It is above all Saint Bernard, particularly through his innovative mystical theology, who shaped the theology of the later Middle Ages and also of modern times. The history of Christian spirituality is rather like a roller coaster with continual ups and downs, as renewal is followed by decline as the human spirit inevitably falters and [...]
The God-given spirituality of love that was the mainspring of early Christianity was still enshrined in the monastic life after Constantine became emperor and Christianity was proclaimed the official religion of the Roman Empire by Theodosius the Great in AD 381. It was this consecrated form of life that was now used to renew the [...]
The way in which God’s plan was implemented in the first centuries after Jesus' resurrection was the wonder of the world. It should still be the wonder of the world today, if it had not been destroyed in the fourth century by a heretic called Arius, who denied that Christ was God. In the fourth [...]
It is only his love given in contemplation that can suffuse and surcharge our impoverished love with the only love that can lead us back from Paradise lost to Paradise regained. The very reason why Christ sent out his love on the first Pentecost day was so that it could enter into all who would [...]
When purification is complete mystics enter immediately into the Mystical Marriage with Christ, often called the Transforming Union. It is then that for the first time they are able to experience the continual contemplation of God that Jesus experienced at every moment of his life on earth. When I was a small boy, I used [...]
For the vast majority of people the night of purification continues for their lifetime on earth. But the truth is that our final destination is union with God, in, with and through Christ, when what happened to him on Mount Tabor will begin to happen to us. The great Franciscan theologian Blessed John Duns Scotus [...]
Immediately after Jesus was baptised in the Jordan by St John the Baptist, “The Spirit drove him out into the desert and he remained there for forty days and was tempted by Satan” (Mark 1:13). St Matthew describes these temptations and the other evangelists show how his tussles with the devil continued in one way [...]
Before the 1960s, mental prayer took place behind the closed doors of a personal prayer life. However, as the charismatic movement began to spread amongst Catholics, communal charismatic style prayer became more and more popular, not least because of unusual phenomena, from speaking in tongues to slaying in the spirit. When criticised as a deviation [...]
The first Christians were called the “saints” because they tried, and so many of them succeeded, in living saintly lives. That this fact converted a vast numbers of pagans in such a short time is as historically undeniable as it is inexplicable to secular historians. St Paul insists that once we are baptised into Christ, [...]
How could a small “heretical Jewish sect” of little consequence convert the vast pagan empire of Rome, created and sustained by the greatest military power the world has ever known, and in such a short time? In the early Church, once a person heard the good news and expressed belief in Christ, baptism followed almost [...]
It is only in mystical contemplation that our weak human love is so purified that it enables this love to mix, mingle and merge with the love of the Holy Spirit. Then, suffused and surcharged with this love we will not only be able to enter into the mystical body of Christ but into Christ’s [...]
Meditation is a means to an end; contemplation is that end. It is our eternal destiny which we will enjoy with all we have known and loved in this life, and those whom we have never known, but who have loved Christ from the beginning. When most readers hear the expression “mystical spirituality” they usually [...]
The first Christians were urged to pray constantly, and this prayer became known later as the “prayer without ceasing”, “Pray constantly; and for all things give thanks to God, because this is what God expects you to do in Christ Jesus” (1 Thessalonians 5:17–18). The Morning Off ering and its implementation is the place where [...]
In the prayer that leads from meditation to contemplation, the deep human desire for love that has always been there is gradually transformed. It is set alight by reflecting and ruminating on love – God’s love. This love is made visible to us as we see it embodied in Jesus Christ, and as it is [...]