Going Into the Light

Also on this website: Toby Johnson's books: GAY SPIRITUALITY: The Role of Gay Identity in the Transformation of Human Consciousness GAY PERSPECTIVE: Things Our Homosexuality Tells Us about the Nature of God and the Universe SECRET MATTER, updated, revised & expanded eidtion from Lethe Press with Afterword by Mark Jordan Read Toby's review of Samuel Avery's The Dimensional Structure of Consciousness Funny Coincidence: "Aliens Settle in San Francisco" GETTING LIFE IN PERSPECTIVE PLAGUE: A NOVEL ABOUT HEALING. Books on Gay Spirituality: White Crane Gay Spirituality Series   Articles and Excerpts: The Simple Answer to the Gay Marriage Debate Why gay people should NOT Marry Wedding Cake Liberation Gay Marriage in Texas What's ironic Shame on the American People The "highest form of love"  The cause of homosexuality What is homosexuality? What Jesus said about Gay Rights The purpose of homosexuality What the Bible Says about Homosexuality Mesosexual Ideal for Straight Men Varieties of Gay Spirituality Why Gay Spirituality: Spirituality as Artistic Medium "It's Always About You" The myth of the Bodhisattva Avalokitesvara Joseph Campbell's description of Avalokiteshvara You're Not A Wave Meditation Practice Curious Bodies What Toby Johnson Believes The Joseph Campbell Connection, The Nature of Religion Being Gay is a Blessing Freedom of Religion The Gay Agenda Gay Saintliness Gay Spiritual Functions The subtle workings of the spirit in gay men's lives.  "The Evolution of Gay Identity" "St. John of the Cross & the Dark Night of the Soul." Avalokiteshvara at the Baths.  Eckhart's Eye Let Me Tell You a Secret Religious Articulations of the Secret The Collective Unconscious Driving as Spiritual Practice Teenage Prostitution and the Nature of Evil Allah Hu: "God is present here"   Adam and Steve Gay retirement and the "freelance monastery" Seeing with Different Eyes What are you looking for in a gay science fiction novel? The mystical experience at the Servites'  Castle in Riverside The Great Dance according to C.S.Lewis The Techniques Of The World Saviors Part 1: Brer Rabbit and the Tar-Baby Part 2: The Bodhisattva Avalokiteshvara Part 3: Jesus and the Resurrection Part 4: A Course in Miracles The Secret of the Clear Light Understanding the Clear Light Mobius Strip Finding Your Tiger Face How Gay Souls Get Reincarnated About Alien Abduction In honor of Sir Arthur C Clarke The D.A.F.O.D.I.L. Alliance Toby's friend and nicknamesake Toby Marotta. About Michael Talbot, gay mystic About Guy Mannheimer The Gay Spirituality Summit in May 2004 and the  "Statement of Spirituality"

A death experience imagined          from PLAGUE: A Novel about Healing by Toby Johnson This was a really serious accident, he thought to himself. And he realized, a bit surprised, that it seemed to be over already. He wondered what had happened. Maybe it was a bad dream, he thought, and wondered where he was.     Maybe I'm in a hospital. Oh God, don't let me be burned. I think I'd rather die than be burned into a monster. He couldn't exactly feel his body, though he sensed that he was still the same person he'd always been. He looked about him. It seemed to be very dark. He wasn't sure if he was standing up or sitting down. He tried to move, but discovered he couldn't tell if he was successful or not. He was surprisingly without fear or emotion. He peered out into the comfortable darkness. A light appeared in the distance. With a start, Mark realized where he was and what had happened. "I am not going to be afraid," he said aloud and seemed to hear echoes rebounding back to him. He remembered himself saying so recently that love is the key to changing universes. And he remembered [the Buddhist story he’d told Jon earlier about the bodhisattva whom they’d been jokingly calling] Avalo-be-walla-walla* and smiled. He had an odd inkling that he'd done this many times before and that he was waking up to his real identity. He willed himself toward the light, and suddenly was rushing into it. The searing blue-white brilliance surrounded him, accelerating him forward. He had the thought that he could stop this forward motion and return, that maybe he could even stop death and go back into his body. He remembered Jon and for a moment a pang of longing burned in his heart. He'd loved Jon so much. But he knew he was not going back; that was not the thing to do. And he felt his heart filling up with excitement and joy. He knew Jon wouldn't want him to turn back now. And he felt that part of him that had been observing so detachedly begin to melt away. . . until there seemed to be only the light and the joy and the rush of forward movement. PLAGUE: A novel About Healing by Toby Johnson, p 207 *The Mahayana Buddhist story of Avalokiteshvara is told in the excerpt from PLAGUE titled "The Fourth Quill" Read Two Suggested Meditation Practices for a Funeral

Toby Johnson, PhD is author of eight books: three non-fiction books that apply the wisdom of his teacher and "wise old man," Joseph Campbell to modern-day social and religious problems, three gay genre novels that dramatize spiritual issues at the heart of gay identity, and two books on gay men's spiritualities and the mystical experience of homosexuality. In addition to the novels featured elsewhere in this web site, Johnson is author of IN SEARCH OF GOD IN THE SEXUAL UNDERWORLD and THE MYTH OF THE GREAT SECRET (Revised edition): AN APPRECIATION OF JOSEPH CAMPBELL.

Johnson's Lammy Award winning book GAY SPIRITUALITY: The Role of Gay Identity in the Transformation of Human Consciousness was published in 2000.

His Lammy-nominated book  GAY PERSPECTIVE: Things Our Homosexuality Tells Us about the Nature of God and the Universe was published by Alyson in 2003.