Mother Teresa

The Dark night of the soul

The recent publication of some letters of Mother Teresa Mother Teresa: Come Be My Light has led to surprise amongst some at the realisation that she spent nearly the last fifty years of her life without any sensation of God’s presence. To the point of some calling her life hypocritical. This surprise fails to realise that the authentic Christian inner spiritual journey moves from creatures to union with Creator. Feelings, spiritual experiences, our ideas and images of God – these are all creatures.

In what is called the kataphatic tradition (the positive way) God is powerful like us – but more so: all powerful; loving – all loving; present – omnipresent; knowing – all knowing omniscient…

There is another tradition, called the apophatic tradition (the negative way) – more prevalent in the East than in the West, including, within Christianity, within our Eastern approach. The apophatic approach is that God is not like this, God is not like that. We have a well-known (Western) hymn that alludes to this:
“Immortal, invisible, God only wise,
In light inaccessible hid from our eyes,
Unresting, unhasting, and silent as light,
Nor wanting, nor wasting”

To be continued…