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Self portrait, St. Mary's Diocesan School chapel  Anthony DeMello says the three rules of spiritual practice are  Awareness, Awareness, and Awareness.  Which is, I guess, his smart alec way of saying that the spiritual life is the process of moving ever closer to what is real. Nobody much has a problem with that, as all of us, even those subject to outrageous psychoses, think we know what is real, and the way we hear an injunction to get in touch with reality is as a suggestion that everyone else needs to open their eyes and see the world as it is; that is as I see it. It's not what DeMello meant. Kind of the opposite of what he meant, as a matter of fact. The world is hidden from each of us, behind the thick curtain of our own preconceptions. The spiritual life is about lifting the curtain. Or curtains. It's a dance of the seventy seven thousand seven hundred and seventy seven  veils, a gradual striptease in which our own illusions are recognised fo...

Every couple of years or so I re read this little book. There are 196 pages, but they are small - the book fits easily into a pocket. There are 31 short chapters so what with the diminutive size and all, you'd think it would be a pretty quick read but it's not. At least, not for me.  The minimum time it takes me to read it is 31 days, but usually it is more like 62 or 93. That's because although it only takes 5 minutes to read a chapter I have to sit with each one for a long time afterwards. When Anthony De Mello died in his mid fifties in 1987 he was very widely known and read. For many of us, his numerous books of enigmatic little stories have been rich seams to be mined for sermon illustrations. For a lot of people Sadhana (1978) has been a resource enabling the start of a contemplative spiritual practice. Until Thomas Keating's Contemplative Outreach and Laurence Freeman's World Community for Christian Meditation became firmly established, Anthony De Mel...

I set out this morning to try and define attachment. Rather than use my own words, I've borrowed the following from Anthony De Mello. "Now if you look carefully, you will see that there is one thing and only one thing that causes unhappiness. And that is attachment. What is attachment? An emotional state of clinging caused by the belief that without some particular thing or some person you cannot be happy. " "Has it ever struck you that you have been programmed to be unhappy and so no matter what you do to become happy you are bound to fail?" "Everywhere people have actually built their lives on the unquestioned belief that without certain things - money, power, success, approval, a good reputation, love, friendship, spirituality, God - they cannot be happy.... once you swallowed your belief you naturally developed an attachment to this person." "Who is responsible for the programming? Not you. It isn't really you who decided even...

Last Sunday the crozier , ring and pectoral cross I am going to use were blessed and laid on the altar of our Cathedral, waiting for Saturday. And I too, have been trying to lay myself on the altar: a living sacrifice The last few days have been a time of reflection. Rather than go off on retreat, I decided to stay at home in order that Clemency could have some part in my preparation, so I had a sort of a retreat in situ . Apart from yesterday when the phone and doorbell didn't stop ringing, it's worked out pretty well. I managed to fit some lengthy meditations in around the daily offices and every day I went to the beach and did a walking meditation. I also read large chunks of two very good books: Anthony De Mello's Walking on Water and Stephen Cottrell's Hit The Ground Kneeling . The latter is a very wise take on leadership and maybe should be required reading for ordinands. But it is the late Father De Mello who has spoken to me most profoundly. Walking On Wate...