Ducks Part Three

I don’t know about you, but whenever I do something that makes others shake their heads in disbelief, I have always found it helpful to have someone else to blame.  It’s good to have another person to take the heat – and even better when they are not immediately available to defend themselves.

In this case, I am blaming one of my former professors (he'll never know). While he was technically a professor of New Testament at a Protestant evangelical seminary, he was also beginning to teach a spiritual formation class and was exposing his students to a wide variety of devotional literature most had not heard of before. That’s how I received a copy of my first book by Henri Nouwen, called The Wounded Healer.

The timing was a God-thing.  I had just lost my father, and could identify with being wounded and wanting to use my experience to help others. But the book had a much larger impact on me. It not only introduced me to a great Christian writer who drew from what is known as the “contemplative tradition”, but by extension, opened up a whole new world to me.

In my previous “Ducks” posts, I mentioned that this tradition is partially responsible for leading me back to the Catholic Church.  So what is the contemplative tradition anyway?  It began with some believers of the third century who left society to live in the desert in relative isolation. Their goal was to renounce themselves and follow Jesus more closely, and this movement eventually grew to include thousands of people.   

Not too long afterward, other believers sought this sort of life, but with a greater emphasis on community.  That’s the reason for the growth of monasteries throughout the early years of the church, through the Middle Ages and beyond, where intense private devotion was combined with a communal atmosphere, service and manual labor.

Reams of valuable devotional writing came from people who practiced this way, which is no surprise.  After all, they were pursuing the spiritual life 24/7.  To be sure, some of them carried things too far.  You can find plenty of crazy stories of brothers and sisters who engaged in some pretty odd behavior back then.   But that doesn’t at all negate the rich wisdom that was also a product of monastic life.

In digging more deeply over the years, I have come into familiar and ongoing contact with Benedict of Nursia, Theresa of Avila, St. John of the Cross, Brother Lawrence, Francis De Sales, Thomas Merton and several others.  And I have noticed a pattern:  when I have spent time with these writers and tried to incorporate some of their thoughts and practices into my life, those were times of consistent growth where I saw differences and felt closer to the Lord. When I would disengage from this (which I did, many times), my sense of nearness and dependence on God seemed to wane. That’s probably more of a commentary on my own inconsistancies, but I know that it’s a fact.

The question then comes up: “Why go back to the Catholic Church? Why not practice this way and remain where you are?”  It’s a good question, and I guess the answer is: been there, done that. The result is a sort of disconnect. I found myself worshipping in a certain tradition privately during the week and in a completely different way on Sunday mornings. I needed consistency in my private and public expressions of faith.  What’s more, if I was to going to be able to share my experiences with like-minded folk, it would more likely be in the Catholic Church, where the contemplative tradition was born and has flourished.  While there are certainly exceptions, evangelical Protestants tend not to spend a lot of time with contemplative writing and practice.  I don't mean that as an indictment at all; it's simply not on the radar or part of the culture for a variety of reasons  - one of which is a greater focus on current popular devotional writers.  

Next time I will try to wrap this thread up by writing about how church history has impacted my move. But meanwhile, I am comforted in knowing that this is all Dr. Weigelt’s fault.  'Preciate it, Doc.