Blog

The blog categories for Anselm’s Quest divide posts into the following groups to help you find those of most interest to you. Each category, in its own way, draws inspiration and sustenance for the quest from the riches of Western spirituality, culture, and knowledge. Posts are kept simple for busy readers. More in-depth content is available elsewhere on the site, as well as suggestions and resources for deeper exploration.

Quest & Journey

Your quest is the inward search for understanding in a landscape of the heart and the spirit. It is something already known, yet beyond language. What you and I draw from our quests feeds the outward journey and helps us to live and grow, and also to learn.

Without this inner nourishment, the outward life becomes sterile. We collect facts without gaining wisdom. We see everything, including other people, as objects, but we are blind to their beauty and essence.

If we constantly look back to what we already know because it makes us feel secure and comfortable, we lose the ability to live and grow into eternal life. The quest builds up strength and flexibility as we meet each apparent obstacle. Navigation for the inward explorer uses geography, weather, and travel as metaphors. In other words, we experience the trials and challenges of the quest as

• mountains
• wilderness
• stormy seas
• deserts, et cetera.

The joys and glories of the quest, by comparison, are like

• scaling a mountain peak
• escaping a wilderness
• enjoying fair weather
• finding a fertile oasis.

There are practical things to learn about navigating the ups and downs of the quest, just as there are ways to travel well on the outward journey through life. The two are intertwined. In the midst of the quest, people sometimes speak about “life getting in the way.” The everyday business of making ends meet, common home and yard work, and being part of the human community often “interrupts” or distracts from what seems to demand all that we are.

Sometimes these are major milestones, as joyful as a graduation or tragic as a loved one’s death. More often than not, they are the small, nickel-and-dime erosions of time and commitment. In reality, the inward quest and the outward journey are two aspects of your one and only earthly life.In reality, the inward quest and the outward journey are two aspects of your one and only earthly life. Each one moves the other forward in ways you may not even understand until years later. They are not two solo dances, but a passionate duet.

The outward journey is where, among other things, we

• develop the skills and compassion to live well in community with others,
• fully realize and maintain our physical, emotional, and mental health,
• keep our spiritual quest anchored in our material reality and purpose, and
• make inward discoveries real, so they move us forward in concrete ways.

The inward quest is where, in contrast, we

• nurture our mystical intelligence and relationship with God,
• draw inspiration for new ways to create, invent, and discover,
• find strength to survive and prevail over tragedy, injury, and disaster,
• draw the love of God from the inward into the outward journey.

Both the inward quest and the outward journey move us closer to understanding, as long as we will all of our being toward truth, beauty, and the good.

Holy Words:

For Christians, Jews, and Muslims, the Bible has different but important things to say about the ways God spoke and acted in the world until the first century or so after the birth of Jesus Christ. The sacred writings of other traditions show how those from different cultures perceived God’s presence in their lives. Most religions and many cultures have their own version of “the Golden Rule,” that we should act towards others as we would have them behave toward us.

Jesus took this further than anyone, telling us to love one another, not only those who are different than we are, but even our enemies. Since that time, individual Christians from the humble to the brilliant have written about their studies and experiences. Many were mystics who knew God in direct ways. This often made Church leaders feel threatened and fearful. Yet, despite persecution and sometimes martyrdom, their words have survived.

There are holy words almost beyond measure in the libraries of the world. Let them be your inspiration as you enter into your own mystical quest, unique to you, in a very different time and place.

Theology & Science

Theology is the systematic study of God and God’s relation to humanity and nature through thought, observation, and experience. Science uses thought, observation, and experiment in its systematic study of the physical and natural world and cosmos, which Christians call Creation. Like the inward quest and the outward journey, theology and science are most revealing and fruitful when working in harmony. We can know only in part, but there is only one ultimate truth, where all partial truths fall away.

In the two thousand years since the death of Jesus, Christian theology has

• carved deep and wide channels of critical study into the nature of God,
• explored the various features of religious belief, and
• changed (at times reluctantly) religious teachings to reflect scientific discovery.

In more recent centuries, modern science has

• remarkably expanded our knowledge of the physical universe,
• increased our understanding of the processes that brought us here, and
• delved into the mystery of consciousness.

Each pilgrim’s quest treats theology and science as complementary ways of seeing, seeking, and finding an understanding of God that rings true.

Arts & Letters

The quest helps feed the creative growth that moves us towards emotional, psychological, and intellectual maturity. Through it we learn to see into those aspects of human life that we know as much through the heart and mind as with our bodily senses. Anselm’s Quest refers to those arts and letters which reflect beauty, truth, and goodness so that, among other things, we

• learn to recognize these qualities in our lives and surroundings,
• grow in our desire to create our own reflective works,
• increase our own creative abilities, and
• are uplifted in spirit and transformed.

Arts and letters here may refer to

• poetry and music,
• dance and drama,
• painting and photography,
• sculpture and architecture.

The arts hold together our dual ways of thinking, the rational and the mystical, making a whole greater than the sum of its parts. Without this creative tension we fail to live and grow into our full humanity, and the quest is constantly undermined.

Quest Log

Designing and producing a website was the last thing I considered when I began to write An Ordinary Mystic. My natural tendency is to work behind the scenes, which is why I liked being a radio producer more than a broadcaster, a stage hand more than an actor.

Michael Hyatt’s Get Published course convinced me it was necessary to have an online presence. Even so, I didn’t take Michael’s advice to just set up a site and start posting. In fact, it took months to make the decision to go ahead. A full year after I registered the Anselm’s Quest domain name I published my first post.

There are surely other reluctant, uncertain, would-be web publishers out there. Part of my problem was that I couldn’t see myself as an online writer or website designer. I am four decades beyond the millennial generation, far from being a digital native. Yet if I can do it, so can you. Here is a a log of website prep and maintenance, pre-launch and ongoing, for those wrestling with similar projects.