One of the writers I’ve been reading on sabbatical is the Episcopalian priest, Cynthia Bourgeault. In The Wisdom Ways of Knowing, she addresses the topic of knowing God. Protestants, with their emphasis on scripture (sola scripture), have mainly had a cerebral approach to knowing God. You could even say that we work hard at Bible study in order to know about God. But knowing about and knowing are two different things. This does not mean that the Roman Catholic Church, 500-years-ago, did not also approach God from a cerebral avenue, but when the Reformation came the Protestants almost went exclusively down that avenue. We made creeds (lists of beliefs) especially important so that we could say that we weren’t like those people, first the Catholics, then later other reformers. Baptists made it a point to say that we didn’t have creeds. But most of us couldn’t resist, so we often made creeds, but called them something else, so we could still feel superior. Mind games.
Bourgeault emphasizes “participatory knowledge” when speaking of connecting to God. This includes the mind, the cerebral approach to God, but doesn’t stop there. Participatory knowledge involves the whole self. It’s knowledge a potter has by working the clay, or a swimmer gains through being in the water. You can’t learn piano from a textbook, but only by participating. So, Bourgeault says, is the way with knowing God. In the same way that a potter comes to know the clay by forming it, spinning it, watering it, and feeling it every moment with her fingers, so the pilgrim seeking God comes to know God through spiritual practices.
Protestants know this, we just don’t like to admit it. It’s why we’ve had prayer groups and taken retreats. A few years ago even Southern Baptists produced a series of class lessons called Experiencing God. There’s always some new Christian fad – 40 Days of Purpose or The Prayer of Jabez – which is marketed and sold like streetside vendors. So, we know this, it’s just that we still want to package it around our cerebral study of the Bible – which is sort of like trying to turn a gourmet meal into a frozen dinner that you heat up in the microwave in a few minutes.
The practices that Bourgeault talks about aren’t new. They’ve been around Christianity for more than a thousand years – Lectio Divina, chanting (or a newer form such as Taize choruses), centering prayer, and monastic labor, among others. Some of which we have occasionally practiced at Sardis Baptist Church in Charlotte. Of course, you can’t learn to play Mozart by practicing occasionally.
And therein lies a tension. We have become an instant gratification society. Modernization and technology make it possible for us to have so much of what we want immediately. Unfortunately, there is not a microwaveable way to connect to the Holy Spirit.
The practices Bourgeault mentions take time, not just chronologically, but kairos – the right time. So, much of the connection to the holy mystery is about my understanding of where I am that without time for the mind to slow down from its rapid pace, for my anxieties to dissipate for a few moments, for my hopes and dreams to rise up within me that there is no “me” to connect with God – just whatever happens to be the last charged thoughts to zap between my brain synapses.
The secret of ancient spiritual practices is not so much of how to help us know God, but to help us slow down enough to know ourselves. The slowing down allows us to move from chronos time to kairos time. So that then, knowing ourselves, we might know God.
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