When we describe God as almighty or omniscient, we are not describing God; rather, we are naming some of the respects in which God’s power and knowledge are different from ours, limited as we inevitably are. The protest that an almighty God could never have permitted Auschwitz only has force if we construe ‘almightiness’ as the observable property of a very powerful being. But matters are different if we see that term as a pointer towards divine mystery. To follow Christ is to be taken on a journey that educates us out of our preconceptions and projections, and opens us to a God who has always been greater than what eye has seen or what ear has heard. Our age is certainly one that raises awkward questions about God, and scrutinises critically the orthodoxies, whether traditionalist or trendy, that it has inherited. But perhaps matters have ever been thus when the quest for God has been alive and honest.
Alexandra Pleshoyano, ‘Etty Hillesum: For God and With God’, 7–20
Etty Hillesum, a young Jewish woman murdered in Auschwitz, left behind diaries and letters which are coming to be recognised as one of the twenieth century's most significant spiritual documents. Alexandra Pleshoyano, who is exploring Etty's significance for contemporary theology, introduces us to Etty's remarkable understanding of God.
André Myre, ‘Christmas and the Confrontation of Empire’, 21–32
A scriptural meditation for the Christmas season. Christ's birth inaugurates not a new religion, but God's liberation of the poor and humiliated--a liberation that thwarts the Empire and its puppets in Jerusalem.
Sue Delaney, ‘Women Beginning a Spiritual Quest’, 33–44
An account of how women, from many different countries and religious traditions, experience the call to a deeper spiritual commitment.
John Pridmore, ‘‘Just Tell Them Stories‘: The Liberation Spirituality of Philip Pullman’s His Dark Materials’, 45–60
Though Philip Pullman’s acclaimed trilogy is sharply critical of conventional religion, it writes of the imagination and of spirituality in ways that are profoundly liberative.
Kathleen McManus, ‘Embracing Life, Embracing the Cross: Edward Schillebeeckx and Suffering’, 61–73
It is only through the experience of suffering that we are fully open to the touch of God, the grace of Christ. Kathleen McManus explores this theme in the theology of Edward Schillebeeckx OP, one of the greatest of contemporary theologians.
Denise Inge, ‘‘A Sight of Happiness’: Thomas Traherne’s Felicity in a Fleeting World’, 75–87
The seventeenth-century poet and mystic Thomas Traherne provides us with remarkably striking and topical insights on the world as God’s body, on the presence of God in nature, on happiness and on resurrection.
Timothy P. Muldoon, ‘Postmodern Spirituality and the Ignatian Fundamentum’, 88–100
Christian experience in postmodernity is vastly different from what it was even two generations ago. Timothy Muldoon explores how the changes are shaping young adults'religious experience, and suggests new ways in which the Ignatian Fundamentum provides openings for spiritual growth.
Rogelio García Mateo, ‘The ‘Accommodated Texts‘ and the Interpretation of the Spiritual Exercises’, 101–116
The text of the Spiritual Exercises which we generally follow is but one of several. The oldest manuscripts we have, the so-called 'accommodated texts', are full of rich material, giving important indications of the order in which Ignatius put together the different parts of his work, and also indicating the scriptural roots of Ignatius’ method
Anonymous , ‘The Exercises of Master John’, 117–132