About
This is, I think, a story about stories. Or a poem about poems. Specifically, the poems we tell ourselves and each other in an attempt to make sense of the world and our existence in it. Religious and spiritual frameworks have long had a monopoly on engaging with these Big Life Questions, but increasingly people are looking outside pre-existing schools of thought to generate their understanding and meaning. To that end, I am currently completing an MA in Existential and Humanist Pastoral Care. And what does all that mean, exactly? An excellent question!
DISCLAIMER: All views presented here are those of the author at the time of writing and do not necessarily reflect those of the author at the time of reading. In fact if these views do not change over time I suspect something has gone terribly wrong.
“The complexity of the new spiritual hunger makes the old answers redundant and unhelpful. Consequently, modem psychology and psychotherapy are the areas into which soul-work is being pushed. Yet despite its frequent luminosity much psychology is unsuited to this need to ground, focus or nourish the longing of the eternal that awakens within. This is primarily priestly work... We all live in the neighbourhood of the eternal”
— JOHN O’DONOHUE, The Priestliness of the Human Heart
“The contemporary pilgrim is a person separated from the life-infusing myths that supported tribal man. He is a secular isolate celebrating the wake of a dead God. When God lived, and man belonged, psychology was no more than “a minor branch of the art of story-telling and myth making.” Today, each man must work at telling his own story if he is to be able to reclaim his personal identity.”
— SHELDON KOPP, If You Meet the Buddha on the Road, Kill Him!