Spiritual Direction
Andreas Rosenwink
Resources for a Grounded Spirituality
in Turbulent Times
Longing
My soul thirsts for the living God. Longing is both gift and guide, the inner pull of every spiritual search. Spiritual accompaniment helps us to follow the trace of this longing.
Silence
Those who enter silence will hear more — from the outside and from within. At first, this can feel uncomfortable. For many, inner restlessness is hard to bear without distraction. Who dares to stay, to endure, and to wait until the waves begin to settle?
Presence
Presence is an attentive way of relating to others, to nature, and to our own inner state. Presence opens us to the mystery of our connectedness with life and to the loving nearness of God. Presence can be cultivated through meditation.
In God I find shelter, still as a child. With Him there is comfort and healing. Yes, my soul longs for God and comes to rest in peace.
Herzenskompass
Spiritual exercises for working
on your own life issues.
Psychology meets Ignatian Spirituality.
Practical workbook with audio instructions.
Video Course
Being mindful
Seven exercises to open yourself to God's presence.
Earth’s crammed with heaven,
And every common bush afire with God;
But only he who sees,
takes off his shoes
Exercises
A collection of well-tested practices. Enjoy exploring…
The believer of tomorrow will be a mystic — someone who has experienced something — or they will not be at all.
GuL 39/5 (1966) 326-342
Topics
The following themes have been and continue to be important on my own spiritual path. Again and again, I see that others have to deal with them, as well. If one of these themes speaks to you or touches your own life, I would be glad to accompany you in it.
I also offer seminars on these topics for small groups or communities.
Images of God: how they make us sick, how they heal*
* Book title from Karl Frielingsdorf
A person may imagine God as loving, merciful, and caring, while at the same time suffering from inhibiting images of God. These are often shaped by experiences from childhood or by wounds inflicted by authority figures, which are then projected onto God.
Ambivalent feelings toward God — a longing for closeness and, at the same time, fear of it — can be explained in this way.
There are various methods and meditations for approaching these often half-conscious or unconscious images of God and for working through them.
Healing images of God are allowed to slip from the head into the heart. This often happens through soothing, spiritual experiences. Such attachment-forming experiences can overwrite old imprints.
A deep, basic sense of caution and threat may, over the years, be gently transformed into a sense of safe belonging.
Contemplative Practices for Small Groups
Various models of communal listening to the Spirit of God within a small group are introduced and practiced: the Catholic practice of Bible Sharing, the Clearness Committee developed by the Quakers (Society of Friends), and different models of spiritual accompaniment in groups.
What these spiritual practices have in common is a moment of contemplative silence, in which each group member is invited to wait for God’s guidance in relation to a concrete personal or shared question. One basic guideline applies: share what is personally stirring, rather than engaging in theological discussion; ask open questions, rather than offering advice.
These practices can be pastorally touching and, in times of decision, clarifying and guiding.
The Role of the Body in One’s Own Spirituality
„Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have received from God?“ (1 Corinthians 6:19)
„Unsere Beziehung zu unserem körperlichen Selbst beeinflusst zutiefst
unsere Beziehung zu Gott, zueinander, zum Gebet, und zu allem Leben.
(Flora Slosson Wuellner)
Western culture is still strongly shaped by the Greek and classical split between body, soul, and spirit. This has led to an alienation from the body and to a faith that is overly centered in the intellect. The holistic Hebrew-biblical understanding of the human person invites rediscovery.
Practices of body awareness help us become more attuned to our “gut feeling,” to the sensations of the visceral nervous system, which can be experienced as a seat of intuition and inspiration.
Insights from interpersonal neurobiology (e.g., Daniel Goleman, Daniel Siegel) and mindfulness practices from the Focusing approach (Eugene Gendlin) enrich our understanding of faith as a sensually perceivable experience of our being-in-relationship with the loving God and with creation.
For spiritual directors: a well-established seminar by Cordula Ruwe and Andreas Rosenwink on Body-Informed Spiritual Direction conveys these themes with special attention to the dynamics of accompaniment conversations.
On this topic, I am happy to make the following academic paper available:
„How Body Awareness Informs the Practice of Spiritual Direction“
Deutsche Übersetzung „Wie Körperbewusstsein die Praxis Geistlicher Begleitung bereichert“
Introduction to Spiritual Disciplines
Spiritual disciplines support a life-giving rhythm of living and working. They foster personal spiritual growth and provide a framework for prayer.
Many experience a renewal of their relationship with God when, in times of dryness, they explore new forms of prayer and gradually make themselves at home in them.
From the wide range of spiritual practices, you can choose forms of prayer that are suited to your current life situation and personality structure.
A selection of spiritual disciplines that can be introduced and practiced in spiritual direction or seminars:
- Lectio Divina
- Ignatian Meditation on Scripture (Imagination)
- Scripture meditation with works of art
- Awareness practices in nature
- Body-awareness exercises
- Breath prayer
- The Jesus Prayer
- Fasting
- Gesture prayer
- The Examen (review on the day)
- Confession
Discernment and Decision-making
“All who are led by the Spirit of God are sons and daughters of God.” (Romans 8:14)
How do we discern impulses that lead toward life from thoughts and promptings that appear good but ultimately distract?
How do I find and follow my personal calling?
Selected biblical examples of how God leads people can help us with these questions. Testimonies also offer insight into the many ways people experience being guided by the Holy Spirit. Body-awareness practices heighten sensitivity to the receptive organ for the movements of the Holy Spirit — our “gut feeling.”
A particularly helpful model comes from the Spiritual Exercises of Ignatius of Loyola. The experiences behind the terms “consolations” and “discernment of spirits” are introduced and explored.
Possible additional topics: The significance of our longing for discernment; the influence of our images of God in decision-making processes; dreams and discernment; selected texts from the history of the Church.
Trauma-Sensitive Spiritual Direction
„The LORD is near to the brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit.“ (Psalm 34:19)
With great personal benefit, I was able to study the course Transforming Trauma for one semester at Eastern Mennonite University (EMU). The course was based on the well-established and globally applied model of the university’s Center for Justice and Peacebuilding:
STAR — Strategies for Trauma Awareness and Resilience.
The newly translated book by one of STAR’s founders, Carolyn Yoder, has been published by Neufeld Verlag. I highly recommend it:
-> Heilsam mit traumatischen Erlebnissen umgehen – Wege zu Resilienz, Frieden und Versöhnung
Dreams on the Spiritual Path
In dreams, God reaches us, so to speak, “through the back door” — beyond our analytical thinking and our impulse to make things happen. Dreams happen to us. They bring the unconscious into awareness, creatively reflect our present situation, and not infrequently point toward a next step or even a possible solution.
The inner imagery of imagination and dreams is also God’s gift to us and can be of great significance for the spiritual path of our healing and becoming whole.
Recurring dream symbols and nightmares have something important to say and can be gently explored within spiritual accompaniment.
A short seminar on Dreams on the Spiritual Path offers background knowledge and presents personal and biblical examples of how God speaks through dreams. It sensitizes participants to prayerfully attend to significant dreams (“the forgotten language of God”) and to allow them to bear fruit for personal growth.