Secondly his view that in any society, there is a collective unconscious. If people say there is no such thing as “society”, they do not know what they are talking about. Human beings always instinctively respond to one another; and a group spirit emerges, even if it is only the spirit of panic.
Under certain conditions materials resonate; atoms vibrate in sympathy with their neighbours, and even electrons do giving rise to super-conductivity. Human beings do the same. Now that the living traditions of England have vanished, it is impossible to tell which people among a group at a meeting have a hidden agenda; you only know instinctively what it is expedient to say, because it will achieve its objective. And you equally know instinctively that to say more will fail, not because it isn’t true; but because it is contrary to the spirit of the meeting. The collective unconscious of any gathering is very real; and one is dimly aware of it, sufficiently so to thread one’s way through its labyrinthine network. Do not let the reader think that by writing of “spirit possession”, I am anxious to return to New Testament style exorcism; I am not, though there may have been something in it. Nor do I like Machiavelli, although there are a few gems to be found even in him. For instance, he says there are three attitudes of mind in a Prince; the first sees problems of its own volition and understands them, and that is “excellent”. The second sees problems, and understands them when explained to him, and that also is “excellent”. The third can neither see, nor understand when they are explained, and that is “useless”!
What has this to do with the ministry of Jesus, and the religion which he inaugurated? Not very much; but it has a great deal to do with coping with professional life in England today. We still need, and always will, the inspiration of self-sacrifice; but for society to continue we need organizing ability as well. You cannot run a society on self-sacrifice. Not even the Army wants to be full of heroes; it wants to recruit predominantly good family men, who have a lot to lose. And it is important to realize that Jesus was a man; which meant that he could not do everything, and that the strain on him in doing what he did must have been almost overwhelming. Is it not better to marvel that he never was false to his nature, even when stumbling under the cross at the end of his physical strength; than analyse with overmuch scholarship what he said in a very different social environment. He was true to the spirit within him right to the absolute end. And so he is an inspiration to us, who have to thread our way through the labyrinthine convolutions of committee meetings and Court proceedings, not only with integrity but with some of the subtlety of Machiavelli.
The significance of Jesus’ life is not so much that he laid down a moral code in the Sermon on the Mount, nor that he expiated the sins of the world by dying on the cross. The significance is that he allowed himself to be filled with the spirit of God, whether it came to him by birth or baptism, and allowed it to guide his actions, wherever it led, and despite the appalling consequences to himself in the end. So we, if we have any imagination, can allow ourselves to be inspired by his example; and do the same, filled with whatever spirit the Creator gives us for a companion. It may be the spirit of Jesus, it may be his own spirit, the spirit of the Creator, it may be the spirit of a woman, it may be the spirit of Justice; it may be several of these. Christianity is about spirit possession; and until you have grasped this, you haven’t even begun to imitate Jesus. With our insane cult of the multicultural society, which breaks down the living traditions of any country that embraces it, being true to the spirit within oneself is as good a way of “seeing off” political correctness as any other. Imitating Jesus does not necessarily mean ending up on a metaphorical cross; it means playing a part in society with integrity, whatever that part is.
Jesus is relevant to our conduct in the secular world, even if the teaching of his Church is blandly irrelevant to someone striving to be effective with integrity in it. As regards how you should behave in the Romeo and Juliet situation, I think the Greek Oracle might have been more help.