ONLY AUTOCRATS FEAR FREEDOM AND DEMOCRACY ON THEIR BORDERS. When an autocrat acts aggressively and violently against a neighboring nation, for no other reason than such a fear, that autocrat becomes an agent of evil. In the Russian war against Ukraine, now underway, the Russian autocrat is raining down suffering, destruction and death on the …
Creative Tension
IN THE 4TH CENTURY, C.E., MONKS IN UPPER EGYPT BURIED DOZENS OF TEXTS. Why? Because a powerful bishop in Alexandria had condemned the use of non-canonical books. We can assume the texts were buried rather than burned because the monks valued the texts and hoped they might be welcomed again at a later date. Instead, …
When You Feel Like a Stranger
IT’S AN UNCANNY FEELING, WHICH I SUSPECT MOST OF US HAVE from time to time, to wonder whether you belong, to wonder whether you might not be a stranger in a strange land. In fact, it’s a timeless and universal feeling, one that has left traces in our literary history as far back as the …
The Boy Who Would Be King
WHAT THE RISE OF DONALD TRUMP HAS SHOWN US IS THE MAGICAL POWER a massively inflated ego has to attract “wounded” people who fear loss and diminishment, that is, people who have developed the so-called “victim mentality.” Inflation, however, is not enough by itself to explain the magical power of the attraction. An unconscious archetypal …
Dreamwalking
WHAT A REMARKABLE AND REVEALING SCENE. One of the cable news shows aired a brief video clip of the FBI interviewing a young man who admitted using a Taser to assault a police officer during the January 6 attack on the capitol. There were two FBI agents in the room, sitting calmly on opposites sides …
Looking Past “Me-or-You” and “Us-or-Them”
A CORE CHRISTIAN TRADITION ASKS US TO RESOLVE A FUNDAMENTAL TENSION in human life. When you read the biblical texts in which it appears, however, you might not feel the full force of the tension. The core tradition I’m talking about is the so-called second great commandment: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself” (Mk. …
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How Deep Does Depth Psychology Go?
IT DIVES TO THE DEEPEST DEPTHS OF YOUR SOUL — at least in theory, if not always in practice. Take a glance at Jungian theory, for example. Jung’s structural model of the psyche traces an inward trajectory that begins with the ego, and quickly descends through unconscious complexes and the shadow (something like a neglected …
Our Potential as Anointed Ones
IN A 1948 ESSAY, PIERRE TEILHARD DE CHARDIN PRESENTED his “fundamental vision” of our expanding universe in which “material arrangements” are becoming increasingly complex, consciousness is reaching ever higher levels, and Christian mysticism is the “perfect energy” for driving evolution forward. (See “My Fundamental Vision” in Toward the Future, 1975, especially the discussion of mysticism, …
Why Emotions Were Gods in Ancient Greece
THE ANCIENT GREEK GODS WERE KNOWN TO BE AUTONOMOUS POWERS who were able to overwhelm mortal humans at any moment. Modern depth psychology tells us that human emotions are also autonomous powers that, like the ancient gods, are able to overwhelm us — at any moment. Does it seem a bit much to liken our …
Moonlight in Christ’s Shadow
IF YOU LOOK AT IT PSYCHOLOGICALLY RATHER THAN THEOLOGICALLY, you’ll discover a fundamental problem with the way we see Christ. The traditional images of Christ, the ones with which we are so familiar, are all unambiguously masculine. On the one hand, we see Christ, the glorious son of God, ascended into heaven and sitting at …
Soul Spirit Wisdom 