I find that all my thoughts circle round God like the planets round the sun, and are as irresistibly attracted by [God]. I would feel it the most heinous sin were I to offer any resistance to this compelling force. —Carl Jung, letter, March 1955
Father Richard considers Swiss psychiatrist Carl Jung a mystic who had a deep connection to the divine:
One of the major figures in my spiritual lineage is the Swiss psychiatrist Carl Gustav Jung (1875–1961). Although he was not a church-going Christian and said many things highly critical of organized Christianity as he saw it in his time, he laid a very solid foundation for the rediscovery of the spiritual world in an extremely materialistic and increasingly secular Europe. Jung utterly knew and believed that the inner life was the source of the outer; late in his life, he firmly and proudly replied when asked “Do you now believe in God?” with “I know. I don’t need to believe. I know.” [1]
Jung made statements that would surprise many Christians, conservative and liberal alike. For example, he saw Jesus’ life and many of the doctrines of the Church as a complete and perfect map and guide for human transformation. He believed in the central importance of rituals, myths, and symbols, which Catholics and Orthodox Christians could appreciate. Although Jung gave Bible passages more meaning and more credibility, he was perceived as an unbeliever by most Protestants. His development of concepts such as shadow, paradox, archetypes, symbols, and the psychological character of human transformation into the Divine made him a true prophet of the soul and a teacher of deep, inner sacramentalism. [2]
Jung believed that if God wants to speak to us, God has to use words that will, first of all, feel like our own thoughts. How else could God come to us? That’s why we have to be taught how to recognize, honor, and allow that sometimes our thoughts are God’s thoughts. That internal trust and authority is necessary to balance out the almost exclusive reliance upon external authority promoted by mainline Christianity. While Scripture, priests, pastors, and the pope may be necessary, Jung recognized that they are all external to the self, and offer us a religion from the outside in. Jung wanted to teach us to honor those same symbols, but from the inside out, to recognize that there are already numinous voices in our deepest depths. If we do not have deep contact with our in-depth self, he believed we could not know God.
Jung wrote, “The whole world is God’s suffering.” [3] That is the knowing of a mystic, and it’s one of my favorite lines of his. A mystic sees thing in wholes, not just in parts. They can connect all the anecdotes and intuit the big patterns. Christian mystics recognize that every incidence of suffering is a participation in what we Christians would call the eternal crucifixion of the Christ. When we see in wholes, we can always find a place for each of the parts. [4]
References:
[1] Carl Jung, interview with John Freeman for BBC Television, March 1959. See “The ‘Face to Face’ Interview,” in C. G. Jung Speaking: Interviews and Encounters, ed. William McGuire, R. F. C. Hull (Princeton University Press, 1977), 428.
[2] Adapted from Richard Rohr, “The Rhineland Mystics,” The Mendicant 5, no. 3 (2015): 1, 6.
[3] C. G. Jung, “A Psychological Approach to the Dogma of the Trinity,” in Psychology and Western Religion (Princeton University Press, 1984), 75.
[4] Adapted from Richard Rohr, Rhine Talks, 2015. Unpublished.
Image credit and inspiration: Augustin Fernandez, Untitled (detail), 2020, photo, Unsplash. Click here to enlarge image. With the Rhineland mystics, we share the ability to gaze with love at the plants of the earth, appreciating the food we eat, and across time and place, we are invited to step through the doorway into the Great Mystery.
Story from Our Community:
Reading about mystics and mysticism in the Daily Meditations has made me think about my own mystical experiences. It wasn’t until the second half of my life that I could see and hear in a mystical way. My most awe-filled moments have come while sitting outside, alone. I hear the birds in my yard talking to one another and find myself talking to them. I’m often overcome with love and find peace during storms.
—Kathy M.
