What in the recent past seemed exotic and foreign is now almost routinely folded into “the fold.”
Buddhism is not only accepted as a mainstream American religion, it is a path increasingly trod by faithful Christians and Jews who infuse Eastern spiritual insights and practices such as meditation into their own religions.
When John Weber became a Buddhist at age 19, his devout Methodist parents were not particularly pleased.
In recent years, however, they’ve invited their son, a religious studies expert with Boulder’s Naropa University, to speak at their church about Buddhism.
“That never would have happened before,” Weber said. “They would have been embarrassed.”
[blockquote]People are hungry for a deeper spiritual experience — meditation, mindfulness, personal transformation, deep insight, union with God or the universe…”In the last generation, 10 to 20 years, some didn’t even think there was a Christian spirituality, just rules — do’s and don’ts and dogma they didn’t find spiritually nourishing. It’s important to recover the mystical aspects of the gospel.”[/blockquote]
I’ve heard this last from my students, at a Catholic college, much more recently than that. I mentioned “Christian mysticism” en passent, students looked very puzzled and agreed with one who piped up, “You don’t usually associate Christianity with mysticism.”
My serious, non-rhetorical question is “why not?” Why are churches apparently embarrassed by this whole rich tradition–the Jesus prayer, the poetry of St. John of the Cross, the Imitation of Christ, and all that? Why don’t they as a matter of course run meditation sessions or whatever and advertise them to the general public? Why don’t clergy or others with the gift do spiritual direction–and tell their congregations about it? If any of this occurs at all it’s strictly for the initiated. People don’t know about it.
I suspect, having been involved in church growth activities, that the take is that people just aren’t interested in this. We have limited resources and to grow–or, realistically, to avoid collapse–we have to provide what most people want: contemporary music, bright, cheerful services in a popular idiom, jolly youth groups, convenient parking, exercise classes, pot-lucks and a raft of essentially secular activities for “building community.”
They may be right–probably most people aren’t interested in mysticism. But it’s those who are though who are most likely to be attracted to religious practice. In my experience though those who are interested just assume that the only place to find it is in Eastern Religions or some syncretic New Age crappola, that it simply isn’t any part of Christianity.