Posted on by Kurt Bodling

pilgrims remember and love

“Pilgrimage in that moment seemed less to me like exteriorized mysticism and more a rite of remembrance. The world would have us forget what is painful. It would have us move on and be free of the past; but both as individuals and societies, we have our loyalties to what we have known and endured. Pilgrimage gave us the illusion of a forward movement across space, even as it allowed an inner journey toward communion with our past. It was a crystallization of the poet Joseph Brodsky’s idea that “if there is any substitute for love, it’s memory.””

Taseer, Aatish Ali. A Pilgrimage Year. New York Times Style Magazine. 9 November 2023. <viewed online 12 November 2023 at https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2023/11/09/t-magazine/travel-bolivia-mongolia-iraq.html&gt;

In pilgrimage our bodies move forward, and our hearts move inward or outward at the same time. I think he’s saying here that our love for God and the saints (however defined) moves us to want to be where they were (are?) so that we can ‘commune with our past’.

Posted on by Kurt Bodling

poverty and contemplation

“It is true, however, that a certain degree of economic security is morally necessary to provide a minimum of stability without which a life of prayer can hardly be learned. But ‘a certain degree of economic security’ does not mean comfort, the satisfaction of every bodily and psychological need, and a high standard of living. The contemplative needs to be properly fed, clothed and housed. But he also needs to share something of the hardships of the poor.”

Merton, Thomas. New Seeds of Contemplation. Introduction by Sue Monk Kidd. New York: New Directions Books, 2007, ©1961, p. 251

Posted on by Kurt Bodling

what hesychasm is

“The Greek term hesychia means a state of silence, stillness, or tranquility, as a result of the cessation of external trouble and internal agitation. Cassian’s ‘purity of heart’ contains the aspect of ‘tranquility of mind’ and thus, the idea of hesychia. The term also means solitude or retreat. Hermits and cenobites alike seek hesychia as an essential value, but in the earliest sources, the term ‘hesychast’ usually denotes a monk living in solitude, or hermit.”

Wong, Joseph. “The Threefold Good: Romualdian Charism and Monastic Tradition.” in Belisle, Peter-Damian, editor. The Privilege of Love: Camaldolese Benedictine Spirituality. Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, 2002, pp. 87-88

Posted on by Kurt Bodling

dogma promulgation

“The time lag between developments in the church and modern society was striking: in the very decade that Charles Darwin announced his theory of evolution to the public, Pius IX for the first time had the idea, as a demonstration of his own fullness of power and de facto infallibility, of promulgating a dogma entirely by himself. Promulgating a dogma is an action which traditionally has always been taken as a council in a situation of conflict to ward off heresy. Pius IX’s intention was to further traditional piety and to reinforce the Roman system. The dogma that he had in mind was that strange dogma of the immaculate conception of Mary (Mary conceived in her mother’s body without original sin), dated 1854. We do not find a word in the Bible and in the Catholic tradition of the first millennium about this, and it hardly makes any sense in the light of the theory of evolution.”

Küng, Hans. The Catholic Church: a Short History. New York: The Modern Library, 2003, p. 162

A certain kind of Protestant will snigger at this and say “See? I told you so!” A certain kind of Roman Catholic will explain, “Küng was a renegade who lost his license to teach as a Catholic theologian; his opinions are all suspect!”

Posted on by Kurt Bodling

humble learning

“I think that it is far commoner at the University to meet men of great attainments combined with sincere humility and charity, for the simple reason that the most erudite specialist at a University becomes aware both of the wide diversity of knowledge and of his own limitations as well.”

Benson, Arthur Christopher. “Books” in From a College Window. New York: G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 1906, p. 57

Comment: Of course, academia is also a place to meet people with no humility or charity at all. They are the people with no real understanding of their tiny place in the breadth and depth and height of all that there is. But I still believe that it is true that in the world of higher learning (and in true religion!) real achievement and sincere humility go hand in hand.

Posted on by Kurt Bodling

how they work together

“Silence deepens the experience of solitude. In silence we not only withdraw from the demands of life in company of others, but also allow the noise of our own thoughts, strivings and compulsions to settle down so we can hear a truer and more reliable Voice.”

Barton, Ruth Haley. Invitation to Solitude and Silence: Experiencing God’s Transforming Presence. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2004, p. 34-35

Posted on by Kurt Bodling

on reading about contemplation

“If, then, you are intent on ‘becoming a contemplative’ you will probably waste your time and do yourself considerable harm by reading this book. But if in some sense you are already a contemplative (whether you know it or not makes little difference), you will perhaps not only read the book with a kind of obscure awareness that it is meant for you, but you may even find yourself having to read the thing whether it fits in with your plans or not. In that event, just read it. Do not watch for results, for they will already have been produced long before you will be capable of seeing them. And pray for me, because from now on we are, in some strange way, good friends.”

Merton, Thomas. The Inner Experience: Notes on Contemplation. Edited and with an Introduction by William H. Shannon. NY: HarperOne, 2003 (NOTE: Merton wrote this in 1959!), pp. 2-3

Posted on by Kurt Bodling

mysticism’s purpose

“The purpose of contemplative and mystical spirituality is to foster greater intimacy with and devotion to God, which in itself is a universal goal of all religious and spiritual traditions that are God-centered (Buddhism does not require belief in God, so in a sense it’s a philosophy). Mystical, contemplative spirituality invites us deep into the wisdom of a path without insisting that it is the only path. This is true for contemplative Christians as well as for contemplatives of other traditions.”

McColman, Carl. The New Big Book of Christian Mysticism: an Essential Guide to Contemplative Spirituality. Minneapolis: Broadleaf Books, 2023, pp. 297-298

Posted on by Kurt Bodling

finding pigpens

“To leave the present moment in search of anything else is to cut a path to a pigpen.”

Haase, Albert. Coming Home to Your True Self: Leaving the Emptiness of False Attractions. Foreword by M. Robert Mulholland, Jr. Downers Grove, IL: IVP Books, 2008, p. 64

Posted on by Kurt Bodling

freedom and levity

"There is a refreshing, ludic quality to the lives of the early desert Christians. They anticipated the dictum of Thomas Aquinas that ‘unmitigated seriousness betokens a lack of virtue.’ …

“Only those having sustained the terrors of the cross can understand the raucous laughter of resurrection. Only the ones who have died completely to the expectations of the world are free to be truly eccentric, off-center by every standard of the majority.”

Lane, Belden C. The Solace of Fierce Landscapes: Exploring Desert and Mountain Spirituality. New York: Oxford University Press, 1998, pp. 170-171