by Father Robert Lauder

Sixth in a series

I have no idea how readers of this column are relating to this series on spirituality. Perhaps some are enjoying it, and some may disagree with almost everything that I have written. I confess that I have enjoyed writing the last five columns as I re-read and studied the essay, “Are We Relating to God in a New Way?” by Gerald M. Fagin, S.J. The essay first appeared in the Review for Religious, November-December, 1993.

The main reason that I have enjoyed Father Fagin’s insights is that they speak to my own experience of trying to relate to God. His description of what we might call the traditional approach to God is a very accurate description of the way I spent most of my life trying to relate to God. In fact, I cannot recall an essay that I have read in the last 20 years that more accurately and clearly depicted my experience.

The essay also seems to describe the experience of several people with whom I have discussed the essay. Father Fagin’s description of a contemporary approach to God also accurately speaks to my experience at least since the Second Vatican Council.

Evolving Approach to God

I find the section of Father Fagin’s essay titled “From Other-Worldly to This Worldly” especially relevant. As I mentioned in earlier columns in this series, some of what Father Fagin articulates so well I had some idea of for years, but it took a long time before I became aware of the significant change that was taking place in my approach to God.

Father Fagin has been able to put my experience of the traditional approach and also my experience of a contemporary approach into words, something I have not been able to do until I read his essay. Describing the outlook on the world of the traditional approach, Father Fagin writes the following:

“At the heart of the relationship with God was a call to renunciation of the material world. The world was a place of temptation and trial. We were pilgrims on a journey to salvation in the next life. Sanctity demanded detachment from the world. Matter was evil, the source of sin. Penance was a way to punish the flesh and control its appetites. …

“At the root of this approach was a negative vision of the world as corrupted by sin. Flight from the world was the road to sanctity. Even apostolic religious orders tended to propose monastic ideals that emphasized separation from the world. A special importance was given to the words of Seneca (Letters, No. 7) quoted in the Imitation of Christ (I, 20): ‘As often as I have been among men, I have returned less a man.’”

When I was studying in the major seminary in the 1950s, sections of the Imitation were read aloud in chapel to the entire community every day at noon. I think the first time I ever heard the Imitation criticized was in a sermon delivered by my friend, the late Father Charles Breslin, when he referred to the book as “that Manichean menace.”

Product of God’s Love

Viewing the world as a product of God’s love and also as the place of God’s redemptive presence, contemporary spirituality has a more positive view of the world than the traditional spirituality does.

Taking the Vatican II document, “The Church in the Modern World” seriously, those who embrace the contemporary spirituality recognize the value of human society and culture. They look at the world as a gift from God and rejoice at its goodness.

Creation Centered

Describing the contemporary spirituality as creation-centered, Father Fagin writes the following:

“Our relationship with God is expressed in a concern for the earth and a sense of stewardship for the resources entrusted to us. The reign of God is already a reality ‘budding forth,’ and our human efforts are an essential element in building the final reign of God. God, then, is found in human experience and human achievement, and this world becomes a sacred place for encountering God. A genuine apostolic spirituality recognizes that we work out our salvation by involvement in the human struggle for justice.”

I think the different emphases in the two spiritualities is obvious. While someone could try to blend the two spiritualities, my own opinion is that one of them would necessarily predominate. Which one would predominate in an individual’s life might be greatly influenced by the individual’s experience of self, of others and of the individual’s education and religious formation.

Choosing Your Spirituality

Finally, the adoption of a spirituality should be made in prayer and under the guidance of a confessor or spiritual director. The choice should be made with some confidence because of the presence of the Holy Spirit in our lives.[divider] Father Robert Lauder, a priest of the Diocese of Brooklyn and philosophy professor at St. John’s University, Jamaica, writes a weekly column for the Catholic Press.