Two Movie Trailers to Check Out…
Here are trailers for two movies concerning monasticism in our time:
The first one, Of Gods and Men is a French film that will be released in American theaters this February. The second one, Mysteries of the Jesus Prayer is available for rent or purchase from iTunes.
Booksigning at First Christian Church of Atlanta this Sunday!
If you live in or near Atlanta, I hope you’ll come to a Reception and Booksigning for The Lion, The Mouse and the Dawn Treader this coming Sunday, January 30, 2011, at 12:15 PM at First Christian Church of Atlanta, 4532 LaVista Road, Tucker, GA 30084. I’ll be visiting with folks and signing books at the church where I taught the class that was the inspiration for this book. For more information, call 770.939.4358.
Refreshments will be served, and I am told that the hospitality committee at First Christian knows how to put on a lovely reception! So… I hope to see you there.
Quote for the Day
To a certain type of mind, the veritable practice of the Presence of God is not the intimate and adorable companionship of the personal Comrade or the Inward Light, but the awestruck contemplation of the Absolute, the “naked Godhead,” source and origin of all that Is. It is an ascent to the supernal plane of perception, where “the simple, absolute and unchangeable mysteries of heavenly Truth lie hidden in the dazzling obscurity of the secret Silence, outshining all brilliance with the intensity of their darkness, and surcharging our blinded intellects with the utterly impalpable and invisible fairness of glories which exceed all beauty” (Dionysius the Areopagite, “De Mystica Theologia”).
— Evelyn Underhill, Mysticism:
The Nature and Development
of Spiritual Consciousness
Atlanta Christian Mysticism Meetup Scheduled for February 2
Be there (aloha). Image via CrunchBase
The reboot of the Atlanta Christian Mysticism Meetup is underway! We have secured a location and scheduled a date & time for our first meeting, of what I hope will become a monthly occurrence.
The Meetup will convene at the Alcove Coffee & Tea Café, 4135 Lavista Rd, Tucker, GA 30084. Alcove is very conveniently located just 2/10 of a mile inside the perimeter off of I-285 exit 37 (LaVista Road exit). We’ll meet on Wednesday, February 2 at 7 PM. To help get the conversation rolling, I hope to have a suggested topic of discussion for each monthly meetup; the topic for this meeting is “What is Christian mysticism and why does it matter?” There is no cost for the Meetup, although if you could contribute a dollar to help pay for the monthly fee to Meetup.com, that would be great (and also plan on buying a cup of tea or coffee while you’re here).
Everyone is welcome, regardless of your spiritual, religious or denominational identity. All we ask is that everyone attending recognize that the topic is Christian mysticism, and that our purpose is to share information and understanding and hopefully build friendships: we’re not here to convert anyone to anything, and so we ask that everyone remain respectful of each other, even when we disagree. Thank you for your consideration on this matter.
Please come to the Meetup! If you attended any of the original Atlanta Christian Mysticism Meetups back in 2005-6, you’ll know how special these meetings can be.
To sign up and/or RSVP for this (and future) Meetups, visit: www.meetup.com/AtlantaChristianMysticism
Mysticism & Narcissism…
Here’s a very interesting, and somewhat challenging, quote from a Jewish Blogger:
It seems to me that [spiritualism] encourages self-involved people to become more self-involved. Spiritual types often talk about the “universe” in the same way that a certain kind of Christian or Jew sees the hand of God in every banal event, or a certain kind of New Yorker broadcasts every little conversation he’s had with his shrink. And while these examples may show that narcissists are drawn to whatever feeds their narcissism, I do think that spiritualists are more likely to confuse causality with their own egotism. I’ve never heard of anyone visiting a psychic in order to learn how to be more generous with other people.
— Gordon Haber, The False Science
Okay, my point in passing this on is not to take potshots at spiritualists or psychics. Rather, this struck a nerve with me because I’ve wondered the same thing about good old Christian contemplation. It’s the old navel-gazing issue: at what point does meditation, or prayer, or other practices associated with the contemplative life stop being forces for liberation and holiness, and instead simply function as ways of self-referential, narcissistic ego-building? “Look at me, I’m so spiritual, I pray the entire divine office and sit in silence for an hour every day.”
Teresa of Avila insisted that the only sure measure of progress in the spiritual life is the question of how we love. You want to find an authentic mystic or “spiritual master” to mentor you? Look for someone who is truly loving, kind, has healthy boundaries, a living conscience about matters such as justice and environmental sustainability, and who has a keen awareness of his or her own brokenness and woundedness (read: imperfection), but who is nevertheless trying to heal and grow.
Atlanta Christian Mysticism Meetup
Meetup: It's more than just politics... Image via CrunchBase
Way back in 2005, I started a Meetup on the topic of Christian Mysticism. I was the organizer of the Atlanta Christian Mysticism Meetup for almost two years, and during that time made a number of new friends, most notably Mike Morrell, who has practically introduced me to the entire Emergent Church Community. I think it’s fair to say that The Big Book of Christian Mysticism would never have been read (and endorsed) by people like Brian McLaren and Phyllis Tickle if I hadn’t met Mike. So, needless to say, I think starting this meetup was one of the smarter things I ever did.
In 2007 when I started writing The Big Book, I gave up the Meetup, and it was taken over by a church called the Center of Light. While I don’t see exactly eye-to-eye with the Center of Light folks on some issues, I liked the husband and wife team who were the priests of the Atlanta Center of Light, and so it seemed to be a reasonable home for the meetup. Indeed, they kept the meetup active up until the middle of last year. But recently I visited the page and noticed that they hadn’t organized a meeting since last summer. I emailed one of the priests to see what was going on, and found out that the Atlanta Center of Light was closing. They were moving to another part of the country, and leaving the meetup group effectively orphaned.
So, not wanting to see it die, I re-upped as the group organizer.
I’m not sure what this means, other than soon (perhaps as early as February) we’ll start regular meetings again. This means that, once a month, in a public setting somewhere in the Metro Atlanta area, people will be invited to gather to share a cup of coffee or tea and have conversation on Christian mysticism and contemplative spirituality.
Sound like fun? Well, if you’re in the Atlanta area, I hope you’ll join us. And if you’re not nearby, perhaps there’s a Christian mysticism meetup in your city (and if not, you could always start your own).
Click here to join the Atlanta Christian Mysticism Meetup Group: www.meetup.com/AtlantaChristianMysticism
Why I’m going to the Wild Goose Festival
God touches humanity...
The good folks who are organizing the Wild Goose Festival have just posted a short piece I wrote about why I’m excited to be participating in that event:
The Wild Goose Festival as the Gathering of the Tribes.
Please check it out. And even more importantly, make plans to attend the Wild Goose Festival, next summer in North Carolina! Purchase tickets here.
Snow at the Monastery
Here are some pictures of the Monastery of the Holy Spirit under several inches of snow — most unusual for us southerners. These photos are by Haven Sweet. (more…)
Register now for the Evelyn Underhill Conference: February 19, 2011
Awakening in God’s Love: Exploring the Christian Spirituality of Evelyn Underhill
Icon of Evelyn Underhill
Saturday, February 19, 2011
8:30 a.m.- 3:00 p.m.
St. Bartholomew’s Episcopal Church
1790 LaVista Rd., Atlanta, GA 30329
Acclaimed as one of the greatest spiritual writers of the twentieth century, Evelyn Underhill recovered the rich heritage of Christian mysticism and interpreted it for ordinary people as the spiritual life — life lived from the center, where one is anchored in God.
In the year 2011, we celebrate the 100th anniversary of her pioneering work, Mysticism: The Study of the Nature and Development of Man’s Spiritual Consciousness. A writer and spiritual director, Evelyn Underhill was the first woman to offer a retreat in Canterbury Cathedral and the first to lecture at Oxford University. Honored as a saint in the Anglican communion, her prolific writing endures, giving inspiration to those who recognize the need for contemplative living.
“Evelyn Underhill: Forerunner of Contemporary Spirituality”
Dana Greene
Keynote Speaker: Dana Greene
Evelyn Underhill reclaimed the Christian mystical tradition and translated it as the spiritual life for ordinary people. As such she was a precursor of the resurgence in contemplative practice today. Underhill is a woman for our times whose vocation was to proclaim to her contemporaries and to us: “there is a splendor burning in the heart of things.”
Historian and biographer, Dana Greene is and Underhill scholar, Dean Emerita of Oxford College of Emory University, and editor and author of seven books including Evelyn Underhill: Artist of the Infinite Life. She is a graduate of the Shalem Institute for Spiritual Formation, having served on its Board for many years, and she is currently president of the Evelyn Underhill Association (www.evelynunderhill.org), and writes for The National Catholic Reporter. Most recently, she served as executive director of the Aquinas Center of Theology at Emory University. Her other books on Underhill, Fragments from an Inner Life: The Notebooks of Evelyn Underhill and Evelyn Underhill: Modern Guide to the Ancient Quest for the Holy are out of print.
Guest Speakers will include:
Carl McColman
Carl McColman
Carl is the author of The Big Book of Christian Mysticism, The Lion, the Mouse and the Dawn Treader and the “Website of Unknowing” blog about Christian spirituality and mysticism (www.anamchara.com). He is a graduate of the Shalem Institute’s Program for Contemplative Group Leaders and is a Lay Associate of the Monastery of the Holy Spirit in Conyers, Georgia.
Margaret B. Ingraham
and
Margaret B. Ingraham
Recipient of an Academy of American Poets Award, the 2006 Sam Ragan Prize, and several poetry Fellowships from the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, Margaret (Peggy) Ingraham is the author of This Holy Alphabet and a chapbook, Proper Words for Birds (number 65 in the New Women’s Voices series from Finishing Line Press). Her poetry appears regularly in a wide variety of national literary journals.
Schedule for the Day
8:30 a.m. Hospitality and check in
9:00 a.m. Welcome and Introductions
9:15 a.m. Keynote address, Dana Greene
10:20 a.m. Discussion groups
11:45 a.m. Lunch, with Margaret Ingraham
12:45 p.m. Plenary, Carl McColman
1:40 p.m. Discussion groups
2:30 p.m. Taize Service
Discussion Groups: Participants will be invited to choose two of four possible discussions on: Saints and Mystics, the Spiritual Life, Prayer and Cooperation with God.
Cost: $45 per person (includes lunch and materials)
REGISTER online, or by downloading and mailing in a registration form with your check. Checks may be made out to the Diocese of Atlanta – IMTE and mailed, with registration form, to Diocese of Atlanta – IMTE, 2744 Peachtree Rd. NW, Atlanta, GA 30305.
Presented by the Institute for Ministry and Theological Education in parnership with The Cathedral of St. Philip and St. Bartholomew’s Episcopal Church
Quote for the Day
As Einstein conceives of space curved round the sun we, borrowing his symbolism for a moment, may perhaps think of the world of Spirit as curved round the human soul; shaped to our finite understanding, and therefore presenting to us innumerable angles of approach. This means that God can and must be sought only within and through our human experience. “Where,” says Jacob Boehme, “will you seek for God? Seek Him in your soul, which has proceeded out of the Eternal Nature, the living fountain of forces wherein the Divine working stands.
— Evelyn Underhill, The Life of the Spirit
and the Life of Today
To make hidden things visible
Image via Wikipedia
Like the P in psychology,
The H in psychiatry,
Invisible Ink
and the Truth in Theology…
The spell is complete,
Now all is visible.
In C. S. Lewis’s The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, the author does not say what exactly Lucy Pevensie had to recite in order to perform the spell to make hidden things visible. But in Michael Apted’s motion picture version of the story, we do get to hear her recite the spell — and what she says is pretty much what I’ve quoted above.
The spell seems to suggest that the key to making hidden things visible has something to do with learning to see what is hidden in plain sight. The P in psychiatry and the H in psychology may not be audible when we pronounce those words correctly, but all we have to do is read the words, and there those “hidden” letters are. Invisible ink might require a “spell” of its own in order to be rendered visible, such as applying heat or a particular chemical to the paper to make the ink appear. As for the truth in theology… well, this is an interesting question. The key element seems to be faith. Believing is seeing, as they say. Or, perhaps, the key is experience: experiencing is seeing.
Mysticism is like the truth in theology. It’s hidden in plain sight. It is “made visible” by either faith or experience (or, ideally, a combination of the two). When we dare to believe that there is something in or beyond the mysteries of life that imbue those mysteries with meaning, we become disposed to discern that very meaning for ourselves. But along with believing in the meaning of the mystery, actually embracing the mystery, and seeking to experience it from the inside out, seems to be just as valid and useful a technique for making the hidden things (of God) visible in our lives.
Remembering John O’Donohue
Today is the third anniversary of the passing of John O’Donohue, the noted Irish author and spiritual teacher, whose works include Anam Cara: A Book of Celtic Wisdom, Eternal Echoes: Exploring Our Yearning to Belong, Beauty: The Invisible Embrace, and To Bless the Space Between Us: A Book of Blessings. He also wrote several books of poetry and created several original spoken audio works.
In 1999 I had the good fortune to spend an afternoon with John O’Donohue, to interview him for a book industry trade publication. That interview is now archived on this website, and you can find it here:
Relations, Integrally
St. Martin and the Beggar, by El Greco. Beauty encounters that which is good. Image via Wikipedia
Happy New Year, everyone. May this be a year of good and beautiful dreams come true.
The other night at a Christmas party I had an interesting conversation with my friend Joe and a couple of young men who are students at the Art Institute of Chicago. We spoke about the relationship between art and politics. One of the students was very interested in this connection, and felt that “justice” was a category that could be applied to how we understand pretty much any kind of artwork. Does any given work of art emerge out of the struggle for justice? Does it testify for justice, or cry out against injustice? Is it borne of social privilege, and does it seek to reinforce that privilege rather than pointing toward a better or more just way?
As an integral thinker, I believe this student is chipping away at what Ken Wilber calls “the big three” — the beautiful, the good, and the true, which in our alienated/dissociated society are understood as art, morals and science. Wilber suggests that the dignity of modernity lies in the recognition of the distinction between art, morals and science; but the disaster of modernity lies in how science became privileged while art and morals became marginalized in our public and intellectual life. Thus, religion and art have become little more than hobbies, consumer choices that individuals are free to take or leave as they see fit, while the only thing that really matters is what is true — the province of science — and its mini-me, technology, which is concerned with instrumentality, or what “works.”
So to see these young artists in training be concerned about the relationship between art and justice is a good thing, even though I would prefer the broader term “goodness” to the more politically charged term of “justice.” Still, what is truly good is just and what is truly just is good, so no real quibble there. Joe noted that “anyone who claims art is not political is simply making a political statement about art.” Integrally speaking, that is to say, “to declare that art exists independently of morals is to make a moral judgment.” The more artists consider how qualities such as justice or goodness are essential to their work, the more hope we have for trying to find a way out of the stranglehold that scientific/technological instrumentality has on our common life.
This is not an art blog but rather a spiritual blog, and so I am more in the business of writing about what is good than what is beautiful. But I think this kind of necessary integral thinking is just as important coming from the other direction. Artists ponder the relationship between art and goodness; contemplatives need to be pondering the relationship between mysticism and beauty. Truth is not only good, it is beautiful. A true mysticism will necessarily be a beautiful mysticism. The practice of contemplative prayer is not only a search to dispose ourselves that what is good and what is true, but also — and just as importantly — to what is beautiful. This is not news to the contemplative tradition; indeed, from the Orthodox liturgy to the visions of Hildegarde of Bingen to the lyrical writing of Evelyn Underhill, beauty has long been recognized as central to true and good spirituality. Those of us who seek to foster a deeper contemplative practice would do well to ponder this in our lives today. How do we cultivate greater beauty in our lives? How do we support one another in our quest to embody, and receive, beauty? Not glamor, mind you, but beauty (and there is a difference).
The Lakota have a saying, Mitakuye Oyasin which means “All my relations” or “We are all related.” This is generally understood in a web-of-life sense: I am related to the trees, and the wildlife, and all that can be found in the great circle of my environment. And of course this is true. But I think we also need to be remembering how “all my relations” works on a spiritual or philosophical level as well. My art is related to questions of goodness and truth, of justice and politics. When I sit down to pray, am I resting on the privilege of my race and class, or am I silent in solidarity with those who suffer and those who struggle? And if so, then how is it making a difference in my life? For if there is any truth to Mitakuye Oyasin, then I am related to those who hunger and thirst, who are the victims of oppression (or the perpetrators of injustice). My contemplation, my prayer, my meditation, is only “real” insofar as it emerges out of a conscious recognition of this interrelatedness. For my prayer to be beautiful, my life must be true and my actions must be good. And all my relations will help me to see if these things are so.
To repeat how I began this post: Happy New Year, everyone. May this be a year of good and beautiful dreams come true.
