What happens to the astral body after death?

Will man ever reach the astral without passing through the stage called death? 

Yes—in time, for the astral consists of a number of planets—the earth plane is only one of the many, many ones, but through past connections became one by itself. 

Man had to pass out of consciousness for a moment in so-called death before he felt capable of ascending through the great distance and space. 

As time passed, all traces of the astral vanished and only the belief in it remained to help the struggling souls of the earth. 

A new system was formed because it became necessary, and birth was conceived—created. 

Men went to the earth plane in a false manner. In time the earth grew to believe it was the only planet of consequence—that all the others were nothing. As the ages went by, a climatic condition of the atmosphere came about, really caused by thought—for thought is atmosphere, and the astral schools and the earth plane school were separated. That is, they were not in relation or contact and only a vague thought of the astral existed. 

The earth would perish without the astral, for the astral is the creator of life and eternity, while the earth plane is only a dependent school. 

Therefore, men after a certain time upon the earth must cease their existence upon that planet and ascend to the astral for final tests. Then if necessary they will return again to the earth plane. 

Man is of the mind, and his thought can travel through all space. That is the secret, but without material aid his physical body cannot. 

The earth plane must grow back into the circle of astral schools—be one of them—or in time all belief in the astral would be lost and there would be no thought by which to ascend after passing on. 

The law of all being, mind, gives only so much time for the lessons to be completed upon the earth plane—therefore, in the scheme of all things, man must return to the astral. 

The Message—Lord Kitchener Lives