Spiritus: A Journal of Christian Spirituality
September 1, 2025
Shelby L. Hall
Abstract:As an autistic woman, I draw on Julian’s writing and the traditions of anchoritic spirituality, women’s visionary literature, and monastic discipline to identify aspects of Julian’s life that resonate with autistic spiritual experience. I provide a critique of the deficit narrative of autism pervading psychology and theology. I examine three characteristics of autism—requiring places...
Spiritus: A Journal of Christian Spirituality
September 1, 2025
Hansol Goo
Abstract:This essay explores the intersection of sacramentality and mysticism in McGinn’s Modern Mystics, particularly his emphasis on God’s transforming presence as central to mystical experience. Mysticism, like the sacraments, is marked by divine encounter, marginality, and mediated presence. In light of McGinn’s use of “presence” and figures like Simone Weil and Michel de Certeau,...
Spiritus: A Journal of Christian Spirituality
March 1, 2025
Miriam Jessie Fisher
Abstract:The biblical concept of leaving the edges of the harvest for others in need frames an exploration of contemplative artmaking and community engagement. Artmakers are contemplative “sowers” who create gleaning spaces. Publicly offered, they invite strangers to moments of contemplation. An exemplar project, entitled Pocket Wisdom, demonstrates the concept in practice. This essay...
Spiritus: A Journal of Christian Spirituality
September 1, 2024
Bo Karen Lee
Abstract: Ignatian meditation and bio-spiritual focusing (or BSF) hold healing potential for those recovering from the effects of trauma. This essay, originally delivered as the presidential address of the Society for the Study of Christian Spirituality in November 2023, outlines the nature and sources of trauma, explores its effects on the human psyche and body, and offers healing pathways...
Spiritus: A Journal of Christian Spirituality
March 1, 2008
Bernard Mcginn
Much of the recent literature on mysticism has taken mystical experience as a central theme. The term itself is not only recent, but also involves complexities both of a theoretical and historical character. The proposal advanced here is that mystical consciousness, understood as the meta-conscious co-presence of God in the entire process of experiencing, understanding, affirming, loving, and...