The Future of Christian Spirituality E-Book

• Herausgeber: WS
• Kategorie: Religion und Spiritualität
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2023

Seitenzahl: 350

Beschreibung

Father Ron Rolheiser is ecumenically recognized as one of the most important voices in Christian spirituality today. His career has spanned fifty years. He has served the Church as a theologian, educator, and priest in the religious congregation of the Oblates of Mary Immaculate. This volume offers ten essays that dare to imagine what the future might hold for Christian spirituality and Christian spiritual formation. They are written by Catholic and Protestant scholars and practitioners, both men and women. They explore the contemporary landscape of contemplation, community, the mystical life, and some of the many spaces in which spirituality intersects (such as spirituality and theology, sexuality, gender, and aging).

Fr. Rolheiser has devoted his life to practicing and teaching others to practice a thoughtful and robust spiritual life. He envisioned and helped to develop a Christian spirituality institute which is now flourishing at the Oblate School of Theology in San Antonio, Texas. His friends and colleagues have come together to honor his life’s work by contributing these essays, sharing their unique perspectives.

Leseprobe

ADVANCE PRAISE FOR

The Future of Christian Spirituality—In Our Lives, In Our Churches,and In the Academy

“Ronald Rolheiser is one of the great Christian spiritual masters of our time. The number of people to whom I’ve recommended his life-changing book The Holy Longing is probably in the hundreds, and the number of times I’ve read his incredible book on an adult faith, Sacred Fire, which was life-changing for me, is probably in the dozens. I cannot think of another Christian writer who so artfully combines powerful insights with beautiful writing. He is a treasure to the church.”

James Martin, SJAuthor of Learning to Pray and Jesus: A Pilgrimage

“Spirituality, understood broadly as the lived experience of believers in their search for God and as the academic study of this experience and its relation to other disciplines, has been a growing phenomenon for the past half-century. Ronald Rolheiser, O.M.I., has made significant contributions to both these dimensions—contributions that can be said to be second-to-none. Thus, it is supremely fitting that a group of the foremost scholars of spirituality have come together to honor his achievement with a volume of studies surveying both the current state of spirituality studies in America and the prospects for the future, in life, in the academy, and in the churches. This is a rich feast for the nourishment of all who have come to recognize, as Gustavo Gutiérrez once put it, that spirituality is the foundation of all theology, and indeed, of all authentic living.”

Bernard McGinnNaomi Shenstone Donnelley Professor, EmeritusDivinity School, University of Chicago

“Amid our contemporary global crises, the wisdom and witness of Fr. Ronald Rolheiser invites collective imagination of a different way forward rooted in our innermost being. This volume’s scholars and religious leaders reflect on Rolheiser’s legacy and how it guides us through the navigation of the insurmountable differences that exist across our planet, within our institutions, and within ourselves. Most importantly, these essays call each of us to play an active role in the flourishing of life through a return to contemplation. This is a rare collection of words and stories that inspire, convict, and nourish all at once!”

Aizaiah G. YongAssistant Professor of Spirituality, Claremont School of Theologyand Amos YongProfessor of Theology & Mission, Fuller Seminary

“The Future of Christian Spirituality is a treasure trove of learning and wisdom—along with some cautionary notes. As the authors unearth spiritual nuggets from the vast array of spiritual literature of the past to find relevant nourishment for the present, they gently critique what might need to be changed or reconsidered for the future. Whether you are a practitioner or a researcher in Christian spirituality, this volume offers an in-depth analysis of pertinent and timely themes that will both affirm long-standing and dearly held beliefs and practices and invite you to re-examine them, all with the goal of promoting faith-filled human flourishing. While academic in scope, this book will be equally useful and instructive for anyone who desires to gain a deeper understanding of the current state of Christian spirituality for their own life, as it explores the many challenges confronting believers and non-believers alike.”

David B. Perrin, PhDProfessor Emeritus, St. Jerome’s University, Canada

“Fr. Rolheiser’s wise insights and gracious guidance have been deeply formative for many on their spiritual journeys, through times of suffering and times of joy. The thought-provoking reflections in this volume honor his legacy and embrace the life-giving spirit of his work. Each chapter invites readers into a fruitful conversation about the nature and practice of Christian spirituality—conversations that will enrich the church, the academy, and the culture.”

Rebecca Konyndyk DeYoungCalvin UniversityAuthor of Glittering Vices (Brazos, 2020)

“The Future of Christian Spirituality is an excellent survey of the current landscape of Christian Spirituality and a challenge for how to move forward both as scholars and as church leaders. The timing was perfect for me. I have been serving as a local church pastor in the seven years since I finished my PhD. Now that I am about to move into the academy as a professor of Spiritual Formation this book has been a crash course for rebooting my academic mind. Each essay offers a different voice from across a diverse spectrum of the theological landscape that both updates and propels the conversation. I was not familiar with Fr. Ronald Rolheiser’s work prior to this book, but now his writings, and this book, will be on all my assigned reading lists.”

Rev. Dr. Steve Thomason. PhDAssociate Professor of Spiritual Formation and DiscipleshipLuther Seminary, St. Paul, MN

“The future of Christian spirituality may well affect the contours of the unfolding human journey itself. Though we can perceive such a future only “through a glass darkly,” the trajectory that Christian spirituality can and should take is nonetheless of critical relevance and much deserving of exploration. The assembled contributors to this volume are all ‘top shelf’ scholars, which makes the work an important and welcome one. The icing on the cake, so to speak, is that it is also a worthy tribute to Ronald Rolheiser, whose incisive mind, humble soul, and hospitable spirit have helped so much to bridge entrenched divides, and whose prescient vision points us toward great possibilities, and a better and more faithful future together.”

Glen G. Scorgie, PhDProfessor of Theology and Ethics, Bethel Seminary

“This substantial collection of essays in honor of Fr. Ronald Rolheiser, who is a humble giant in the field of Christian spirituality, beautifully covers the future of Christian spirituality in our lives, in our churches, and in the academy. I highly recommend it as essential and edifying reading for all of us!”

Rev. Siang-Yang Tan, PhDSenior Professor of Clinical Psychology, Fuller Theological SeminarySenior Pastor Emeritus, First Evangelical Church GlendaleAuthor of Counseling and Psychotherapy: A Christian Perspective, Lay Counseling: Equipping Christians for a Helping Ministry, and Shepherding God’s People: A Guide to Faithful and Fruitful Pastoral Ministry

“This collection honors Ron Rolheiser’s enormous impact on the emergence of spirituality in both popular and scholarly discourse in recent decades. Rolheiser has enriched the lives of countless persons longing to live lives of connection, depth, and meaning through his writings, and he has played an instrumental role in the development of spirituality as an academic field. The distinguished authors included here appropriately mark Rolheiser’s contributions to both lived spirituality and the study of it in a diverse set of essays reflecting on the past and future of Christian spirituality.”

Timothy RobinsonLunger Associate Professor of Spiritual Resources and DisciplinesBrite Divinity School at Texas Christian University

“Anyone who has heard or read Ronald Rolheiser is sure to appreciate this collection of essays in honor of his long legacy. Fr. Rolheiser’s ability to mine the breadth and the depth of the human heart unearths wisdom and grace for an extraordinarily wide readership—the scholarly theologian as well as the seeker of meaning and hope. The authors of the essays included in this volume give testimony to Rolheiser’s reach across denomination, interest, and scholarship. They signal exciting new directions and challenges in the world of spirituality for a long time to come. Mostly, these authors give well deserved accolades to a man who can probe the scholarly underpinnings of spirituality, give word and voice to living spirituality, and serve as an architect for programs and institutions that will carry forward the life and work of spirituality well into the future. Need it be said that this would not be possible if Ronald Rolheiser were not a man who lives the depths of spirituality in his own life. A treasure he is for the churches and for the world.”

Barbara Quinn, RSCJ

“Like many who will be drawn to this volume, Ron Rolheiser’s “The Holy Longing” helped me at the beginning of the twenty-first century to take a personal deep dive into the territory of contemporary Christian spirituality in a way that honored my particular tradition while framing it within a large, rich reality. As a new teacher in the field, it provided language and a resource for introducing others to this territory. Thank you, Ron, for continuing for twenty-some years to be a wise guide, bolstering us in our work.

As Ron often reminded us, the Paschal Mystery keeps us alert to the importance of endings and beginnings, the former often serving as segue into something new and life-giving. This volume is timely for the season of transitions in which we find ourselves—personally, in our faith communities, and in the academy. I recommend it for anyone who wants to ‘taste’ a sampling of the diversity of current Christian spiritual writing and ‘see’ the perspectives of those who thoughtfully reflect on what Christian spirituality is and is becoming.”

Rev. Douglas S. Hardy, PhDProfessor of Spiritual Formation, Nazarene Theological Seminary

“Fr. Ronald Rolheiser is one of the most beloved writers in the field of Christian spirituality working today. In this fulsome tribute from some of the leading scholars in the field we can read essays concerning some of the key areas to which Fr. Rolheiser has contributed during his long career: pastoral and mystical theology, ecumenical and political studies and the nature and future of the academic study of Christian spirituality. As a leading figure in the world of Christian spirituality it is notable how he has managed to straddle the divide between ‘academic’ and ‘popular’ spiritual writing. This unique gift will mean that this important celebration of his work will be accessible to all who take the current study of Christian spirituality seriously—whatever their background and perspective. The editors are to be congratulated on producing such a timely work.”

Prof. Peter TylerSt Mary’s University, Twickenham, London

“Fr. Ronald Rolheiser’s life and work have indisputably impacted contemporary Christian spirituality. This volume fittingly pays tribute to how Rolheiser’s wisdom has shaped countless people’s lives and scholarship in faith communities and in the academy and has seeded emerging vital conversations. The editors have collected contributions from scholar-practitioners whose expertise in storytelling and the self-implicating mode of Christian spirituality writing invites the reader into the kind of profound reflection that Fr. Ron’s work routinely invites. Further, the writers contributing to this book propose possibilities for how Christian spirituality advances the project of responding to and healing our world’s various crises, social and ecological. Recommended for scholars and graduate students in Christian spirituality studies and for members of Christian faith communities, this book identifies Fr. Ron as the paradigmatic Christian spirituality scholar-practitioner for our time, considers honestly this moment’s challenges and opportunities, and generously provides ideas for how we might navigate these challenges and opportunities.”

Rachel Joy Wheeler, PhDAssistant Professor of Theology (Spirituality)University of Portland

Each of us aches for significance, meaning, uniqueness, preciousness, immortality, and great love and great beauty in our lives. This yearning is congenital and incurable.

—Fr. Ron Rolheiser (The Shattered Lantern)

The Future ofChristian Spirituality—In Our Lives,In Our Churches,and In the Academy

THE FUTUREOF CHRISTIANSPIRITUALITY—

IN OUR LIVES,IN OUR CHURCHES,AND IN THE ACADEMY

Essays in Honor ofFr. Ronald Rolheiser, OMI

EDITED BYDAVID POCTAANDJOHN J. MARKEY

A Herder & Herder BookThe Crossroad Publishing Companywww.crossroadpublishing.com

© 2022 by David Pocta and John J. Markey

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Contents

David Pocta, Preface

Daniel P. Horan, Introduction

CHAPTER ONE

Ron Rolheiser, Christian Spirituality in Our Cities, Our Churches, and in the Academy: The Agenda Moving Forward

IN OUR LIVES

CHAPTER TWO

Wendy M. Wright, Lessons for the Road Ahead

CHAPTER THREE

Robert Ellsberg, The Future of Christian Spirituality

CHAPTER FOUR

Steven L. Porter, The Future of Christian Spiritual Formation

IN OUR CHURCHES

CHAPTER FIVE

Ruth Haley Barton, Known by What We Protest: A Protestant’s Journey Toward a More Unified Faith

CHAPTER SIX

John Shea, Three Futures of Christian Spirituality

IN THE ACADEMY

CHAPTER SEVEN

Sandra M. Schneiders, The Future of Christian Spirituality as an Academic Discipline

CHAPTER EIGHT

Amy E.W. Maxey, Feminist Theologies and Christian Mystical Spiritualities: Convergences, Challenges, and the Future

CHAPTER NINE

Philip Sheldrake, The Mystical Way in Times of Challenge

Contributors

Index

Preface

This volume is a collection of writings published in honor of the life and work of Father Ronald Rolheiser, OMI. Written by his colleagues and friends, each contribution imagines an aspect of the future of Christian spirituality as a reflection of Father Rolheiser’s profound scope of influence.

In consideration of Fr. Rolheiser and his vast contributions to the Christian Church, one word comes to mind: gift. Paul, in his First Letter to the Corinthians, writes: “To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good. To one is given through the Spirit the utterance of wisdom, and to another the utterance of knowledge according to the same Spirit” (1 Cor 12:7–8 NRSV). Fr. Rolheiser’s expression of his spiritual gifts is an example par excellence. His gift has blessed the people of God in South Texas and around the world.

The embodiment of his charisms enables Fr. Rolheiser to maintain the work ethic and productivity of his youth as he celebrates the golden anniversary of his ordination later this year. As he continues to pour himself into his students, his community, and his writing, his wisdom permeates ever-expanding circles of influence. Fr. Rolheiser is one of the most passionate, generous, and hard-working people I know.

Fr. Rolheiser is beloved at the Oblate School of Theology. He served as president from 2005 to 2020 and continues to teach in the spirituality program, give lectures, mentor students, offer spiritual direction, and host retreats. It was during his presidency in 2013 that the PhD in contemporary spirituality was launched, a unique and vital program that has rapidly become a prominent academic institution nationally and internationally.

In preparation for the 2020 conference held in honor of his contributions to the academy, I surveyed students and faculty in an effort to more broadly recognize the influence and impact that Fr. Rolheiser has had on the community at the Oblate School of Theology. I asked two questions: “What unique contributions has he made to the field of spirituality?” and “How has he personally impacted your life?” The following is a compilation of collective reflection expressing the deep respect, appreciation, and affection held by many.

Fr. Ron is welcoming and accessible. Those who work with him and study at the school feel respected and mentored by him, and yet they call him their friend. He is thoughtful and makes time for any who ask.

Fr. Ron is both academic and pastoral. He has read deeply and masterfully integrates spirituality, theology, anthropology, philosophy, biblical studies, and depth psychology. He reaches both the academic community and into the pews.

Fr. Ron is a community builder. He has developed a diverse PhD program with students from Vietnam, Kenya, Zambia, and Burkina Faso, as well as from a diversity of faith traditions. All are included. All are respected.

Fr. Ron possesses the uncanny ability to get to the heart of the matter. He bridges the chasm between right and left. He reminds people of their humanity and the common good as he teaches about the spirituality of everyday life.

Fr. Ron embodies the spirituality that he teaches. He is not pretentious or arrogant but rather he models humility, simplicity, and kindness. He is a living example of sacrifice and generosity.

Fr. Ron is an authentic journeyer who helps to articulate spirituality in relevant and useful ways for himself and others to navigate the God-given and innate passion with which we are born. He is faithful to his Canadian farming heritage and is appreciated for his sense of humor.

I am one who bears witness to the many blessings of knowing Fr. Rolheiser. He invited me into his classroom and his life in 2016 when I was spiritually disoriented. He has been my mentor, co-journeyer, and friend. He has created a safe and fertile place for me. He has helped me to find my voice and taught me that spirituality gives us a language to build the kind of unity that represents the heart of God.

With respect and in gratitude we dedicate this volume to our colleague, teacher, mentor, pastor, and friend.

David PoctaOblate School of TheologyJune 2022

Introduction

Daniel P. Horan

The story goes that in the 1990s, during a faculty social at the opening of a new academic year, a friend of mine, a seasoned historical theologian who had been hired by a certain research university to direct a graduate program in spirituality, was approached by one of his new colleagues. This colleague, another middle-aged white man from a different theological field, approached the newly relocated spirituality professor and asked him, “So, what’s your area?” Eager to be collegial and socialize with his new peers, he responded promptly with: “Spirituality.” The colleague replied, with an emergent smirk, “Ah, spirituality.” He then offered an unsolicited comment that he assumed would come across with the wisdom of an ancient aphorism. “Cheese is to Cheez Whiz, as theology is to spirituality!”

Laughter ensued, but only from one side of the interaction.

Those who work in the academic field known today as “Christian spirituality” are often familiar with this kind of dismissive attitude from scholarly colleagues, something Sandra Schneiders recounts from her own experience, referencing other derisive descriptors she has heard for spirituality over the years, such as “theology lite.” And yet, despite the academic incredulity that haunted practitioners and scholars of spirituality alike in the latter part of the twentieth century, interest in spirituality as a discrete field of study has steadily increased. In her contribution to this volume, Schneiders makes the point that when it comes to spirituality, “What we are studying is a, if not the, major reality of human life—namely, the relation of the individual in community with God as that project is mediated to us in sacred scripture and throughout history in the believing community(ies), in dialogue with the socio-historical realities of our life situations.” This sentiment is echoed by the great Latin American liberation theologian Gustavo Gutiérrez in his classic work We Drink from Our Own Wells: The Spiritual Journey of a People, who boldly states that spirituality is the foundation of all theology, including theologies of liberation. Citing the Dominican theologian M.D. Chenu, Gutiérrez proclaims: “Clearly, theological systems are nothing but the expression of spiritualities…a theology worthy of the name is a spirituality that has found the appropriate rational instruments for its religious experience.”1

Not only is spirituality at the heart of theological reflection, but it is also—as Ronald Rolheiser has written in so many venues over the course of four decades—at the very core of what it means to be human. As he writes in his best-selling book The Holy Longing, “Spirituality is not something on the fringes, an option for those with a particular bent. None of us has a choice. Everyone has to have a spirituality and everyone does have one, either a life-giving one or a destructive one.”2 Put another way, the great interreligious scholar Raimon Panikkar once described spirituality as simply “one typical way of handling the human condition.”3 While spirituality is fundamental to human existence, that longing and desire described so famously by St. Augustine of Hippo (d. 430 CE) in terms of a restless heart, it has not always been the object of formal academic study in the same way as other theological loci over the centuries, like one finds in the sub-disciplines of systematics or ethics or biblical studies.

The academic study of spirituality as a proper discipline in the academy is, as many contributors to this volume have observed, a relatively new area of distinctive scholarly inquiry. Most of the founding mothers and fathers of this field—especially of what has become known as spirituality studies in North America, as distinct from the previously established area of “spiritual theology” in Continental Europe—actually never held graduate degrees in the field they themselves helped forge. It was not until very recently that advanced degrees in the study of spirituality were granted in the United States, such as through the PhD programs at the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley, California, and the Oblate School of Theology in San Antonio, Texas. Instead, those who have significantly paved the way for what is now widely recognized as a distinctive academic discipline came from disparate theological subfields, including biblical studies (e.g., Sandra Schneiders, IHM), historical theology (e.g., Bernard McGinn, Wendy Wright, Philip Sheldrake, and Mary Frohlich, RSCJ), and systematic theology (e.g., David Tracy and Ronald Rolheiser, OMI), among others.4

This volume is a collection of essays about the future of Christian spirituality that have been gathered and published in honor of Fr. Ronald Rolheiser, OMI, and his manifold contributions to the field of spirituality. In this introductory essay I want to do three things to help set the stage for the important chapters that follow. First, I examine the way that the academic field of spirituality has developed and continues to develop. Second, I explore the many contributions Ronald Rolheiser has made to the field. Finally, I survey the contents of this volume with an eye toward understanding how the contributors examine Christian spirituality in our lives, in our churches, and in the academy.

The Ongoing Development of a Discipline

One of the key ways that the study of spirituality is distinctive among academic disciplines, although by no means unique, is its self-implicating nature.5 In an age that is marked by scientific positivism, materialism, and general incredulity regarding non-empirically verifiable forms of inquiry—what we might generally classify as modernity—the claim that the study of spirituality is a legitimate academic discipline or field of study has been a difficult sell. That difficulty within academe has only grown more intense as, perhaps ironically, the market for popular resources on spirituality broadly conceived has consistently increased over the last several decades. These days, every bookstore has a section labeled “spirituality” that includes everything from translations of the great desert mothers and fathers of early Christianity to “new age” texts describing the benefits of crystals to pop-psychology offerings of a “self-help” variety. Because this textual category is so expansive, it creates another obstacle to the acceptance of spirituality as a rigorous field of scholarly interest alongside its already self-implicating nature. When the object of your inquiry is first-order experience of the transcendent, how do you approach it methodologically in a manner acceptable to the modern academy? With so many disparate understandings of what constitutes “spirituality” flooding the marketplace, how does one overcome the reduction of Christian spirituality to “theology lite” or “Cheez Whiz” in the popular and scholarly imagination? Given its distinctive characteristics and challenges, can Christian spirituality even be considered a valid academic discipline or field of inquiry?

For at least the last four decades these challenges and questions have motivated scholars across academic fields, both in the humanities and in the social sciences, to flesh out their conviction that spirituality can be a legitimate academic discipline, thereby launching the formation of an emerging field of study.6 In 1983 the late historical theologian Walter Principe published a short article simply titled “Toward Defining Spirituality.”7 Drawing on his expertise in historical methodology, Principe argues for a definition of “spirituality” according to its documented and shifting usage over the centuries. What results is an important differentiation between spirituality as “the way in which a person understands and lives within his or her historical context that aspect of his or her religion, philosophy or ethic that is viewed as the loftiest, the noblest, the most calculated to lead to the fullness of the ideal or perfection being sought” (hence, the self-implicating character of spirituality) and the distinct but related “formulation of a teaching about the lived reality” and the study of that formulation.8 This key differentiation has been clarified further in subsequent years by those, like Michael Downey, who have summarized this in terms of the what and how of studying spirituality. Downey explains: “In studying spirituality today, a great deal of attention has been given to answering two interrelated questions: 1) What is studied in studying spirituality? 2) How is it to be studied?”9 Over the years, others have likewise sought to refine these questions and probe further into both the object of study in and methodological approaches to spirituality.10 The result has been the formation of an interdenominational community of theologians and social scientists committed to the rigorous study of Christian spirituality from a variety of methodological approaches.

Around the same time that Principe was outlining his proposal for how to begin categorizing distinctions within this nascent discipline, two major multivolume academic publishing ventures were launched: the World Spirituality: An Encyclopedic History of the Religious Quest series by Crossroad Publishing and the Classics of Western Spirituality series by Paulist Press, the latter of which continues to expand with the addition of new volumes today. It is difficult to overstate the importance of the publication of these two series for the development of the academic study of spirituality. The World Spirituality series, with several volumes dedicated to Christian spirituality specifically, brought together hundreds of the world’s leading scholars of religion to examine the historical origins, classic texts, and practices of various spiritual traditions. Under the general editorship of the late Ewert Cousins, the World Spirituality series provided a scholarly yet accessible repository of secondary literature on spirituality. The Classics in Western Spirituality, published under the guidance of an editorial board of eminent scholars, published critical translations of classical texts in English, often with lengthy and substantive introductions and notes. These two libraries of resources provided scholars and students with volumes that aided them in the pursuit of critical inquiry into spirituality, even as other scholars continued to delve deeper into questions of spirituality’s disciplinary boundaries, formal object of study, and methodological approaches.

In 1991 the Society for the Study of Christian Spirituality (SSCS) was established to “facilitate the scholarly examination of spirituality” and maintain the presence of the academic study of spirituality at the annual American Academy of Religion conference and beyond.11 Shortly thereafter, the SSCS began publishing a journal titled the Christian Spirituality Bulletin, which ran for nearly a decade until it was renamed Spiritus: A Journal of Christian Spirituality in 2000 and thereafter published by the Johns Hopkins University Press as a leading academic journal.12 The formation of a scholarly guild in the SSCS and the foundation of an academic journal that published rigorous essays on the questions of spirituality contributed to creating a context within which the seeds of a distinctive academic field could germinate and blossom in the form of scholarly research, conversation, and collegiality.

This period of increased academic interest, growth in specialized programs of study, and establishment of a formal professional society and scholarly English-language journal during the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries marks a key moment in the history of the discipline. More than thirty years after the founding of the SSCS, and now with little doubt about the legitimacy and significance of spirituality as an academic field, we find ourselves at another significant moment framed by the question: What is the future of Christian spirituality?

The contributors to this volume take up this question and offer numerous observations and proposals that will undoubtedly help shape the discussion moving forward.13 With them, I wish to offer a few thoughts about the future of Christian spirituality as an academic discipline and a practice before turning to consider some of the many contributions Ronald Rolheiser has and continues to make to this field.

While there are many areas to consider when looking toward the future of Christian spirituality according to the three areas that frame this volume, there are some topics and characteristics that are more pressing or urgent. With that in mind, I wish to start by looking at the future of Christian spirituality in our lives. One key dimension of our contemporary social and ecclesial setting, particularly as we come out of several years of a global pandemic, is the digital saturation of our lives today. News, entertainment, shopping, socializing, and virtually every other aspect of modern living have now become mediated through the Internet, electronic devices, and social media. In some settings, such as during recent years of pandemic-driven isolation, such digital connectivity is a welcome blessing. However, as our increasingly polarized communities reflect, increased virtual mediation of relationships removes something fundamental about healthy human interaction that ought to raise unease for those concerned about the holistic and transformative role of spirituality. There is also the matter of constant distraction, interference with conditions of silence and contemplation, and a reduction of spiritual practices to superficiality in the digital age.

This is not to suggest that our dual residency in the analog world and what Pope Benedict XVI once called the “digital continent” is always and everywhere inherently negative, even as it concerns the practice and study of Christian spirituality.14 For example, during the COVID-19 pandemic, communities of faith had to creatively and radically reinvent what worship, spiritual practices, and pastoral outreach looked like over mediating technologies like Zoom, Facebook, and YouTube. Some were quite successful, while others struggled to be nothing more than simulacra of traditional embodied worship, prayer, and meditation, or even failed outright. Lessons from communities that flourished during this time and experience, such as at the Church of Our Lady of Loretto in Notre Dame, Indiana, can provide us with guidance or insight about other creative forms of what Christian spirituality looks like in an undeniably digital era.15 Recognizing that there are both “blessings” and “curses” associated with the digital age, practitioners and scholars of spirituality alike will need to grapple with the shifting “new normal” that such virtual mediation presents moving forward.

In terms of the future of Christian spirituality in our churches, one of the major characteristics of our time is the decreasing credibility of religious leaders and institutions. Sociological data make clear that traditional affective religiosity is on the decline and institutional disaffiliation is on the rise, especially among members of younger generations. At first glance, this would appear to portend bad news for religion as such. However, anecdotal and survey results suggest that the very same young people (and aligned not-so-young people) still recognize an inherent sense of the transcendent in their lives. The common expression “I’m spiritual but not religious” has served to frighten or offend religious leaders and adherents over the decades, but what those who find the saying to be inherently negative or pessimistic miss is the potential for churches to give language and context for spiritual seekers in their quest for meaning making.16 The future of Christian spirituality in our churches is one in which spirituality is finally recognized as the foundation and source of doctrinal or second-order reflection on faith, not an “add-on” or optional interest to take or leave.

In this sense, Christian spirituality in our churches should take a place of priority and drive initiatives to restore credibility and relevance to ecclesial communities. When contemporary people raise legitimate questions about the import of millennia-old religions for modern living, spirituality provides a natural response: prior to any dogmatic or propositional claim, we acknowledge that we are creatures loved into existence with the capacity for communion with God and, as such, we are more than the sum of our empirical parts. No other locus of scientific or humanistic study or practice can account for this fundamental human phenomenon; therefore, the future of Christian spirituality is one that must be inclusive, hospitable, honest, and open. In an age when facts and veracity are questioned, both accusations and real instances of “fake news” proliferate, consumerism is on the rise within the context of our digital saturation, modern seekers desire authenticity and truth. Christian spirituality may not only be part of our collective ecclesial experience, but it may also very well be the future of our churches themselves.

Lastly, the future of Christian spirituality in the academy is likely to develop in several areas. First, as has been discussed over the last few decades, methodological considerations will play an important role moving forward. This is one of the major themes raised by Rossano Zas Friz De Col in his 2018 article, “The Future of the Study of Christianity.”17More recently, this was the subject of a special issue of the Italian journal Mysterion: Rivista di Ricerca in Teologia Spirituale, which collected papers presented at the September 2019 conference on “Evolving Methodologies” in Rome and co-sponsored by the SSCS and the Forum Dei Professori di Teologia Spirituale in Italia.18 The ongoing tension between the North American and European approaches to the study of spirituality—fields known respectively as “spirituality studies” and “spiritual theology”—continues to play out with each approach differing in starting points, methodological considerations, interlocutors, and audience. Conferences like the 2019 Rome meeting have been fruitful in identifying both points of commonality and areas of disagreement, but work in this area continues to be important.

Another key aspect of the future of Christian spirituality in the academy is the increasingly shifting departmental and disciplinary home for this scholarly work. As evidenced by the foundational graduate programs at the Graduate Theological Union and the Oblate School of Theology, the field of spirituality originated in graduate schools of theology and ministry. It has since become a specialization in other universities, especially within theology and religious studies faculties. But in the last five years there has been a blossoming of interest in the academic study of spirituality in secular and land-grant universities, as well as increasing openness to exploring the role of spirituality in professional fields such as medicine, law, and business. Moving forward, scholars of spirituality will find themselves engaging in new conversations and with new audiences, including in areas no one would have anticipated even a decade ago. Spirituality in the academy will no longer be the exclusive domain of theology and ministry, which is a shift that is both exciting and challenging.

A third aspect regarding spirituality in the academy is a deepening and broadening of the discipline’s inherently interdisciplinary character. It seems to me that interdisciplinary emphasis will only be accelerated in the coming years by the growing interest in spirituality beyond schools and departments of theology and ministry. While this is undoubtedly a thrilling phenomenon, it will also introduce new questions about methodology, source material, audience, and outcomes. It will also renew questions about the self-implicating nature of the discipline, particularly when dialogue partners are engaging this work from outside the Christian or other religious traditions.

A fourth dimension I see on the horizon for the future of Christian spirituality in the academy is the need for a decolonial hermeneutical approach to the discipline. As with all areas of academic inquiry in our contemporary setting, especially those situated within the humanities, attention to the history and context of sources, methods, and audiences will be increasingly important and necessarily critical. This is all the more true in the field of Christian spirituality, given the colonial heritage and complicity of Christian institutions and practitioners in multiple systems of oppression. Attention to race, gender, sexuality, ability, class, and other aspects of social location will no longer be the interest of a few, but a requirement for the entire field.

Finally, the relationship between practice and theory in the academic enterprise of studying spirituality is likely to continue growing. For too long the siloes within which scholars and practitioners worked independently have maintained a false sense of separation. Recent efforts like that of Elizabeth Liebert, Steven Chase, and Rupert Sheldrake have signaled precisely this kind of attention to the intersecting realities of the practice and the study of spirituality.19 This also invites greater ecumenical conversations about the role of spiritual formation in the study of spirituality.

We are witnessing a moment of tremendous creativity and opportunity in the area of Christian spirituality. Its future in our lives, in our churches, and in the academy is promising and exciting, but also fraught with new challenges and questions. Whatever shape the future of Christian spirituality will take in the coming years, decades, and beyond, it will be indebted to the extraordinary vision and work of the many scholars and practitioners who have helped to clarify and advance a discipline. One such luminary is Ronald Rolheiser, whose contributions to the field have occasioned this Festschrift and to whom we now turn to survey the good work he has and continues to accomplish.

The Contributions of Ronald Rolheiser

Ronald Rolheiser has made significant contributions to Christian spirituality in all three of the major areas explored throughout these essays collected in his honor. Although it is impossible to fully encapsulate the reach and impact of his teaching, preaching, writing, and pastoral ministry on the millions of those who have encountered him in person or through his many recorded lectures and retreats, numerous books and articles, and decades of weekly columns, it is fair to say that Rolheiser has touched the hearts and informed the minds of many, many lives. Likewise, his skilled and creative way of making the core elements of Christian faith come alive for contemporary believers, spiritual seekers, and even those of no religious affiliation at all has opened new avenues for theological reflection and the practice of spirituality in our churches. However, given the scholarly nature of this essay collection, I want to spend some time reflecting on the immeasurable contributions Rolheiser has made to Christian spirituality in the academy, which have certainly shaped the future of the field for decades and centuries to come.

Drawing on an academic distinction in the field of literature between literary critics and authors of literature, Rolheiser opens his essay in this volume by proposing an analogous distinction within the field of Christian spirituality. Pointing to those who are scholars of Christian spirituality, he notes that they by and large fall into the category of “writing about spirituality” in a manner akin to literary critics, while others—such as Julian of Norwich and Henri Nouwen and Joyce Rupp—“write spirituality.” Rolheiser also notes that there are those rare folks who fall into both categories, who stand in the centerpiece of the overlapping Venn diagram: sometimes writing analytical, hermeneutical, and critical scholarship about the study or practice of spirituality, while also sometimes writing spirituality as such. Rolheiser’s primary interest in thinking about the future of Christian spirituality is geared toward the latter group—those who write spirituality—which is not surprising given that this has undoubtedly been his most recognizable contribution to the field over the decades. But on account of his work and legacy, he falls into yet another category, one that he didn’t explicitly discuss in his essay, namely, those who have through administrative vision and academic leadership created institutions and programs that foster the study and practice of spirituality. For the sake of simplicity, let’s call this category “promoting spirituality” and note that it is something that Rolheiser has been unparalleled in accomplishing. I’ll circle back to this third category a little later, but first I want to spend some time looking at Ronald Rolheiser as one who “writes spirituality.”

One of the distinctive characteristics of Ronald Rolheiser to those who know him personally is his genuine humility and lack of self-importance. For someone who has been as widely read, influential, and well known as Rolheiser, it may surprise some readers to know how he summarized his hopes for remembrance after his death. In an interview with author and editor Alicia Von Stamwitz, Rolheiser reflected for a time on the question and answered: “I guess I want to be remembered as somebody who’s trustworthy, as someone who didn’t betray anybody’s faith, as someone who never hurt anyone. Someone who was kind and who dispensed mercy in God’s name, rather than any kind of judgment.”20 That sense of goodwill and the primacy of relationship shine through in his writing as much as it does in his personal life.

Rolheiser is the author of more than twenty books and over 1,700 articles since the early 1980s. His written output alone is massive, which does not even include his thousands of hours of lecturing, teaching, and leading retreats. For this reason, it is a great challenge to summarize his contributions or distill his work into a few paragraphs. Nevertheless, while his work is always original and engaging, there are major themes that recur and help form threads of continuity in his spiritual writing. At the top of the list of foundational and guiding themes in his work are love and desire, life and death. I would dare say that in every one of his essays or books you could recognize him returning to these key areas of the spiritual journey.