Falling Upward: A Spirituality For The Two Halves Of Life

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BB: I don’t want it, because I don’t want to give it to people when that happens. And yet again, my prayer, I’m trapped in certain grace. I mean, I cannot get out of God’s grace if I try. It seems unrelenting.

The Two Halves of Life — Center for Action and Contemplation

Jung writes of his own experience: “It was only after the illness that I understood how important it is to affirm one’s own destiny. In this way we forge an ego that does not break down when incomprehensible things happen; an ego that endures, that endures the truth, and that is capable of coping with the world and with fate. Then, to experience defeat is also to experience victory.” [3] RR: You’re a one. You have such a nice smile. You know, a lot of ones don’t know how to smile. It takes this man a while to smile, I think, but he does. You do, but you have to work on him for a while. BB: Well, we’re going to do a two-parter that you’ve generously agreed to do, and the first part is the two books, I think all of your books, have had messages for me that… I told you this before we started, changed me and really made me angry. And then they made me angry, then they changed me. Is that how it works sometimes? RR: And if you look for a way to prove that you did deserve it, you’ve lost it at that moment. I see people even regarding the war in Ukraine now talking about, what did those people do to deserve that? Nothing. It works both ways. Evil is gratuitous, and grace is gratuitous. And if we’re not programmed to receive grace, we’ll normally gravitate toward grievance. Why the world has done me in, done me wrong.RR: Major whomping. But I’m a Senator. I don’t need a whomp. I mean, like this whole past few years of denying obvious deceit, denying obvious untruths. And I’m supposed to look up to you as an elder? You’re not in the first grade. I’m not trying to be overly judgmental, although that’s our sin as ones. We’re overly judgmental.

Falling Upward: A Spirituality for the Two Halves of Life Falling Upward: A Spirituality for the Two Halves of Life

RR: I know. That I think a lot of people become Christian or remain Christian to prove that they’re right, to prove that they’re innocent, they’re good, they’re holy. It doesn’t create a flexible personality that is ready to change, which is the first words Jesus used. It’s translated, “Repent,” which of itself is a terrible translation, because the word repent connotes nothing like the word change. BB: Let me go into this because this is the sentence that I’ve probably read, no joke, a hundred times. A couple of months ago a student gave me a cap embroidered with the words "Theology Matters." And so it does. I fervently believe that theology must not be an arcane academic pursuit reserved only for a few super-nerdy types. Rather, theology exists for the sake of the church and its mission. It exists to assist ordinary believers read and enact Scripture in authentic ways, together, and in their own locale, as a local body of faithful disciples of Jesus Christ. The unitive encounter with a Power greater than you resituates the self inside of a safe universe where you don’t need to be special, rich, or famous to feel alive. Those questions are resolved once and for all. The hall of mirrors that most people live in becomes unhelpful and even bothersome. Now aliveness comes from the inside out. This is what we mean when we say “God saves you.”The perennial philosophy [20] forms the basis of much of Rohr's teaching; his work's essential message focuses on the union of divine reality with all things and the human potential and longing for this union. Rohr and other 21st-century spiritual leaders explore the Perennial Tradition in the Center for Action and Contemplation's issue of the publication Oneing. [21] In a similar vein, he sometimes draws on spiral dynamics and Ken Wilber's integral theory. Psychological concepts from Carl Jung and the Enneagram of Personality are also recurring themes in his work. Lutzer, Erwin W. (2018). The Church in Babylon. Chicago: Moody Publishers. p.207-208. ISBN 9780802413086. RR: Unlearning. Not learning, but unlearning. The patterns that come so naturally to the ego. Yeah. It’s not about learning, which is what we made it into. Radical Grace: Daily Meditations (edited by John Bookser Feister) (1993, reissued by St. Anthony Messenger Press, 1996) ISBN 978-0-86716-257-8 RR: I was inspired the summer I wrote that book, I guess. Because it’s so well received in jails and prisons, really.