The Content of Faith

Mysticism, once cast to the sidelines of the Christian tradition, is now situated in postmodernist culture near the center. In the words of one of the greatest theologians of the twentieth century, Karl Rahner, "The Christian of tomorrow will be a mystic, one who has experienced something, or he/she will be nothing." Mysticism begins in experience, it ends in theology. Without the heartfelt experience of a healing God, there can be no mystics.

Somewhere in the spiritual life, there must be a Damascus Road....an encounter with the Living Christ. It does not matter whether these ambushing energy releasing experiences of God are of the intensity of a floodlight or a flashlight. For each person the experience will be of a different candlepower. But it must genuinely be YOUR experience of God, and it must lead you into the common experience of community.

The gospel opens up the possibility, in Simone Weil's words, of a "real contact, person to person, here below, between a human being and God."

The gospel is not the excitement of an idea, though it may begin that way. The gospel is the flow experience of a living person. We must have more than a principal within. We must have a person within. We must have a divine consciousness within.

     Leonard Sweet

We are the wire, God is the current. Our only power is to let the current pass through us. Of course, we have the power to interrupt it and say "no." But nothing more.

     Carlo Carretto

He that has united himself to God acquires three great privileges: 
Omnipotence without power
Drunkenness without wine
And life without end

     Nikos Kazantakis

God, you are my God
My heart thirsts for you
My body longs for you
As a land parched, dreary and waterless

     David the Psalmist