A Flock of Books (for the Wild Goose Festival)
Here’s a gallery of selected books by some of the speakers, authors, conversationalists, storytellers, and agitators who will be present at the first Wild Goose Festival, to be held in North Carolina this coming June 23-26. If you’re like me, you probably find this list of books in itself to be pretty exciting. Imagine the opportunity to hear — and interact with — the authors of all these books, along with a few thousand other creative, visionary, and justice-oriented people of faith. Throw in some great music, opportunities for artistic expression, and creative worship experiences, and you have the Wild Goose Festival. I hope I’ll see you there. To learn more, visit the website or just go ahead and buy your tickets already! (more…)
Evelyn Underhill: from Atlanta to the Huffington Post
Yesterday was the Evelyn Underhill Celebration at St. Bartholomew’s Episcopal Church in Atlanta. Over sixty people attended; with presentations by Dr. Dana Greene (a leading Underhill scholar) and me, breakout groups doing lectio divina exercises using excerpts from Underhill’s writings, and a lovely Taizé service to close the day, it was truly a mini-retreat. I came away refreshed and with my love for Underhill renewed yet again.
As part of the preparation for the weekend, a wrote a short piece on why Underhill’s classic book Mysticism: A Study in The Nature and Development of Spiritual Consciousness still matters. I submitted it to the Huffington Post, where it was published as After a Century, Why Mysticism Still Inspires.
So if you missed the conference, at least the HuffPost article can give you a glimpse in the wonder and importance of Evelyn Underhill and her important work advocating for Christian mysticism in the modern world — which we postmoderns can also benefit from.
Celtic Wisdom… in Latvia!
Today I received a package of books from Alpha Press, who publish the “Complete Idiot’s” guides. My Complete Idiot’s Guide to Celtic Wisdom has been translated into Latvian!
Ceļvedis ķeltu gudrībā (The Complete Idiot's Guide to Celtic Wisdom)
Amazon.com does not list the Latvian edition, so I can’t provide a link to it on their website, but here is a link to a website in Latvia that carries the book: Ceļvedis ķeltu gudrībā.
As of this writing, I have several copies that I’d be willing to sell to readers in the United States, so if you or someone you love speaks Latvian and wants to read this book, drop me a line (via my contact page). Once they’re gone I probably won’t have any more, so if you want it, don’t delay.
Quote for the Day
To many early Church Fathers, “mystical” signified the allegorical interpretation of scripture, especially the disclosing of Christ as the key to unlocking the secrets of the Old Testament. Scripture, Christologically interpreted, was the ground of all Christian thought, including mysticism, especially in the first centuries. Jesus was sometimes called the “mystical angel” whose entire life, death, resurrection, and glorification were understood as the truly mystical.
Eventually, Christians used the word “mystical” with respect to the sacraments, especially the Eucharist. The Fathers of the Church spoke of Christ’s “mystical Pasch,” the “mystical sacrifice of his Body and Blood,” and the “mystical bread and wine.” “Mystical waters,” of course, referred to baptism. The profoundest mysteries of the faith — such as the Trinity and Christ’s Divinity — were likewise deemed supremely “ineffable and mystical.” Especially in its formative stages, Christian mysticism was always both ecclesial, that is, realized only in and through the community, and scriptural, that is, tied to the spiritual, hidden, or mystical meaning of the sacred text.
— Harvey D. Egan, SJ, Soundings in the
Christian Mystical Tradition
Thought for the Day
Too many ascetics fail to become great saints precisely because their rules and ascetic practices have merely deadened their humanity instead of setting it free to develop richly, in all its capacities, under the influence of grace.
— Thomas Merton, Thoughts in Solitude
Do Be Do Be Do
A new friend of mine has this on her Facebook page: “We’re human beings, not human doings.” This reminds me of Evelyn Underhill, whose admittedly Platonic approach to mysticism seeks to find the eternal world of being over and above the ever-changing world of becoming (or “doing”). I’m also reminded of the Buddhist notion that all things are impermanent — the world of becoming is also of necessity the world of change, of decay, of death. Finally, I am reminded of the theme of the Lay Associates retreat at the Monastery of the Holy Spirit this past weekend: that contemplation, the contemplative life, is ultimately not something we do — like centering prayer or lectio divina — but is truly and finally simply something we are.
All this is true enough (although I chafe at the Platonic idea that being is somehow “higher” than doing). But I’m left with wondering: are we to concentrate so entirely on our being, that our doing simply gets ignored? This seems to me to lead to the heresy of quietism. Quietism, where we are so liberated from having to do anything that we end up doing… nothing. We end up reacting with hostility and anger at life’s demands on us. We become angry because we are so stressed out, and yet we refuse to take the steps to de-stress ourselves: steps that include, ironically enough, practices like meditation and centering prayer.
So once again I find myself sitting, next to Thomas Merton, in the belly of a paradox. Embracing the contemplative life means not having to do anything, but simply to be, in the present, awake, mindful. And embracing the contemplative life means making choices, which is the most fundamental thing we have to do. I, for one, have been noticing that my silent prayer seems to have hit a plateau: my patterns of distraction seem to be dancing around me in circles, and while I’m fairly disciplined at embracing the silence every morning, my vesper silence pretty much isn’t happening. So what am I to do? Yes, “do.” It seems that I have a choice: I can “be” happy or unhappy with where I am; if I choose to be happy, I don’t have to do anything — and nothing changes. But if I choose to believe that things can change for the better, than I have to do something about it (even if that “something” means simply to pray, to ask for help, to get out of my own way so that the Holy Spirit can act in my life). The risk of overemphasizing what I do, of course, is Pelagianism, the idea that my own well-being, wholeness, salvation, whatever you want to call it, is entirely up to me and fully within my ability to achieve. But the other risk, as I’ve pointed out, is quietism: sitting around, doing nothing, simply being whatever I am, passive and convinced that everything is perfect just as it is and I need to change nothing. I’m not very interested in being either a Pelagian or a quietest. So I’m left in the paradox, trusting that the contemplative life is not about what I do, and yet doing what I think needs to be done (in my case, considering options like a class on meditation or Shambhala training or something along those lines).
To embrace the contemplative life, there is nothing we need to do. And to be a contemplative, there is no limit to what we will be asked to do. Find the nonduality in this one, and you’ll be well on your way…
This about sums it all up...
Carmelite Review
Carmelite Review, Fall/Winter 2010
In the Fall/Winter 2010 issue of Carmelite Review, Father Gregory Houck, O.Carm. had this to say about The Big Book of Christian Mysticism:
When I was an undergraduate taking philosophy, my professor said to the class that most philosophers are not actually philosophers; rather, they are merely historians of philosophy. What he was saying is that there is a clear distinction between knowing content and practicing that content. Since then I have found that this same distinction can be applied to many disciplines, and is especially true in religion — the difference between “talking the talk and walking the walk.” When reading The Big Book of Christian Mysticism: the Essential Guide to Contemplative Spirituality by Carl McColman, I quickly found that the author is doing both.
Although he has entitled this “the Big Book” it actually is moderate in length, only 320 pages. In comparison, Teresa of Avila’s The Interior Castle and Thérèse’s Story of a Soul are both around 200 pages. And in those 320 pages he covers a lot of historical ground — from Plotinus (around 250 AD) to Evelyn Underhill (died 1941) to himself. He proves himself a historian of spirituality. What is especially valuable here are the appendices: appendix A is a chronological list of mystical writers and their major works starting with Saint Paul and ending with Richard Rohr, appendix B then provides a synopsis of each of those major works (a massive undertaking in itself), and appendix C provides just a few online resources.
It's not really THAT big...
Even though Carl McColman shows himself well-versed in the history of spirituality, he has not structured the book as a historical montage at all. Rather, he has written a ‘how to’ manual and it seems that he has used his own journey to structure it. This is exactly how Teresa of Avila structures The Foundations, Story of Her Life, and The Interior Castle. McColman has not written an autobiography though. The examples he uses throughout come from the many spiritual writers he has read, or from people who is personally walking with.
What makes this book especially valuable is that he tries to clearly define and describe terms. This is really good. What is meant by “purgative, illuminative and unitive”? What is “meditation” and what is “contemplation” and what is the difference between those two terms? What is “Lectio Divina”? What is meant by “Dark Night of the Senses” and “Dark Night of the Soul”? And, of course, what is “Mysticism” and how is it distinguished from “Prayer”?
The Carmelites show up a lot in this book, but does that surprise us? He refers to Teresa and John a lot, of course. But he also brings up Edith Stein, Mary Magdalene d’Pazzi, Lawrence of the Resurrection and Thérèse. I am surprised, though, that Titus Brandsma is not mentioned.
I highly recommend this book — both to Carmelites and to any person interested in spirituality and mysticism. Spiritual directors should have it on hand for directees who are asking “mystical” questions. Lay Carmelites should read it because it puts together all the pieces they have learned in their formation into one narrative. Preachers should have it on hand for the wealth of quotations it offers from a large host of spiritual writers. And anyone who is on the quest to see the face of the living God should have it on hand to provide some light whenever the path gets cloudy. Although not lengthy at all, The Book of Christian Mysticism lives up to its name.
The Atlanta Christian Mysticism Meetup… Off and Running
The ecstasy of Saint Teresa. Just one of many reasons why Christian mysticism is controversial.
Last night was the inaugural meeting of the rebooted Atlanta Christian Mysticism Meetup.
Alas, I forgot to take my camera, so I have no incriminating images to share with you. But I can tell you about it: we had eleven people show up, seven of whom I had never met in person before (although a few of those I knew from online). The participants seemed to represent a variety of church affiliations (or, non-affiliation), ages, and perspectives on mysticism. We structured the meetup around three questions:
- What does “mysticism” mean to you?
- Why does mysticism matter to you?
- Why specifically Christian mysticism?
Of course, people came up with a wide array of responses, although in general, the consensus seemed to fall somewhere along these lines:
- Mysticism is the quest for a deeper sense of union or connection with God;
- Mysticism matters because such a connection is something that, once tasted, a person will devote the rest of his or her life to seeking more;
- Christian mysticism appeals both because of its communal dimension (love neighbors as well as loving God) and because, frankly, most of us grew up in the Christian tradition.
In a mere 90 minutes, we could all barely do more than introduce ourselves and have the most basic of conversations. But we’ll meet again on March 2. If you are in the Atlanta area, I do hope you’ll join us. Here’s the details:
Atlanta Christian Mysticism Meetup for March 2011: Wednesday Evening Conversation
When: March 2, 2011, 7:00 – 8:30 PM
Where: Alcove Coffee & Tea, 4135 Lavista Rd Tucker, GA (jut inside the perimeter off of exit 37)
Cost: Suggested donation of $1 to cover Meetup expenses, plus please support Alcove!
Topic: What do mystics do? We’ll explore not only how the great mystics throughout history practiced their spirituality, but also how mysticism can make a difference in our spiritual lives today.
Hope to see you there! And if you’re not a member of the Atlanta Christian Mysticism Meetup, you can join by following this link.
