Where has the joy gone?
Reconnecting with our True Selves
Online or On the Ground (Bonnevaux)
We live in a time when depression, anxiety and other emotional dysfunctions are on the rise. It seems that modern sources of meaning and happiness are not enough to satisfy a deeper thirst.
Many people live in superficiality and this makes them feel an existential emptiness and a lack of meaning. Joy seems to be getting further and further away.
The negative consequences of this spiritual atrophy we experience in modern times are fanaticism, polarization, consumerism, existential emptiness, intolerance and a loss of will to live. But the Spirit lives within us and meditation is one of the ways to reconnect with the Spirit.
Meditation as a pilgrimage to the center of our being where the Spirit of God dwells. Laurence Freeman explores meditation as a spiritual journey, away from self and beyond self, into the infinity of God. It is a journey towards divinization, towards enlightenment. Enlightenment is a spiritual process that happens in time and through time, and cannot be advanced by any technique. The only requirement for the journey is commitment and faith.
In times of crisis, the rescue of spirituality becomes a balm towards true joy.