Christian Mysticism Symbols
ONE of the commonest of the criticisms which are brought against the mystics is that they represent an unsocial type, of religion; that their spiritual enthusiasms are personal and individual, and that they do not share or value the corporate life and institutions of the church or community to which they belong.characteristics of mysticism Yet, as a matter of fact, the connection that does and should be present between personal religion and the corporate life of the church frequently seen in them in a strange rigor, a peculiarly interesting form; and in their lives, rather, more easily than anywhere else, we may recognize the principles which do or should govern the relation of the individual to the community
mystic astrology free horoscopesPersonal religion is raised higher than ever in a true mystic, who is often erroneously referred to as a religious individualist. If we accept his experience as genuine, it involves an intercourse with the spiritual world, an awareness of it. This transcends the typical experience, and looks to be independent of the general religious consciousness of the community to which he/she belongs. The mystic does not speak with God as a member of a group but with God as a person. His life is not directed by faith, but by knowledge and reason that was acquired by unmitigated communication with God.A certitude was received by the certitude with which he can not be parted with and which is normally not diffused-oversees every consequence of the Universe. It will withstand and support him during the darkest events of his life when all awareness of spirituality is not evident.
It seems at first that such a personality as his lacks the support generally given by a community of fellow-believers. By the very term “mystic” .we indicate a certain aloofness from the crowd, suggest that he is in possession of a secret which the community as a whole does not and cannot share; that he lives at levels to which they cannot rise. I think that much of the distrust with which he is often regarded comes from this sense of his independence of the herd; his apparent separation from the often clumsy and always symbolic methods of institutional religion, and the further fact that his own methods and results cannot be criticized or checked by those who have not shared them. “I spake as I saw,” said David; and those who did not see can only preserve a respectful or an exasperated silence.
Yet this common opinion is decisively contradicted by history, which shows us, again and again, the great mystics as the loyal children of the great religious institutions, and forces us to admit that here as in other departments of human activity the corporate and the individual life are intimately plaited together. Even those who have broken away from the churches that reared them, have quickly drawn to themselves disciples, and become the centres of new groups. If we can try the natural connection of a group of people linking to a network of great value to the server that leads the operation.
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Posted: June 20th, 2009 under Positive thinking.
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