Things Hidden: Scripture as Spirituality
The author of Things Hidden, Franciscan priest Richard Rohr, is the founde
r of the Center for Action and Contemplation in Albuquerque, New Mexico. He is the author of numerous books, including Falling Upward: Spirituality for the Two Halves of Life and The Naked Now: Learning to See as the Mystics See. Rohr writes,
“The development of consciousness is a gradual, lifelong process; it’s not typically a straightforward journey.
We may catch a glimpse of Divine Reality, but often it’s too much for our small self, and so we recoil until great love, suffering, or contemplative practice help us surrender a bit more.
“We see this dance – three steps forward, two steps back – mirrored in sacred texts. Human authors at different levels of consciousness portray God in different ways. At times in most religious histories God has been described as violent, exclusive, and judgmental. It’s easy to point the finger at other religions and forget our own religion’s lower levels. For example, despite recent criticism, the Quran is not more violent than the Bible; our scriptures also hold many punitive, dualistic, and exclusionary passages. But also running throughout the world’s sacred texts is the thread of God’s desire for union, inclusivity, non-violence, forgiveness, mercy, and healing.
“At their most mature level, religions cultivate in their followers a deeper union with God, with each other, and with reality–or what is. The work of religion is to re-ligio–re-ligament or reunite what our egos and survival instincts have put asunder, namely a fundamental wholeness at the heart of everything.
“My calling has been to retrieve and re-teach the wisdom that has been lost, ignored, or misunderstood within the Judeo Christian Tradition. Any truth that keeps recurring and gathers humanity’s positive energy is called wisdom and most assuredly has to be from the One Holy Spirit.”
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