This song is about awakening to the wisdom that absolute power not only is a fantasy played out by our ego based on fear but is also destroys us and the world around us. Nevertheless this destruction on all fronts is important to awaken us to an all-inclusive, more elevated vibration of love. It uses figurative wording that talks of Christian crusaders, impossing their beliefs in a violent way to a world foreign to them. How the illusion is not only isolating but it can also be hypnotizing, acknowledging the "dark" within all of us is primordial to this process of awakening. The best part of this song is the title "VIVA LA VIDA" which in Spanish means "BRAVO TO LIFE" and in my opinion it's there to let us know that at the end of the day it all will be fine, that we will awaken to this truth. Celebrating life as the classroom that it is for our souls and conciousness. The word Missionaries is placed instead of Crusaders for obvious reasons. Missionaries don't carry swords and shields like the song says. When he says Roman Cavalry choirs are singing, I think the word Cavalry is placed instead of Catholic to avoid controversy, since it's obviously speaking of a militaristic approach to faith. It makes more sense to say Roman Catholic choirs, doesn't it? It uncovers the marriage of the powerful and organized religion that was the norm during the middle ages between the European nations and the Vatican. If there's an actual channeling from a past life, It will have to be the king of either England, France or Spain during the middle ages crusades. These were the nations champions of Christianity, puppets of the Vatican. They brought Sheer terror over the arab world particularly Jerusalem during the crusades.