Bloomsbury Guide to Christian Spirituality

The Bloomsbury Guide continues from strength to strength. Two news items this week. First, I received a message from Archbishop Thomas Menamparampil of Assam with whom I had the pleasure of spending a couple of days in Bangalore earlier this month. I sent him a copy and he told me how delighted he was with it. He also asked us to pray for his peace mission in North East India. He is presently negotiating a peace initiative for a dialogue between the Rengma Nagas and the Karbis and asks for us to hold this in our prayers.
And then from the States I receive a message from ‘Choice Journal’ which presents reviews of academic journals. To my surprise the Bloomsbury Guide has been awarded one of the ‘Outstanding Academic Titles’ of 2013 – wow! Apparently it demonstrates:


• overall excellence in presentation and scholarship
• importance relative to other literature in the field
• distinction as a first treatment of a given subject in book or electronic form
• originality or uniqueness of treatment
• value to undergraduate students
• importance in building undergraduate library collections

(see http://www.ala.org/acrl/choice/outstanding for more)

After all the hard work Richard, myself and the contributors put into it it is great to have this accolade. My thanks to everyone who helped make this happen.

Best

Peter

Teresa of Avila Conference June 2015

Dear All
One of my first duties on returning is to publish the poster for our forthcoming Teresa conference in June 2015. With Professors Julia Kristeva, Bernard McGinn, Gillian Ahlgren and Rowan Williams having agreed to speak it looks like being a tremendous event. We have limited numbers to 100 so do consider booking early! We also have a powerful Carmelite presence, both Discalced and Carmelite including Wilfrid McGreal, Matthew Blake, Iain Matthew and the Carmelite sisters from the UK. Do please keep this venture in your prayers and we look forward to welcoming you next year to celebrate Teresa's big 500! best Peter


Teresa of Avila – 1515 to 2015: Mystical Theology and Spirituality in the Carmelite Tradition

Proposed Programme Thursday 18th June 2015

Day One: Teresa in Her Context

08.30 onwards Registration (Reception and Refectory)

09.00 Arrivals 09.30 Welcome and Introductions. WDR

10.00 Keynote Address: Professor Bernard McGinn

11.00 Break

11.30 Keynote Address: Fr Wilfrid McGreal OCarm

13.00 Lunch – Dolche Vita Cafe 14.00 Short Papers – K Block 16.15 Break – Tea/Coffee available

16.45 Keynote Address: Dr Edward Howells/Dr Peter Tyler

18.15 Finish 18.30 Supper – Refectory (residential delegates only) 19.30 Evening Event 21.00 End of Day One – SU Bar open

Friday 19th June 2015

Day Two: The Impact of Teresa

09.30 Keynote Address: Prof Rowan Williams

10.30 Break


11.00 Keynote: Fr Matthew Blake OCD/Fr Iain Matthew OCD

12.30 End of morning Session 13.00 Lunch – Dolce Vita Cafe 14.00 Short Papers 15.30 Optional Tour of Walpole House 17.00 Eucharist (Chapel). 18.00 Conference reception – Senior Common Room 19.00 Conference Banquet. Waldegrave Drawing Room. (Bar open afterwards, D121)

Saturday 20th June 2015

Day Three: Teresa in the 21st Century

09.30 Keynote Address: Prof Julia Kristeva

10.30 Break

11.00 Keynote Address: Prof Gillian Ahlgren

12.30 Lunch – Dolce Vita Cafe
13.30 Short Papers 15.00 Break

15.30 Final Session: Carmelite Life Today. The Carmelite Sisters Close of Conference at 17.00

Prayer, Worship and Meditation Each day of the conference the Roman Catholic Eucharist will be celebrated in the Chapel Crypt at 8.30am. The college Chapel Crypt and Interfaith Prayer Room will be available for meditation and prayer throughout the conference. For all of the above see Conference website on www.smuc.ac.uk/inspire for more details.

Abroad thoughts from Home...

Dear All

Having just got back and slept most of last night I can begin to reflect on the wonderful time in India. I was also delighted to receive messages about how much you had enjoyed these posts. I certainly enjoyed presenting them. Using my limited skills I have tried to attach a video of the Indian rite liturgy at Vidyavanam. This, and the joy and faith of the seminarians, have been the abiding memories of my visit. St Peter's seminary is one of several seminaries in Bangalore (including the CMI one at Dharmaram), each with about 200 seminarians each. Coming from UK where our seminarian numbers are comparatively low, this is staggering. Tagore wrote at the end of his life that he had looked to the West for the future as a young man, now, an old man during the middle of World War Two, he thought that the future light 'would come from the East'. I suspect the same for Christianity. Our future will lie in the hearts and minds of these kind and generous people. To meditate and experience their devotion was truly life changing. I shall be giving a day at the House of Prayer in East Molesey next month and I hope to share some of these experiences there... even doing a little bit of the light puja!

best

Peter

 

Forest Wisdom

 

 

 

Written on a rock in the ashram of Vidayavanam near Bangalore (see posting above) are the words: ‘Let wisdom emerge from the forest’. This was the inspiration of Fr Francis Vineeth CMI when he founded the ashram 17 years ago. After that time, with the grateful assistance of Frs Anto and Jojo, it is still going strong. It is as much a small thriving village as an ashram with its own dairy herd, vegetable and crop land and extensive range of fruit trees. The food is exceptionally good and varied and the water clean. Each morning begins in darkness in ‘the cave of the heart’ – Fr Vineeth’s chapel (see picture) - which to my Celtic eyes resembles a long barrow or dolmeth. As the morning liturgy proceeds with bhajans, flowers and incense, the first rays of dawn strike the window above the priest’s head and the whole ‘barrow’ is illuminated ( I will try and attach a video clip). After our silent breakfast it is time for teaching and following the sacred tradition of India this will happen under the trees. I share my visit with a small group of seminarians on retreat from all over India. Their stories are heartbreaking and inspiring in equal measure and we quickly make friends. Today they have asked this western scholar to give a talk under the trees (I attach some of the text below). This is the first time I have taught under a tree and the effect is magical – students cannot drop off and the birds and butterflies seem to join in the fun. The text? Well as I sit in my cell day after day I thought something from the desert fathers would be appropriate.

 

Me being me I am already thinking about ways of bringing groups to experience these riches. Once I am back at St Mary’s I will be talking with my InSpiRe colleagues about a possible future study pilgrimage to visit some of these wonderful places I have seen over the last few days. So please watch this space if you are interested. Tomorrow morning I leave early for England with fond sadness and joy in my heart.

 

Best wishes

 

Peter

 

 

Desert Wisdom

 

The metaphor and reality of the desert burns itself into the consciousness of at least three major world religions: Judaism, Christianity and Islam. All three arise from the desert and contain a nostalgie for former times when God first revealed God’s self in the harsh burning environment of the wilderness. For the Jews it is the place where God revealed God’s self to Moses at Horeb appearing in the burning bush (Exod. 3), that very essence of the dry, desiccated wasteland within which Moses found himself at that time. It was the inhospitable place within which the people of Israel were tested for forty years as God played cat and mouse with their hopes, expectations and theological understandings, culminating in the revelations of God’s nature and covenant on the inhospitable peak of Sinai (Exod. 19). After the deportation and exile to Babylon the prophets looked back nostalgically to their people’s time in the desert and longed once again for God to lure and ‘seduce them’ (Hos. 2:14) back to the wilderness where the Valley of Suffering would once again become the ‘door of hope’. There, they sang, Israel ‘shall respond as in the days of her youth, as at the time when she came out of the land of Egypt’ (Hos. 2).

            Likewise, Christianity ‘appears in the wilderness’ in the shape of the quasi-shamanic figure of St. John the Baptist. He emerges from the desert, writes St Mark, ‘clothed with camel’s hair, with a leather belt around his waist’ eating ‘locusts and wild honey’ (Mk. 1). This child of the desert, a true prophetic soul, wild and unkempt, pulled no punches in his dealings with the powers and authorities of the city – the classic antithesis to the desert dwellers. In his delight in infuriating, challenging and generally rubbing those in power up the wrong way, he set a precedent that his disciple, Jesus, seems to have enjoyed emulating.

            John arises from the desert and Jesus, we are told in Matthew 4, begins his ministry there. His first act after his baptism at the hands of John. Thus, at the start of his ministry Jesus withdraws immediately to the desert to begin battle with the devil – that traditional inhabitant of the wasteplaces. We shall have more to say about him and his little demon helpers later.

            Thus from its earliest beginnings Christianity recognises the importance of entry into the desert as a necessary stage in the spiritual journey. Its importance in the earliest stages of Christianity (for example, St Paul after his conversion spends time in the deserts of Arabia described in Galatians 1) means that it becomes ‘archetypal’ for all Christian spirituality that will follow. Of course, as Christianity unfolds this will not necessarily be about actually entering the physical desert of the Middle East. For the early Celtic Christians at the Western fringes of Europe their desert was to be found in the wild and untameable ocean besides which they would often live or upon which they would set out on voyages of spiritual self discovery. As the late middle ages collapsed into the modern age and the growth of the cities reduced the terrain of the desert, the new orders such as the Carmelites stressed the importance of finding the desert in the city. St Teresa of Avila, in her reform of the order in the sixteenth century insisted that her ‘carmels’, her ‘little deserts’, should be placed at the centre and heart of the cities of sixteenth century Spain, where, by and large, they remain to this day. In the twentieth century the Italian Little Brother of Jesus, Carlo Carretto, felt that the desert was to be found in the city and made sure that the little brothers and sisters of Jesus would live in the most rundown, socially deprived inner city estates. Today the sisters and brothers in the UK live in the hardest hit neighbourhoods of the great cities such as Birmingham and London.

            So, as Christianity emerged ‘desert spirituality’, as it is often called, emerged too. Not just a physical dwelling in the desiccated or abandoned places but also a dwelling in the inhospitable places within. An invitation to all people to move out of their comfort zones and move to the places of loss, driven-ness, pain and grief that our ordinary lives so deftly and easily mask through addictions, consumerisms, promiscuities, greeds and violence. For us 21^st century children of Freud and Jung it is the place of the unconscious where we are no longer in control and more primitive and basic urges and desires take over. It is ultimately a spirituality of paradox for, we are told, it is in the uncomfortable places that we do most to avoid that God chooses to reveal God’s self to us. Here we will find the ‘living water’ that ultimately we are seeking – not in forests, cities and verdant places but in the neglected, dry and dead places on our earth and in our selves.

 

Buddha, Selfhood and Identity

I spent yesterday afternoon with the Venerable Ananda Bhante of the Maha Bodhi monastery in Bangalore discussing Western and Buddhist notions of self. The passage below is from my new book 'Teresa of Avila: Doctor of the Soul' which should be available anytime now. I was keen to check some my ideas expressed there with the Abbot and fortunately he concurred with my analysis. What was remarkable was the way he could recite the 50 conditions of mental activity in the 4th skandha from memory. Sitting with Professor Jose of DVK it was an honour and privilege to discuss these matters. Afterwards as we toured the temple grounds near Bangalore's Freedom Park we saw the novices washing the Buddha and Bodhi tree (planted from a sapling from the great Bodhi tree at Bodh Gaya) - I took the photograph above.
After breakfast today I travel to Vidyavanam to spend some days with the monks there.

best wishes

Peter

The Purpose of Mindfulness: The Agnostic Self

What then is the purpose of mindfulness in this Buddhist context? Essentially it can be seen as the need to develop freedom from entanglement with things as they seem. Desire, craving and its consequences will create the illusion of ‘self’ and ‘I’ that will further drive craving, desire and unhappiness (Dukkha).[1] The Buddha wrote of the delusion of self resting on our grasping of the five ‘aggregates’ or ‘heaps’ of ‘grasping’ (Pali khandha/ Sanskrit skandha).These aggregates are not to be seen as irreducibly elements of the personality, but rather as ‘the most prominent functions that are involved whenever the human personality is the subject of discussion’ (Kalupahana 1992:21). They are traditionally classed as:

1.    Rūpa – material form

2.    Vedanā- feeling or sensation (that which is pleasant or unpleasant)

3.    Saññā – perceiving/recognition

4.    Sankhārā – disposition or karmic formation/volition

5.    Viññāna – consciousness[2]

The work of mindfulness is therefore the work of awareness of these elements of existence so that the shifting bases of personality will inevitably be revealed. Therefore, through the practice of mindfulness the essentially shifting nature of the self will be revealed (Kalupahana 1992:75). Against this, write the Buddhist commentators (see Kalupahana 1992:40), there are two human tendencies, vis: to essentialise the self (largely speaking the contemporary Western view of personality) or to dissolve the self into nothingness (such as is found in wrong notions of ‘non-self’). For Kalupahana ‘the middle way consists of neither succumbing to essentialism or nihilism. Absolute self negation as well as absolute self cessation are not only morally repugnant but also epistemologically unwarranted’ (Kalupahana 1992:40).

          Mindfulness will accordingly assist us in moving from the grasping illusion of an ‘essential self’ to the flexibility of a de-centred or agnostic self. In the Buddha’s terms we remove our attachment to the aggregates to realise that over-identification with them is the source of delusion:

          He regards feeling as self… perception as self… volitional formations         as self… consciousness as self, or self as possessing consciousness, or consciousness as in self, or self as in consciousness. That           consciousness of his changes and alters. With the change and         alteration of consciousness, his consciousness becomes preoccupied       with the change of consciousness. Agitation and a constellation of       mental states born of preoccupation with the change of consciousness       remain obsessing his mind. Because his mind is obsessed, he is        frightened, distressed and anxious, and through clinging becomes       agitated. (BS: 3.16)

          A well taught, noble disciple… regards material form thus: “This is not       mine, this I am not, this is not my self.” He regards feeling thus, “This   is not mine, this I am not, this is not my self.” He regards formations    thus, “This is not mine, this I am not, this is not my self.” He regards         what is seen, heard, sensed, cognized, encountered, sought, mentally        pondered thus: “This is not mine, this I am not, this is not my self.”     And this standpoint for views, namely, “That which is the self is the           world; after death I shall be permanent, everlasting, eternal, not     subject to change; I shall endure as long as eternity” – this too he           regards thus:  “This is not mine, this I am not, this is not my self.”       (Alagaddūpama Sutta: 15 in MN: 1.136)

The mistake would be to see the Buddha’s account as a type of ‘non self’. This is as much an illusion as the essentialism of everyday thought, or as Peter Harvey puts it in ‘The Selfless Mind’ (1995), the denial of any kind of self, metaphysical or empirical is ‘quite wrong’ (1996:7). We are therefore left with a sort of agnosticism towards selfhood. Therefore mindfulness as thus portrayed in its Buddhist context is generally seen as that which helps to sharpen our awareness of processes of the mind whilst generally remaining agnostic as to the nature of self in its essence. As the Buddha puts it in the Sabbāsava Sutta, both the view that ‘self exists for me’ and ‘no self exists for me’ are equally delusory:

          This speculative view, bhikkus, is called the thicket of views, the      contortion of views, the wilderness of views, the vacillation of views,     the fetter of views. (MN: 1.8)

With this Buddhist notion of the ‘decentred agnostic self’ revealed through mindfulness before us we now return to Teresa to see how she employs ‘oración mental’ and ‘contemplación’ in her works and whether, if at all, there are parallels with these Buddhist notions of mindfulness.

---

[1] ‘This delusion is the basis of māna (conceit of 'I am'), one of the samyojanas (fetters) that bind us to the wheel of rebirth.’ Paul Trafford: Note to author, 2012.

 

[2] See, for example, Mahāpunnama Sutta (MN 109:14) : ‘So it seems material form is not self, feeling is not self, perception is not self, volitions are not self, consciousness is not self. What self, then, will actions done by non-self affect?’ See also Williams 2000:89 passim for an extended discussion of the later Abhidhamma fine gradations of the five khandha.

Picturing the Soul

By the time you read this I will probably have delivered the Canisius Endowment Lectures at Dharmaram College, Bangalore. It has been a wonderful week full of memorable conversations, walks and visits. Much time has been spent in the splendid DVK Central Library where the hard-working Fr John presides. During this time I have put the finishing touches to the lectures and prepared the final manuscript for publication. This will probably take place in June but in the meantime I attach a 'sneak preview' of the beginning of the book and my lecture tomorrow. On Saturday I go to the Vidyavanam Ashram I spoke about earlier in the week but I will try and do another posting before I leave India next week.

best wishes

Peter


Picturing the Soul: Revisioning Psychotherapy and Spiritual Direction

 

Chapter One: Picturing the Soul

 

This book arises from a glorious time spent in the quiet peace of Dharmaram College, Bangalore where I had been kindly invited to give the annual Canisius Endowment lectures. Each day I studied in the library while exotic butterflies flitted and the wonderful, chaotic life of India swirled around me. From these lectures, and the enriching encounters with the ever enthusiastic students of ‘young India’, this book grew. My aim in both was twofold: first to spend time mapping the use of what I today call ‘soul-language’ in the psychotherapeutic and spiritual direction encounter, and secondly to explore a theological/anthropological position that would be of real benefit in practical pastoral situations. As with much of my writings I am not so much drawn to academic speculation for speculation sake but rather would like to explore issues that impinge on those in day-to-day care situations. In making this journey I have adopted three perspectives that arise from my own life encounters, interest and background. The first comes from analytical philosophy, or more particularly, the work of Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889 – 1951). As described in my earlier Return to the Mystical (Tyler 2010) we can find in Wittgenstein a particular approach to interpersonal encounter (especially in the so-called ‘later Wittgenstein’) that stresses the need to recognise a choreography of saying and showing in all our interactions. I shall draw out the implications of this for psychotherapy and spiritual direction shortly. My second influence comes from what we may term the ‘Christian mystical tradition’ (again, see Tyler 2010). As the term is used in such a variety of diverging ways it may be worth my while simply to state how I shall use the term. I see it essentially as :

 

1. A way of knowing (or unknowing) – a heart knowledge as much as a head knowledge.
2. A way of theology/being –  by this I mean an affective theology based on being rather than a speculative theology, and
3. A way of speaking/writing –  by this I mean that the tradition has developed certain strategies for getting its message across, eg paradox, aporia etc.

 

Again, I shall not write more on this for now as these are themes that I will elaborate and develop throughout the book.

The third approach I will use in this archaeological dig is from the psychological investigations of Freud, Jung and the founding fathers of Western psychology. Indeed much of the argument I will present here comes from this area.

From these three traditions then, analytical philosophy, the Christian mystical tradition and depth psychology I will construct some ‘pictures of the soul’ that survey this strange dance or choreography of saying and showing that we call psychotherapy, spiritual direction and counselling.  Before I do that, however, it is worth beginning with a theological conundrum and using this as the basis of our psychological speculation. In Christian theological terms we have a problem when we talk of God. As God is Creator not creature and cannot be part of creation, therefore anything we say of God cannot be God. Traditionally this has been called the practice of apophasis or ‘not-saying’ . Faced with this conundrum, Michael Sells suggested we have 3 alternatives:

1. Silence.
2. To distinguish between ways in which the transcendent is beyond names and the ways it is not. Here we have the classic scholastic distinction between God as God is in God’s Self and God as perceived in God’s creatures. i.e. an anagogical approach .
3. To maintain the tension of the aporia and develop a form of performative discourse that realises that every assertion of the nature of the transcendent must be accompanied by another that denies it.( From The Mystical Languages of Unsaying, Sells 1994).

 

Now clearly option one is attractive and one often taken by many therapists and spiritual directors... a wise nod from the safety of the ashram, monastery or consulting room. Yet, being creatures of intellect we still strive to present an approach to the ineffable that is perhaps more satisfactory. The analogical turn is one found in the psychological consulting room (and even more so in the spiritual director’s practice) but the option I would like to stress in this book is the final one... what Sells calls ‘the mystical languages of unsaying’. As I have said,  this is a well-known and well-used strategy within the Christian contemplative tradition. Take, for example, Meister Eckhart, often seen as the ‘master of apophasis’. In his hard cutting and controversial ‘German Sermons’ he took this position to its extreme by suggesting:

 

Masters of little subtlety say God is pure being. He is as high above being as the highest angel is above a midge. I would be as wrong to call God a being as if I were to call the sun black. God is neither this nor that. And one master says ‘whoever thinks he has known God, if he has known anything, it was not God he knew’. (Walshe 76, Deutsche Predigten 10, p.150 )

 

Which leads to his ultimate and shattering conclusion:

 

Therefore let us pray to God that we may be free of God that we may gain the truth and enjoy it eternally. (Quint 32 ‘Blessed are the Poor in Spirit’, Walshe 87, p.271)

 

As stated above, I see this mystical ‘performative discourse’ as one that uses ‘shock and awe’ as a tactic to get its message across...

 

Accordingly, I have come to appreciate more and more that psychology and spirituality are two wings of the butterfly that are both necessary if the fragile creature of the soul is to fly. However I must also emphasise that I am not advocating a sort of syncretic mush between the two. I believe that each must be faithful to its methodologies and origins whilst respecting its relative shortcomings and successes – a difficult tightrope to walk but one I will attempt in this book and hope that I do not fall off! For me, psychological and contemplative discourse are both languages of discourse for engaging with the essential unknowability that lies at the heart of the soul or psyche.

I shall conclude this opening chapter to turning to what I understand by psyche and how it relates to psychotherapy and spiritual direction.

Fritz Kunkel, when asked by Robert Johnson, how one learnt psychology suggested there are three ways:

1. To read all ancient Greek mythology (I would add to this... all world mythology!)
2. To read the collected works of Carl Jung. Again, I would add as much psychological literature as you can get your hands on.
3. But the third, and best, way he suggested was to ‘watch and wait’ (Johnson 1996: 78)

The third, like our silence above, is probably the best and one that I hope you will continue to practice in your own lives and in those to whose care you are entrusted. The second is one that we shall engage with during this book. For now, though, I shall begin with the first and the origins and meanings of ‘psyche’ in Greek mythology...

 

 

Revealed Yet Hidden in the Cave - Know Him ! - The Theophany

After the birth of compassion in the soul strange visitors come from afar. Far-off ‘Magi’ - wise ones, magistri, the intellectual faculties - are awoken by the birth of compassion and come to assist us. They confront the negative ruling power of the soul and subvert it by intuition. Moving swiftly and silently by night they are guided by nocturnal phenomena – stars, comets, dreams – as they move from the Underworld to the source of all consciousness. Once there they make obeisance, along with the natural instincts of the soul – the beasts and shepherds who have already made their homage. And once this happens – once the intellectual powers have made obeisance to the Divinity born in the soul – then all the old things can now be put away: the banners, baubles, tinsel and old Christmas cards. The last old left-overs can be cleared away – and – as they depart again by night – we are left once again in the gathering twilight of an early January dusk knowing that ‘we sleep but our hearts are awake’. We shall sleep no more for our hearts from now on will always be awake as we are invited into eternity...

For today is a day of rededication as we remember all those who have gone before us to bring the light into the darkness of the world and remember our own duty and dedication to bring the light of truth to those around us.

I write this on a warm January night in Bengaluru where I am a guest of the Carmelites of Mary Immaculate (CMI). Today I was welcomed at the ashram of Vidyavanam by Fr Francis Vineeth (you can see the picture with Fr Aidan from Tanzania below), Fr Francis drew my attention to the quote from the Upanishads with which I head this post. In a way he, and his ashram, represents the true spirit of today's feast... how we are called to go beyond the known and certain into 'the cave of the heart' where the unknown one rests. That may be an internal cave or, as so is increasingly the case today, an unknown and uncertain external future amongst strangers. Like the Magi we set out into the unknown guided solely by the star of faith, mindfulness and contemplation...

I wish you all a happy Feast day and from the great ocean of tradition that is India I will hold you in my prayer tonight.

best

Peter