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7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Introducing Spiritual Reading, May 5, 2010
This review is from: A 30 Day Retreat: A Personal Guide to Spiritual Renewal (Paperback)
With the publication of A 30 Day Retreat: A Personal Guide to Spiritual Renewal, Orthodox priest and author, Fr William C Mills has given readers a fine introduction to the spiritual reading of Holy Scripture. What he has not written is a book that is particularly Orthodox. To many this would sound like a rejection of the book and even a condemnation of its author. It isn't and in fact it is one of the strengths of Fr William's work.
There is well known tendency among Orthodox Christians, especially those who converted from Evangelical Christianity, to so stress the differences between the Orthodox Church and their former confession that one wonders whether or not you can refer to both as "Christian" in any meaningful sense of the word. While a defense of the faith can necessitate drawing sharp distinctions, this often becomes an obsession by those who are immature in the faith. Sadly this immaturity is a not function of age, years in the Church, or even whether or not the person has been ordained.
Like their Catholic or Protestant opposite numbers there are some Orthodox Christians who are not so much interested in the Gospel as they are in demonstrating that they are right. For these individuals, the Tradition of the Orthodox Church, its spirituality, theology, liturgy and ascetical practices, are simply a big stick that they weld to bludgeon others into submission as they try and shore up their own rather frail egos.
This isn't Fr William. Rather he presents us with a very good introduction to a practice common to the spirituality of both the Christian East and West, lectio divina, or the spiritual reading of Holy Scripture. He does this in two ways.
First he offers a series of 30 meditations on short passages from the New Testament, primarily the Gospels. For those just beginning to read the Scriptures his use of short readings, brief meditations and questions he calls "Food for Thought" will be very helpful.
Unhelpful as this is, what is worse is the reader who doesn't realize he is an average reader. In this case the reader plows ahead with material that is too complex or advanced for him theologically or spiritually. More often than not this does not lead the reader to repentance and humility but spiritual pride. My own experience as priest is people who want to begin their spiritual reading with, say, the Philokalia, The Arena, or The Ladder of Divine Ascent are major of source of confusion and even division within a parish. And this also results in deformations in the reads own spiritual and emotional life.
This isn't to say that lay people ought not to read these, and other Orthodox spiritual writings. Far from it. It is however to say that novices in the spiritual life need introductory material. As extraordinarily rich and profound as these and other Orthodox spiritual classics are, they are not for beginners. Nor can they replace the daily reading of Scripture.
Together with the questions at the end of each short chapter, Fr William's personal medications on Scripture helps the reader begin the discipline of spiritual reading. This leads me to the second thing I like about this book.
For the average reader Orthodox Christian spiritual texts are often too long and complicated. This can be extremely frustrating and cause the person to simply give up on spiritual reading. Father offers a refreshing alternative to this. Both in the introduction and the appendix of the book, Father offers the reader a clear and concise overview of the mechanics of spiritual reading.
His brief summary of how and why we might want to keep a personal journal based on what we read is also very helpful. Correctly he observes that we "get distracted by so many thoughts that if we are not careful, we can miss the message of whatever scripture lesson we are reading" (p. 158). This is true not simply with our reading of Scripture but the whole of life.
The great spiritual struggle is to remember what God has done for me in Jesus Christ. I am always prone to distraction and tempted to forget the presence of God in my life. To borrow from Jean Pierre de Caussade, this very moment is a sacrament of God's presence and growth holiness requires from me nothing more than that I abandon myself right now to God.
Given how busy we have become, Fr William's counsel that we slow down might seem unrealistic. But almost 2,00 years of monastic experience would suggest that it isn't; it's just hard. And because it is hard, the author's gentle, conversational style of writing will help ease the reader's anxiety. As I said above, most Orthodox spiritual texts are meant for monastics or at least for the lay people who is an "advanced beginner." Blessedly and unapologetically, A 30 Day Retreat is for the "beginning beginner" in us all.
I do have one, small criticism of the book. The publisher, Paulist Press, is a Catholic publishing house who markets their books primarily, and not unreasonable, to a Catholic audience. What this means practically is that the author refers to the "Mass" rather than "Divine Liturgy," or "confirmation" and not "chrismation." These minor examples to be sure and while they don't touch on the substance of the book, as an Orthodox reader I found their use in a book by an Orthodox author jarring and a minor distraction.
That aside, Fr William has written a very help book that would be of real spiritual value for individuals or a parish Bible study group. More importantly he has demonstrated that an Orthodox author can speak to wider Christian audience without sacrificing the integrity of the Orthodox tradition or feeling a need to highlight the differences that separate us. I would heartly recommend this book to all.
In Christ,
+Fr Gregory
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3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Listening to God right where you are, April 3, 2010
This review is from: A 30 Day Retreat: A Personal Guide to Spiritual Renewal (Paperback)
This book provides a practical approach to forging a daily habit of listening to God. The author, Fr. William C. Mills, uses common examples that readers can identify in their own lives. There is no necessity to go any place but one's own home for the thirty days of retreat. Furthermore, there is no requirement to pray a prescribed prayer, or sit in a special chair, or commit more than 30 minutes every day to reading a chapter. When you pick up this book, you feel like a good friend gives you suggestions to get you going, and then you decide how to get going by doing what feels right for you.
The Introduction [1-9] makes suggestions about how to calm the mind to listen to the Word of God with the ears of your heart. The author's suggestions about breathing and short prayers have been tested by generations of Christians, and they work well for many people. After calming the mind, Mills invites readers to read the passage appointed for the day from the New Testament [Christian Scriptures], by savoring each word as if it were "...a delicious meal" [7]. He couples these ideas with an Appendix, "Lectio Divina" ["divine reading," 158-61], in which he provides further instructions about the practice of listening to God. I recommend that you read the Introduction and Appendix before beginning the 30-day retreat.
Mills wears a variety of hats in this book. He is a tour guide, leading you to places that will seem new, but in reality they are spiritual places that you visit everyday, such as questions about how to listen to God while raising a family or earning a living. Another hat is that of a coach to give you strategies and motivation tips for listening to God every day. Mills also wears a teacher's hat, because he provides context for each passage from the Bible that he identifies. In addition, he recommends books [162] for readers to employ on day 31 and following--in other words, after they finish this 30-day retreat.
Regardless the hat he wears, Mills is honest. Take, for example, the title for day 14 [73-8]: "Jesus irritates me!" Pretty honest title, I would say. The reading for the day is the story of the Gerasene demoniac in Mark's Gospel. Mills writes that Jesus irritates him "really bad" [74] ..."like poison ivy in the summertime. There is nothing worse than getting poison ivy in the summertime" [74].
Mills has identified with the Gerasene people, who became very annoyed with Jesus when the demons that he exorcised entered their swine herd and drowned every last pig in the Lake of Galilee. Jesus might have done a great thing by freeing the man of the demons. However, Jesus ruined the favor of the Gerasene people when he killed their cash of pigs. At the end of the reading for day 14, Mills makes a comment that I consider exquisite:
"If we read the gospel with an open mind and heart, we will feel just a bit uncomfortable because it is not always easy or convenient to turn the other cheek or to love people who really bother us, but that is in fact what the gospels say" [78].
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2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Good introduction to Lectio Devina, May 27, 2010
This review is from: A 30 Day Retreat: A Personal Guide to Spiritual Renewal (Paperback)
I've recently finished reading "A 30 Day Retreat: A Personal Guide to Spiritual Renewal" (Paulist Press, 176 pages, paperback) by Fr. William Mills, a month-long introduction to the meditative reading of Scripture. The book's structure is optimized for daily devotionals. Each of the thirty short chapters begins with a short Biblical passage, followed by a couple of pages of reflections by Fr. Mills. These reflections combine personal anecdotes with spiritual insights, relatable stories with small chunks of theology. Each chapter concludes with "Food for Thought", self-probing questions that encourage practical application.
Fr. Mills is gifted at revealing God in everyday experiences. In stories of Winnie the Pooh, Fr. Mills finds John the Baptist. In a long Starbucks he sees the beauty of Advent's expectation. And in the local news he sees the timeless stories of Scripture. Fr. Mills has an eye for the transcendent, but also a gift to describe it.
In "30 Day Retreat", Fr. Mills introduces lectio devina, an ancient method of spiritual reading. Instead of skimming a chapter or two from the Bible, lectio devina requires a slow, repetitive reading of a short passage of Scripture, with contemplation saturated throughout. The deep meditation of lectio devina produces a conversion of the heart more than the head. While each chapter illustrates this practice, the methods of lectio devina are fully explained in the book's Appendix, as well.
Interestingly, "A 30 Day Retreat" is published by a Catholic publishing house, despite being written by an Orthodox priest. These two traditional influences can be seen throughout the book, as Fr. Mill's reflects on the Mass and the sacraments, while concluding with a final chapter on Mary. A Catholic or Orthodox reader would enjoy these emphases, but the references may grate on a Protestant reader. Nevertheless, I would still recommend "A 30 Day Retreat" to Protestant friends as a good introduction to spiritual reading.
If you want the words of the Bible to penetrate you deeper, I suggest exploring lectio devina. For a good introduction to this art of spiritual reading, read "A 30 Day Retreat" and have your heart transformed.
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