To understand the whole of reality has been a pursuit of humankind since the appearance of our species. Over the last few thousand years the human perception of physical reality has been transformed through discrete steps. Each paradigm advancement has presented a larger, more grand, more complete understanding. Now the beginning of the new millennium denotes the commencement of another profound advancement of humankind’s perception of the whole of existence. This new paradigm shift is of far greater magnitude and vastly more comprehensive than all those preceding.

Part I reviews the 5 primary past perceptions of reality: the Mideastern 3-Tiered Structure; the Greek Geocentric picture lasting until the 1600’s; its heliocentric replacement, the larger Galacticentric picture of the 1800’s; and, finally, the present Univercentric paradigm commencing around 1920.
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The Univercentric paradigm naturally raised the question “How came the universe and the trillion galaxies within?” By the 1960’s the answer was determined to be the “Big Bang.” A simultaneous drive to understand the forces within the universe culminated in the 1970’s with the Standard Model for non-gravitational interactions. Then in the 1980’s String Theory offered a means of unifying the non-gravitational forces with gravity and, in the process, enlarged the Univercentric paradigm from being 3+1 dimensional to being 9+1. The Whole Story of the Universe was shown to be much more complex than realized prior, but this enlargement was still consistent within the Univercentric Paradigm.

Hints of the next paradigm shift, beyond the Univercentric, first arose from developments in Inflation Theory. The most consistent physical explanation for the appearance of our universe implied our universe but one of many born as bubbles within an unstable ocean of spacetime. Further, while String Theory was proffered as a Theory of Everything it soon appeared to come in five different versions. Then, around 1994 the five were shown equivalent. However, the fundamental particle could no longer just string-like, but membrane-like and quantum mechanical consistency required spacetime to actually be 10+1.

Transformation from 9+1 dimensional reality into a 10+1 had more profound implications than did going from 3+1 to 9+1 dimensions. While String Theory was consistent with the Univercentric paradigm, M Theory is not. M Theory suggest the existence of a Multiverse containing at least 10100 to 101000 universes within.

Part two investigates philosophical and theological issues raised by an M Theory Multiverse including (i) the existence of the Multiverse in its entirety prior to the Big Bang and its revisions to the Big Bang; (ii) a global Multiverse time frame and implications; (ii) parallel universes eternally disconnected from ours; hidden universes gravitationally connected to ours; (iii) the fate of our universe; (iv) application of the Cosmological Anthropic Principle and life within the Multiverse; (v) the transcendence of God, as Creator, existing beyond (10+1)-dimensional spacetime; and (vii) comparison of a bulk Multiverse to St. Augustine’s block universe and related issues.