330- Do spirits know the time when they will have to reincarnate?
“They can sense it like a blind man who feels the fire he is approaching. They know they must return to a body just as you know you must die someday, but without knowing when it will happen.” (See no. 166)
– Is reincarnation therefore a necessity of spirit life, as death is a necessity of corporeal life?
“Yes it is.”
331- Do all spirits concern themselves with their approaching reincarnation?
“There are those who never give it a thought, who do not even comprehend it. It depends on the degree of their advancement. For some, uncertainty about their future life is a punishment.”
332- Can spirits hasten or delay the moment of their reincarnation?
“They may hasten it through strong desire. They may also delay it if they recoil from the upcoming trial, since among spirits there are cowardly and indifferent ones. However, they do not delay it with impunity; they will suffer for it, like those who refuse the medicine that can restore them to health.”
333- If a spirit felt quite happy in an average situation among discarnate spirits and had no ambition to evolve, could it prolong its errant state indefinitely?
“No, not indefinitely. Advancement is a necessity and spirits sense it sooner or later. All must evolve – it is their destiny.”
334- Is the union of a soul with a particular body predestined, or is the choice made at the last moment?
“The spirit is always designated beforehand. In choosing the trial it wishes to undergo, the spirit asks to reincarnate, and God, who sees and knows everything, sees and knows beforehand that a particular soul will unite with a particular body.”
335- Does a spirit have the right to choose the body it will enter, or does it only choose the kind of life that will serve as its trial?
“It may also choose its body because the body’s imperfections will be the trials that will help its advancement if it overcomes the obstacles it encounters thereby. This choice is not always up to the spirit but it may at least ask for it.”
– At the last moment, can a spirit refuse to enter the body that it has chosen?
“If it refuses it, it will suffer much more than one who had not undertaken a new trial in the first place.”
336- Could it happen that there might be no spirit who is willing to incarnate in a particular unborn child?
“God would provide for this. When a child is to be born alive it is always predestined to have a soul; nothing is created without a design.”
337- Can the union of a spirit with a particular body be imposed by God?
“Such a union may be imposed in the same way as the spirit’s other trials, especially when it is not yet able to make a conscious choice about the matter. Moreover, as an expiation, a spirit may be compelled to unite with the body of a particular child who, by its birth and the position it will have in the world, may become a means of punishment for that spirit.”
338- If it just so happened that several spirits presented themselves to occupy the same body, how would the decision be made among them?
“Many could very well request the same body, but in such cases it is God who decides which one is best suited to fulfill the mission for which the child is destined. But as I have already said, the spirit is designated before the instant in which it is to join the body.”
339- Is the moment of incarnation accompanied by a state of confusion similar to the one following discarnation?
“The confusion is much greater and especially much longer. At death, a spirit escapes slavery; at birth, it enters it.”
340- Is the moment of incarnation a solemn one for the spirit? Does it accomplish it as something serious and important?
“The spirit is like a traveler embarking on a dangerous voyage, not knowing if he will meet death on the waves ahead.”
Travelers who set out on a voyage are aware that they will be exposed to dangers, but they do not know if they will run aground. The same applies to a spirit. It knows the kind of trials to which it will be submitted but does not know if it will fail.
Just as the death of the body is a kind of rebirth for the spirit, reincarnation is a kind of death, or rather, a kind of exile and confinement. It leaves the spirit world for the corporeal world just as, after having been a human being, it leaves the corporeal world for the world of spirits. A spirit knows that it will reincarnate, just as a human being knows that he or she will die. Like humans, however, the spirit only becomes aware of it at the last moment, when the appointed time has arrived. Then, in that supreme moment, confusion takes hold of it, similar to someone in the throes of death. This confusion lasts until the new existence is firmly established. Thus, the commencement of reincarnation is a kind of death throes for the spirit.
341- Is a spirit’s uncertainty as to the probability of successfully enduring the trials it will experience in life a cause of anxiety before its incarnation?
“It is a cause of great anxiety because the trials of its existence will either delay or hasten its evolution, depending on whether they are borne well or badly.”
342- At the moment of its reincarnation, is the spirit accompanied by spirit friends who come to assist with its departure from the spirit world, just as they come to meet it when it returns?
“That depends on the sphere the spirit inhabits. If it belongs to a sphere in which affection reigns, spirits who love it accompany it up to the last moment, encouraging it and quite frequently following it during its lifetime.”
343- Are the spirit friends who follow us throughout life those who we sometimes see in our dreams, and who show their affection for us even though we do not recognize them physically?
“Quite often they are. They come to visit you as you would visit a prisoner in jail.”
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