While ascension’s First Point is: I am not equal to my Source, my Source is outside of me therefore I need to ascend to it in order to become a greater being more worthy of love and light).
Ascension is of the teacher-student ordering of the universe, residing within HMS. It defines the subtle aspects of self-deception that are caught-up in the spiritual belief systems of Earth and the interdimensional planes as well.
If you believe you are in the process of ascending, ask yourself the questions: Where I am ascending to? How do I know that that endpoint is not of the Human Mind System? Are my mental pictures of ascension based on my own experience or have they been downloaded from the information and knowledge systems of humanity – in the other words, the unconscious domain?
All of the energy, efforts, attention and learning that are placed on the ascension process are a diversion from your own realization of the Sovereign Integral. It is as if you have pursued a shadow in favor of the substance. The ascension pathway is ensconced in the comforts of gurus and masters – both physical and interdimensional – that supposedly support your journey into the Light and Love of God. Along this journey you see how it absolves you of responsibility related to this world’s real conditions of hunger, inequality, rape, war, abuse, servitude, illness, racism and a hundred other maladies. The absolution comes in the form of your journey itself. The diversion. The separation.
Realization of the Sovereign Integral consciousness is realization of one’s True Self as present in everyone else. You see the condition of the human family as your own, and your condition as one with everyone else.
You are in the moment, engaged in the dismantling of the HMS, knowing that as you do this, you are invoking the Sovereign Integral consciousness to manifest on Earth in a human instrument where there is complete and unconditional transparency and therefore expansion.
James Mahu
