Christian Spirituality: an introduction
By Alister E. McGrath
Blackwell Publishing, 2004
Review by John L. Ng
December, 2011
By way of introduction, I have two nagging concerns. In recent years, the inflated use of the noun spirituality and the adjective spiritual has devalued their meanings. The muddled notion of spirituality enters our conversation indiscriminately. It can mean many things from the immaterial world to music genre to the affective soul. Second, the Evangelical churches speak of spiritual formation in their teaching. Yet their congregants understand it little and practice it even less. Many are not aware of its long history and traditional practices. Some assume mistakenly that it consists only of bible reading and prayer.
Alister E.McGrath’s Christian Spirituality (first published in 1999 with last reprint in 2004) alerts us back to the historical and practical significance of spirituality. He is the Professor of Theology, Ministry and Education, and Head of the Centre for Theology, Religion and Culture at King's College, London. His introductory chapter immediately clarifies various terms and defines Christian spirituality as ‘the quest for a fulfilled and authentic Christian existence, involving the bringing together of the fundamental ideas of Christianity. . .’ The remains of the book unpack this definition.
The book continues with the main historical typologies of spirituality – the Catholic, Orthodox and Protestant (including Evangelical) traditions. These traditions’ views of the world, culture and history obviously impact their theology of spirituality and their adherents’ practice of spirituality. The main sections of the book focus on four major concerns: 1. The different traditions’ theological foundations are presented and compared. Case studies are used to illustrate how their foundational doctrines are practiced. 2. The Biblical texts and images provide basic models for spiritual practices. Here McGrath emphasizes that our God-given imagination plays a significant role in spirituality in all traditions. 3. The notion of arts, spaces and time in spiritual practices are explained and cautioned. Being body people, we need to engage our multi-sensory capacity – like seeing, hearing, smelling – to enhance our spiritual exercises. 4. Finally the classic writings on spirituality, old and new and from all traditions, are introduced with samplings from the greats – like Gregory of Nyssa, Augustine, Anselm of Canterbury, Teresa of Avila, John Henry Newman and James Packer. Each chapter is followed with resources for further inquiries. To accommodate the technological data generation, it also has an internet resources section. For the uninitiated, there is a glossary of terms used in the book.
If a Christian is interested in pursuing spirituality beyond conversational prayers and Bible reading, McGrath’s introduction is a good place to start. Its exposition clearly and concisely introduces spiritual formation as an important missing element in our faith and practice. Depending on congregational maturity and congregants’ needs, I make two recommendations for the use of this book. We can use this book as our text for teaching a class on spirituality. We can also use this book as a resource for group studies and conversations.
Blackwell Publishing, 2004
Review by John L. Ng
December, 2011
By way of introduction, I have two nagging concerns. In recent years, the inflated use of the noun spirituality and the adjective spiritual has devalued their meanings. The muddled notion of spirituality enters our conversation indiscriminately. It can mean many things from the immaterial world to music genre to the affective soul. Second, the Evangelical churches speak of spiritual formation in their teaching. Yet their congregants understand it little and practice it even less. Many are not aware of its long history and traditional practices. Some assume mistakenly that it consists only of bible reading and prayer.
Alister E.McGrath’s Christian Spirituality (first published in 1999 with last reprint in 2004) alerts us back to the historical and practical significance of spirituality. He is the Professor of Theology, Ministry and Education, and Head of the Centre for Theology, Religion and Culture at King's College, London. His introductory chapter immediately clarifies various terms and defines Christian spirituality as ‘the quest for a fulfilled and authentic Christian existence, involving the bringing together of the fundamental ideas of Christianity. . .’ The remains of the book unpack this definition.
The book continues with the main historical typologies of spirituality – the Catholic, Orthodox and Protestant (including Evangelical) traditions. These traditions’ views of the world, culture and history obviously impact their theology of spirituality and their adherents’ practice of spirituality. The main sections of the book focus on four major concerns: 1. The different traditions’ theological foundations are presented and compared. Case studies are used to illustrate how their foundational doctrines are practiced. 2. The Biblical texts and images provide basic models for spiritual practices. Here McGrath emphasizes that our God-given imagination plays a significant role in spirituality in all traditions. 3. The notion of arts, spaces and time in spiritual practices are explained and cautioned. Being body people, we need to engage our multi-sensory capacity – like seeing, hearing, smelling – to enhance our spiritual exercises. 4. Finally the classic writings on spirituality, old and new and from all traditions, are introduced with samplings from the greats – like Gregory of Nyssa, Augustine, Anselm of Canterbury, Teresa of Avila, John Henry Newman and James Packer. Each chapter is followed with resources for further inquiries. To accommodate the technological data generation, it also has an internet resources section. For the uninitiated, there is a glossary of terms used in the book.
If a Christian is interested in pursuing spirituality beyond conversational prayers and Bible reading, McGrath’s introduction is a good place to start. Its exposition clearly and concisely introduces spiritual formation as an important missing element in our faith and practice. Depending on congregational maturity and congregants’ needs, I make two recommendations for the use of this book. We can use this book as our text for teaching a class on spirituality. We can also use this book as a resource for group studies and conversations.
The Social Animal: the hidden sources of love, character and achievement
By David Brooks
Random House, 2011
Review by John L. Ng
May, 2011
In high praise of the Creator God that ancient king of Israel, David, mused how we mere humans are fearfully and wonderfully made (Psalm 139.14). The divine work in the human person is indeed wonder-full. David Brooks’ “The Social Animal” explores this fearful creation. We may know Brooks from his New York Times Op-Ed column or as a PBS commentator. Imitating Rousseau’s literary devise of using an imaginary character in his novel “Emile” to explore a philosophical discourse, Brooks hangs his research on being human on two imaginary people.
Harold and Erica find their life paths along the six stages of human development – childhood, adolescence, odyssey, adulthood, retirement, old age. As he promised, Brooks’ narrative, although at times wooden and other times contrived, does make its reading fun and relevant. Using diverse resources from social science, he paints the possibility, complexity and pathology of being human. His central focus is the two-tier human mind, the unconscious and the conscious. Much goes on in the unconscious. Brooks contends that what goes on there is much more significant than what is in the conscious. With that take, he argues that the conscious is over-confident and perhaps over-rated. It takes too much credit for what it does and over-estimates what it knows and understands. To help us appreciate the unconscious, Brooks takes great fun and length to plot through the life stations of Harold and Erica.
Besides the unconscious, the mind also has emotive and cognitive faculties. It can feel and think. To find our path in life, the emotive and cognitive have to work in partnership. But being human that we are, they do not always interact to empower us in decision making. Our irrational can impede our rationale. For example, if a surgeon tells us that a procedure has a 15 percent failure rate, we most likely will decide against it. If told the procedure has an 85 percent successful rate, we will highly likely take it. Of course, this kind of psychology is not profound. The market place has employed this for years to sell us something. Nevertheless, it shows how powerful our unconscious can be in our daily encounters, be they big or small.
Brooks notes that we know more about the human mind in the past 30 years than in the previous 3,000 years. That may be true. But the wonder-full human mind is still a deep mystery. Even with all the insights of modern social science, we cannot fathom the mind’s complexity. Here Brooks seems to trust solely on social sciences for his conclusions. He uses and quotes these resources almost indiscriminately. I wonder if his unconscious is more the determinative than his conscious’s intentionality to make a point. I find myself diffident whether his many noted scientific surveys can really plumb the depth of our dark mind.
It is still entertaining and informative to plow through the almost 400 pages. In spite of all his references, it is a breezy read. His narrative of Harold and Erica helps me appreciate more how fearfully and wonderfully God has made us. Even with our pathology, our mind is a wonderful creation. We are who we are, do what we do and become what we have become because our minds are engaged in the paths God has carved out for us, whether we want to admit it or not.
Random House, 2011
Review by John L. Ng
May, 2011
In high praise of the Creator God that ancient king of Israel, David, mused how we mere humans are fearfully and wonderfully made (Psalm 139.14). The divine work in the human person is indeed wonder-full. David Brooks’ “The Social Animal” explores this fearful creation. We may know Brooks from his New York Times Op-Ed column or as a PBS commentator. Imitating Rousseau’s literary devise of using an imaginary character in his novel “Emile” to explore a philosophical discourse, Brooks hangs his research on being human on two imaginary people.
Harold and Erica find their life paths along the six stages of human development – childhood, adolescence, odyssey, adulthood, retirement, old age. As he promised, Brooks’ narrative, although at times wooden and other times contrived, does make its reading fun and relevant. Using diverse resources from social science, he paints the possibility, complexity and pathology of being human. His central focus is the two-tier human mind, the unconscious and the conscious. Much goes on in the unconscious. Brooks contends that what goes on there is much more significant than what is in the conscious. With that take, he argues that the conscious is over-confident and perhaps over-rated. It takes too much credit for what it does and over-estimates what it knows and understands. To help us appreciate the unconscious, Brooks takes great fun and length to plot through the life stations of Harold and Erica.
Besides the unconscious, the mind also has emotive and cognitive faculties. It can feel and think. To find our path in life, the emotive and cognitive have to work in partnership. But being human that we are, they do not always interact to empower us in decision making. Our irrational can impede our rationale. For example, if a surgeon tells us that a procedure has a 15 percent failure rate, we most likely will decide against it. If told the procedure has an 85 percent successful rate, we will highly likely take it. Of course, this kind of psychology is not profound. The market place has employed this for years to sell us something. Nevertheless, it shows how powerful our unconscious can be in our daily encounters, be they big or small.
Brooks notes that we know more about the human mind in the past 30 years than in the previous 3,000 years. That may be true. But the wonder-full human mind is still a deep mystery. Even with all the insights of modern social science, we cannot fathom the mind’s complexity. Here Brooks seems to trust solely on social sciences for his conclusions. He uses and quotes these resources almost indiscriminately. I wonder if his unconscious is more the determinative than his conscious’s intentionality to make a point. I find myself diffident whether his many noted scientific surveys can really plumb the depth of our dark mind.
It is still entertaining and informative to plow through the almost 400 pages. In spite of all his references, it is a breezy read. His narrative of Harold and Erica helps me appreciate more how fearfully and wonderfully God has made us. Even with our pathology, our mind is a wonderful creation. We are who we are, do what we do and become what we have become because our minds are engaged in the paths God has carved out for us, whether we want to admit it or not.
Saint Augustine’s Childhood: Confessions Book One
By Garry Wills
Penguin Books, 2001
Review by John L. Ng
April, 2011
This small gem of a book brings together two of my favorite writers. Both are prolific and profound. Garry Wills is the professor of history emeritus at Northwestern University. His writings include diverse topics: Venice: Lion City, Lincoln At Gettysburg, What Jesus Meant and Why I am a Catholic. Augustine was a small church pastor in Hippo of Africa and a giant in history as a great church teacher. His extensive writings include The City of God, Enchiridion on Faith, Hope & Love, The Trinity and The Confessions.
This small book is a translation and commentary of Book One (of 13) in Augustine’s The Confessions (397 AD). The traditional title is a transliteration of Augustine’s Latin: Confessio. Others refer to it as meditative or autobiographical. Augustine’s original genre is difficult to define. Wills prefers to call it The Testimony, noting that the both the Confessio’s subject and object is God. That is, it is Augustine’s contemplative prayer with and of God. The readers are listening bystanders to this great testimony of Augustine’s informed imagination of God to God. Listen in on how he begins: Vast are you, Lord, and as vast should be your praise. . .
Book One of The Testimony is structured along the first two stages of the patristic scheme of human life: infantia (non-speaking) and pueritia (speaking). What divides our childhood is the development of speech – our ability to use sounds as human language. Augustine uses this divine gift of language to contemplate what it means to be human before the divine.
Immediately in the first paragraph, he confesses to God: You prompt us yourself to find satisfaction in appraising you, since you made us tilted toward you, and our heart is unstable until stabilized in you. (emphasis mine) Shortly after his conversion, Augustine entered into prayer with these words: that I may know me, that I may know you. This great intellect had enough great sense to realize that to be aware of God we need first to be self aware. Augustine’s self awareness leads him to confess that we are forever restless and weightless until we find rest and gravity in God.
Augustine, in great self awareness, marvels how wonderfully and fearfully we are made. Even in our initial speechlessness, the human creation is a divine miracle. First he is in awe of our multi-sensory perception – seeing, hearing, smelling, tasting, touching. Second, the ingenious symmetry of our bodily functions also impresses him. Third, the organic wholeness of who we are as body and soul is a testimony to God’s creativity.
Finally, what is worthy of praise is our innate ability to retrieve meanings out of human sounds. Our capacity to converse substantively defines who we are before God. Augustine recognizes the wonders of our environment in our ability to learn language. There is the divine provision. Psalm 35.10 affirms that divine illumination in every human person’s sensory capacity. John 1.9 further points to Jesus, the Word of God, as God’s illumination personified. In an appendix, Wills uses a delightful dialogue between Augustine and his son to illustrate this great church father’s delight in human conversation. It has warmth, intellect, humor and potential for enlightenment. Their exchange testifies to God’s presence and provision in our lives.
Penguin Books, 2001
Review by John L. Ng
April, 2011
This small gem of a book brings together two of my favorite writers. Both are prolific and profound. Garry Wills is the professor of history emeritus at Northwestern University. His writings include diverse topics: Venice: Lion City, Lincoln At Gettysburg, What Jesus Meant and Why I am a Catholic. Augustine was a small church pastor in Hippo of Africa and a giant in history as a great church teacher. His extensive writings include The City of God, Enchiridion on Faith, Hope & Love, The Trinity and The Confessions.
This small book is a translation and commentary of Book One (of 13) in Augustine’s The Confessions (397 AD). The traditional title is a transliteration of Augustine’s Latin: Confessio. Others refer to it as meditative or autobiographical. Augustine’s original genre is difficult to define. Wills prefers to call it The Testimony, noting that the both the Confessio’s subject and object is God. That is, it is Augustine’s contemplative prayer with and of God. The readers are listening bystanders to this great testimony of Augustine’s informed imagination of God to God. Listen in on how he begins: Vast are you, Lord, and as vast should be your praise. . .
Book One of The Testimony is structured along the first two stages of the patristic scheme of human life: infantia (non-speaking) and pueritia (speaking). What divides our childhood is the development of speech – our ability to use sounds as human language. Augustine uses this divine gift of language to contemplate what it means to be human before the divine.
Immediately in the first paragraph, he confesses to God: You prompt us yourself to find satisfaction in appraising you, since you made us tilted toward you, and our heart is unstable until stabilized in you. (emphasis mine) Shortly after his conversion, Augustine entered into prayer with these words: that I may know me, that I may know you. This great intellect had enough great sense to realize that to be aware of God we need first to be self aware. Augustine’s self awareness leads him to confess that we are forever restless and weightless until we find rest and gravity in God.
Augustine, in great self awareness, marvels how wonderfully and fearfully we are made. Even in our initial speechlessness, the human creation is a divine miracle. First he is in awe of our multi-sensory perception – seeing, hearing, smelling, tasting, touching. Second, the ingenious symmetry of our bodily functions also impresses him. Third, the organic wholeness of who we are as body and soul is a testimony to God’s creativity.
Finally, what is worthy of praise is our innate ability to retrieve meanings out of human sounds. Our capacity to converse substantively defines who we are before God. Augustine recognizes the wonders of our environment in our ability to learn language. There is the divine provision. Psalm 35.10 affirms that divine illumination in every human person’s sensory capacity. John 1.9 further points to Jesus, the Word of God, as God’s illumination personified. In an appendix, Wills uses a delightful dialogue between Augustine and his son to illustrate this great church father’s delight in human conversation. It has warmth, intellect, humor and potential for enlightenment. Their exchange testifies to God’s presence and provision in our lives.
Sacred Marriage
By Gary Thomas
Zondervan, 2000
Review by John L. Ng
February, 2011
Self help books do not capture my imagination. Mostly, they provide simple answers that are not quite adequate; worse, they provide simplistic answers that are quite inadequate. A couples group was studying a marriage self help book assigned by their pastor. After plowing through several thin chapters, a husband turned to me: I can honestly say this book is underwhelming. For that reason alone, I usually do not recommend anything on the local book store’s self help shelves.
After reading Gary Thomas’s “Sacred Marriage,” I change my mind this once. Its subtitle captures my imagination: What if God designed marriage to make us holy more than to make us happy! That propositional insight counteracts many popular books on marriage. It counters the common sentiment embraced by many American Christians. Being Americans, the pursuit of happiness is embedded in our collective psyche; being Christians, God’s guarantee of marital happiness is presumed in our shared expectation.
Thomas immediately dispels that notion. “If the design of marriage is simply to enjoy an infatuation and make me fulfilled, then I would have to get a new marriage every few years,” he writes. In thirteen insightful chapters, he continues to spell out the creative intents of God for marriage. The chapters integrate Biblical teachings (some with fresh insights), other writings (mainly Porter’s “The Necessary Enemy”, Ricucci’s “Love That Lasts”, Allender and Longman’s “Intimate Allies”) and personal observations to delineate twelve learning goals for marriage.
Sampling chapters will suffice to demonstrate his goal: Finding God in Marriage: marital analogies teach us truths about God; Sacred Struggle: embracing difficulty in order to build character; Sexual Saints: marital sexuality can provide spiritual insights and character development; Sacred Presence: how marriage can make us more aware of God’s presence; Sacred Mission: marriage can develop our spiritual calling, mission and purpose.
All good marriages are the same. They all have similar defined characteristics and applied virtues. All bad marriages are different. Each has its own pathos as to why two people who once thought they loved each other drift apart. Although not impervious to what makes a happy marital union, “Sacred Marriage” rather focuses on how an imperfect union can make us more perfect people. From learning forgiveness and perseverance to intimacy of sexual love and prayers, Thomas concludes that just about every aspect of marriage is permeated with potentials for character formation. The book also provides helpful chapter questions for group discussion and self reflection.
In some church traditions, marriage is considered a sacrament. Indeed, a marriage is sacred in that it is a commissary of divine grace for us to grow in Christ. I will end where Thomas begins with this quote from Socrates: by all means marry. If you get a good wife, you will become happy. If you get a bad one, you will become a philosopher.
Zondervan, 2000
Review by John L. Ng
February, 2011
Self help books do not capture my imagination. Mostly, they provide simple answers that are not quite adequate; worse, they provide simplistic answers that are quite inadequate. A couples group was studying a marriage self help book assigned by their pastor. After plowing through several thin chapters, a husband turned to me: I can honestly say this book is underwhelming. For that reason alone, I usually do not recommend anything on the local book store’s self help shelves.
After reading Gary Thomas’s “Sacred Marriage,” I change my mind this once. Its subtitle captures my imagination: What if God designed marriage to make us holy more than to make us happy! That propositional insight counteracts many popular books on marriage. It counters the common sentiment embraced by many American Christians. Being Americans, the pursuit of happiness is embedded in our collective psyche; being Christians, God’s guarantee of marital happiness is presumed in our shared expectation.
Thomas immediately dispels that notion. “If the design of marriage is simply to enjoy an infatuation and make me fulfilled, then I would have to get a new marriage every few years,” he writes. In thirteen insightful chapters, he continues to spell out the creative intents of God for marriage. The chapters integrate Biblical teachings (some with fresh insights), other writings (mainly Porter’s “The Necessary Enemy”, Ricucci’s “Love That Lasts”, Allender and Longman’s “Intimate Allies”) and personal observations to delineate twelve learning goals for marriage.
Sampling chapters will suffice to demonstrate his goal: Finding God in Marriage: marital analogies teach us truths about God; Sacred Struggle: embracing difficulty in order to build character; Sexual Saints: marital sexuality can provide spiritual insights and character development; Sacred Presence: how marriage can make us more aware of God’s presence; Sacred Mission: marriage can develop our spiritual calling, mission and purpose.
All good marriages are the same. They all have similar defined characteristics and applied virtues. All bad marriages are different. Each has its own pathos as to why two people who once thought they loved each other drift apart. Although not impervious to what makes a happy marital union, “Sacred Marriage” rather focuses on how an imperfect union can make us more perfect people. From learning forgiveness and perseverance to intimacy of sexual love and prayers, Thomas concludes that just about every aspect of marriage is permeated with potentials for character formation. The book also provides helpful chapter questions for group discussion and self reflection.
In some church traditions, marriage is considered a sacrament. Indeed, a marriage is sacred in that it is a commissary of divine grace for us to grow in Christ. I will end where Thomas begins with this quote from Socrates: by all means marry. If you get a good wife, you will become happy. If you get a bad one, you will become a philosopher.