Secular Spirituality

Session 8Going forth to Love

AndServe

SpiritualitySpirituality \Spir`it*u*al"i*ty\, n.; pl. [L. spiritualitas: cf. F.

spiritualit['e].] 1. The quality or state of being spiritual; incorporeality; heavenly-mindedness or other-worldliness.

• (Eccl.) That which belongs to the church, or to a person as an ecclesiastic, or to religion, as distinct from temporalities.

• An ecclesiastical body; the whole body of the clergy, as distinct from, or opposed to, the temporality.

• Seeing all around us with different eyes and uniting the opposites by kenotic love

Spirituality

• In the ordinary• In the world• What are your sacred spaces and places?• Where do you encounter the holy• Little clerics, we are not

• Models of familiar Spirituality stem from

– Monastic settings– Clerical settings, liturgies– Church settings

• Secular Spirituality/Sanctity requires us to look beyond the familiar

• Christianity is forward looking, always seeking to Christify all of creation, the Cosmos, and through our active participation in Christian Life to make the love of God visible.

• We often prefer to be simply observers, to hold tight to the past, comfortable with what is know, afraid to risk becoming crucified love!

Shame-less plugGospel to Life – Life to Gospel

• Listen to the Gospel, hear the words of the Eternal Word

• Contemplate Jesus “Is there any suffering like mine” the Mirror

• Put the Gospel into Action

http://www.franciscanaction.org/

The ultimate goals of Christianity

• To unify the temporal and spiritual world, living today, in the NOW and being an expression of kenotic love. Crucified Love.

• Seeking holiness in the every day ordinary world, the places made sacred by the Incarnation – God’s self-empting into fragile, messy humanity

• By loving every facet of the world, to take it seriously, embrace it and transform it into the fullness of Christ.

• To actively participate with the Father’s co-re-creation of the world, by embracing the self-empting love of the Cross

• To actively bear God in us and bring him, like Mary to the world

• Approach all life with:

• Gratefulness and Joy• Different seeing eyes• Sense of family• Intrinsic goodness• Openness• Self-empting and joyful suffering

• As we go back to our homes and fraternities, we can be spiritual guides and offer ourselves for our sisters and brothers.

• "Let us begin, for up to now, we have done nothing.“

St. Francis of Assisi