The unexpected popularity of the new documentary Won’t You Be My Neighbor? shows how much people are craving a simpler, gentler, kinder world than the one we’re experiencing today. The film recounts how Fred Rogers, the host and creator of the 1960s children’s show Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood, used that TV show as his ministry—he was a Presbyterian minister—to demonstrate a friendly and loving neighborhood environment where all children were accepted, appreciated and loved. Even difficult topics like death and divorce were taken up and discussed in Mr. Rogers’ quiet and compassionate way, to teach children how to successfully cope with life’s sometimes overwhelming challenges. Everything was about love, he said—either giving it or needing it—and he focused his show on providing love in many forms to everyone in the neighborhood, unconditionally. 

Many are understandably cynical, thinking that such a world is possible only in flights of childhood imagination. Yet the wisest voices in history, from Gandhi to King to Mandela and many others have told us that our intrinsic nature is to love.

Wouldn’t we all like our neighborhoods to be like Mr. Rogers’? Well, a planetary culture based on real love—a love-in-action that encompasses wisdom, compassion, sharing, justice and acceptance—is the vision for humanity set forth by a great spiritual teacher by the name of Maitreya. According to British author Benjamin Creme, Maitreya has been in our everyday world since 1977, working behind the scenes for our betterment until the conditions are right for him to appear before all of us simultaneously on an international television/internet broadcast. As other great teachers before him, such as Krishna, the Buddha, and Mohammed have done, he has come to bring us the next lessons we need to continue our evolutionary journey on Earth in this new age. And he has brought the Masters of Wisdom, a group of similarly enlightened beings, with him.

While perhaps relatively foreign to western sensibilities, the idea of Masters is well known to eastern cultures. The Masters are simply individuals who have refined their consciousness to the point where they can demonstrate their innate divinity on a moment-to-moment basis in a way we generally cannot. They could be considered our Elder Brothers.

Much as Mr. Rogers spoke earnestly and truthfully with the children in his neighborhood, during his international broadcast, Maitreya will explain that we are all equally beautiful divine beings who have forgotten who we are. He’ll tell us how we’ve lost our way in competition and materialism and how we can repair the damage we’ve done to each other and the Earth. He’ll advise us as one human family to share the resources of the Earth more fairly, as an individual family would do, and he’ll describe the miraculous future we can create together if we choose to share. 

In three volumes—Maitreya’s Mission Volumes I, II, and III—Benjamin Creme reveals the outlines of Maitreya’s plan for humanity—which is nothing like our present experience. If we had to choose between the two today, there is no doubt what our choice would be. Let’s take a look at some of the ways our reality will be different, if we decide to act on the understanding that we’re all brothers and sisters in the One Human Family.   

Under the guidance of Maitreya and the Masters, we will experience Oneness in an entirely new fashion—not just in theory or in terms of a utopian platitude, but palpably and undeniably. A new energy will begin to pervade our relationships and institutions; a new sense of freedom and joy will replace current tensions and fears. Fairness, cooperation and sharing will become the norm instead of divisiveness and feelings of separation. We will enter an era of tranquility and peace—in exact proportion to the present discord. 

Politically and economically, the present system of competition, subterfuge, belligerence, war and terrorism will give way to a completely new, yet ages old, understanding—that as we harm others, we inevitably inflict that very same harm on ourselves. We will comprehend on a practical level the Law of Karma—that whatever causes we set in motion, for good or ill, individually and collectively, inexorably come back and lead to effects which condition our lives and the life of our planet. The Law of Karma, it will be understood, is immutable and governs life in all of Cosmos. 

The unrest in much of the world can be seen as the beginning of this new understanding. People worldwide sense the danger of the times, the inadequacy of our present systems and the need for a fresh approach. Millions have repeatedly hit the streets in protest during the past 20 years, demanding an end to war, environmental degradation, economic oppression and political corruption. This voice of the people, further galvanized by Maitreya and the Masters, will lead to a tipping point, an irrefutable worldwide demand for real justice and sanity, a demand the magnitude of which no government or institution on Earth will be able to withstand.

Economically, the acceptance of the principle of sharing—a just and equitable redistribution of the food and resources of the world—will replace the present modus operandi of competition and ravenous consumption at all costs. No longer will billions be forced to make do on $2 a day or less. No longer will children die of malnutrition and related causes in a world with a significant surplus per capita of food. No longer will multitudes have to live in horrifically substandard conditions, lacking even the most basic necessities to sustain life.

New technologies that will transform the way we live are waiting in the wings, with the first stages of their development taking place even now. Solar power will eventually become a new Technology of Light, powered by the sun, that will supply our energy grids, transport systems and all our other energy requirements. This technology will be clean, unlimited and freely available to all. No longer will we befoul the environment burning fossil fuels and fight protracted wars in vain efforts to control their sources.

Even now, new modes of transportation are being developed—quiet, fast and efficient—to replace the noisy, crowded, enervating ones in which we now travel. The accelerating development of the new, so-called hyperloop might be seen as one of the first steps in the evolution of these new modes of travel. 

Once the principle of sharing has been universally adopted, a humanity freed from the overwhelming stresses and pressures of trying to survive will experience a freedom and an increase in leisure time available now only to the privileged few. As is already occurring, automated devices will perform manifold tasks, and the human family, unshackled from the burden of drudgery and endless repetitive toil, will witness a blossoming—an explosion—of creativity and artistry the like of which has never been seen. One Master of Wisdom, Djwhal Khul, has said that the art of the past, compared to the art of the coming time, will be like comparing children’s building blocks with the great cathedrals of Europe.  

Much ill health will be alleviated by the reduction of stress and through gifts from the Masters. One gift is 777 springs of healing waters to help cleanse the physical body. Some have already been discovered: in Tlacote, Mexico; Nordenau, Germany; and Nadana, India, near Delhi. The Technology of Light, mentioned above, will ultimately facilitate a process whereby, using our own DNA structure, organs can be rebuilt and our bodies revitalized. With new information from the Masters, healing with sound and color will also become sciences of the future.

The universal practice of cremation rather than burial will prevent diseases from migrating into the soil, then into plants and animals we consume, so they will no longer be transferred to future generations. And, as most farming will be organically based, the nutritional value of food will increase and the chemicals and poisons that negatively impact health will go. As a result of all these changes, we will live longer and with more vitality.

Gradually, the worst slums in major cities will be replaced by human-scale housing interspersed with parks, neighborhood shops, and cultural centers, and many people will move from central cities to rural and suburban areas. New buildings will be shaped quite differently from past and present structures, with some being designed to focus and accumulate specific energies.

A new science, the psychology of the soul, will underpin all future educational efforts. The fulfillment of each child’s soul purpose, which teachers will be trained to assess, will become the focus of individualized instruction. Seen as a soul in incarnation, each child’s validity and right to self-expression will be respected. Schools and colleges will integrate increasingly with their surrounding communities, and a closer relationship with work will become the norm, leading to “schools without walls.” Education will rise to the highest priority in each country.

In the future, television will be the key tool through which Maitreya and the Masters teach humanity. “The Masters can project onto the television screens a view of life in the far, far distant past, in Atlantean days, and forward into the future, showing visions of what can be,” Mr. Creme reports. There will be wonderful programs for children, too, perhaps something similar to Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood.  

As ecological imbalance is one of the top challenges of the next few decades, it will be tackled as a priority if we accept the Masters’ guidance. The pollution of our air, waters, and soil is slowly poisoning everyone; the decimation of the world’s forests and global warming threaten us in numerous ways. Reversing global warming will require the participation of every nation and a complete transformation of the economic structure of the world into one that’s sustainable. The Paris Agreement is a good start on the former; the latter will mean acceptance of the just redistribution of planetary resources that Maitreya will recommend. We will come to see that the urgent need to restore our planet to health and equilibrium rests on the shoulders of all, the powerful and the humble alike. 

The Masters have the technology to neutralize the greenhouse effect, atmospheric pollution, and even the effects of nuclear radiation—but we must change our ways before it can safely be given to us. Maitreya will teach that man, God, and nature are one, and that the proper care of the planet is essential to the well-being of the whole. Consequently, a growing concern for nature will soon lead to universally accepted legislation to insure better stewardship of the Earth. And, we in the developed world will simplify our modes of living, cease gross over-production and planned obsolescence of products, and stop using atomic fission as a source of energy. People will live in closer contact with nature, and there will be greater harmony among the plant, animal, and human kingdoms. 

Looking at our world today, it’s hard to imagine that the average person’s dreams of harmony, happiness, peace and fulfillment could possibly be realized, much less those of everyone on the planet. However, that is Maitreya’s promise: if we choose to care for each other and the Earth as one interdependent whole and share the abundant resources given us, we’ll create a civilization more magnificent than any yet known. Mr. Rogers showed us a small neighborhood where all the inhabitants lived peacefully with each other; it’s up to us to expand that vision to include all of humanity, the other kingdoms of nature, and the Earth itself.