Ep 45 Four Quadrants of Spiritual Life

Most of us tend to have specific ways that we’re used to connecting with God, and those things serve us to some degree, giving us a sense of belonging and security. But in today’s podcast, we also talk about the benefits of exploring a variety of ways to connect spiritually. Join us as we nerd out about words and talk about how we can lean into the expansiveness of our spirituality. 

Additional Resources
Book: Spiritual Life: The Foundation for Preaching and Teaching by John Westerhoff
Book: Jesus-Brand Spirituality by Ken Wilson
Book: Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer 

#Apostolic
#Charismatic
#Mystical
#Sacramental 

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Transcript

SUMMARY KEYWORDS

apostolic, charismatic, sacramental, mystical, John Westerhoff, Ken Wilson, Jesus Brand Spirituality

Dominic Kaiser  00:06

Welcome to The Contemplative Life: Three pastors, friends and spiritual companions help us explore spirituality through a contemplative lens.

I'm Christina Roberts.
I'm Chris Roberts.
I'm Kristina Kaiser. We're glad you joined us. 

Chris Roberts  00:24

Well, hello, it's great to be with you. Today we want to talk about four quadrants of spiritual life. And this is taken from a book by John Westerhoff, Spiritual Life: The Foundation for Preaching and Teaching. And we want to just take a moment to discuss these four different quadrants of spiritual living.  So, I'll kick off the first quadrant defined as apostolic. Apostolic is prayer as one's action and striving for justice and peace.  It would also be discipleship and how we improve upon the world. And so as I mention these quadrants, what comes to mind for us today, this first one apostolic?

Kristina Kaiser  01:07

So I think what is shocking to me in this one is that the word apostolic and justice somehow get paired together. It wouldn't have occurred to me naturally. But there is this notion of action here in this quadrant, which I very much relate to.  I've been an action-oriented person for much of my life and I love calling others to action as well. So I relate to it. I never had thought to call apostolic, the same thing as action in particular, but I totally relate to it.

Christina Roberts  01:36

What would you have thought about apostolic? I'm curious.

Kristina Kaiser  01:40

Church planting.  I think I just saw it as apostolic is maybe forwarding the Gospels, so to speak.

Christina Roberts  01:48

Sure, so kind of reducing it to that. Yeah, I think to this word apostolic, I probably have something similar, the apostle Paul or things like that. But I think also, when I think about apostolic giftings, I think we don't necessarily talk about them a lot in our modern day context. But I think of catalysts, people that get things going, entrepreneurs, I would consider apostolic. And so I think people that are like doing businesses that are ethically driven, or starting nonprofits, things like that I would consider in the apostolic sort of quadrant.  I like that this is sort of identifying part of our faith and spirituality as actual action and doing and justice and making the world better. So I think that's a great aspect.

Chris Roberts  02:34

Yeah, I appreciate you guys naming that. I think whenever I first looked at this image, the apostolic, I saw some crossover with what I would typically think of as evangelical or spreading your faith or taking faith to different nations. But I really appreciate what comes to mind for you guys, as we, as we talk about apostolic being prayer as one's action and striving for justice and peace.  The next quadrant is sacramental. And sacramental is described as mental prayer, meditation that engages the senses, fulfilling vocation in the world. So as I give you the definition of sacramental, what comes up for you guys?

Christina Roberts  03:17

I think I appreciate that there's mind and action going on here in sacramental.  So again, I think sacramental as maybe liturgical churches where you would take communion or do rituals type of a thing. And it seems like that's part of what's being mentioned here. But also this idea of fulfilling vocation in the world that there is something sacramental about doing what we love to do, and improving the world. And so I was recently listening to a podcast with Jane Goodall. And she was talking about her gifts of being out in nature as a kid, and of course, all of her work with chimpanzees and how faith plays into that. And I think well, that is sacramental. She is expressing through her mind, her studies, things that she's really been intrigued in, and then offering that to the world. So again, I appreciate that there's sort of these individual aspects of the spiritual life sacramentally. But also, you know, as well, there are I think containers and church cultures that really celebrate the sacraments in some unique ways.

Kristina Kaiser  04:16

So I think what I'm hearing and this is a new idea, to me, I think a little bit the sacramental notion of as a way of being but it sounds experiential, as one sort of a thing, right? Like I experienced it with my senses and I experienced in terms of meaning almost, right? So in this business of vocational fulfillment, I'm pursuing meaning, which isn't necessarily to say that meaning doesn't exist in our justice work. That's very interesting. But that there's something internally about what meaning means as well. So those two buzzwords are coming to mind for me experiential and meaning.

Chris Roberts  04:50

Yeah, and I like the definition under sacramental of engaging the senses. I think that's what the sacraments do, they engage our senses. One of the things that is striking to me is I think whenever you take sacramentalism too far, it leads to dogmatism. And if that is your only way to connect, you become dogmatic in your approaches to spiritual life. And so I like the notion of engaging my senses as a spiritual practice. But if that becomes the only way in which you connect in a spiritual life, you're going to have problems. So the next quadrant that I want to talk about is the mystical quadrant. And the mystical quadrant is defined as contemplative prayer, emptying self to live an awareness of the Spirit. So what comes up for you as we think about the mystical quadrant?

Kristina Kaiser  05:45

Wow, yeah, so I feel like the mystical is probably the one that maybe I've seen the least in my church experiences. But I've experienced a lot through workshops, conferences, things like this. It's also in my adult life that I enjoy being. Because I spent so much time, I think, coming into adulthood with prayers that were full of words, so many, so many words. And the contemplative prayer gave this opportunity just to exist in the presence of God, to intercede by acknowledge it right. To light a candle and just exist, and kind of lift that person up to God. And I found that relieving that somehow I didn't have to be smart enough and eloquent enough. But just being in the presence of God, acknowledging God's loving presence and engaging God in that way for myself, for others became this super relieving space, which now I have so much interest in bringing to others.

Christina Roberts  06:49

Yes, interesting. Because this diagram, again, going to the extreme of that would be escapism. And I just think, Ooh, there's something to that. And what comes to mind for me is in the Benedictine Spirituality, they have this phrase, “Ora-Labora,” which is basically weaving in prayer and work. And I find that sometimes when I'm like, heavily in the mystical spaces, and I'm contemplating a lot, after I'm done with that, I want to be doing things with my hands, I want to be busy. There's like all of this energy that needs another outlet and release. And so I appreciate that balance of the “Ora-Labora.” Yes, there is that emptying of oneself. But also, the counter of that is so important, because I do think that we can fall into that escapism, which this author is mentioning.

Chris Roberts  07:35

Yes, which is a great point, which is why I really appreciate the work of the Center for Action and Contemplation.  I think you do need both. You need to be able to contemplate. Contemplative prayer is important to one spiritual journey. And this idea of one's own awareness of where the Spirit is at work in life is super important. But then from there, if the Spirit is at work in life, not just your own life, but in the lives of many other people that are surrounding you, what do you then? I like you bringing that up, Christina? 

The fourth quadrant is charismatic, the charismatic quadrant. And this is a verbal sensate prayer type of quadrant of relationship with Jesus and achieving holiness of life. So charismatic as a quadrant.

Christina Roberts  08:34

This one's interesting to me because I grew up in a sacramental church environment with a Greek Orthodox Church, and then in high school, went to a charismatic church environment where it was very expressive.  People were raising their hands and shouting to the Lord and saying prayers out loud and such an opposite experience of faith. And so I remember such new language around Wow, like, it's not just the Trinity, as sort of this holy, revered, essence, but I can have a personal relationship with Jesus? What is that all about? And oh, you actually read the Bible? And is it okay to use a highlighter in the Bible? Like, isn't that like, you know, sacrilegious to mark your Bible? When I hear charismatic, those are some of the things that come to mind. But I do think that there's something beautiful about taking it down a notch where there is sort of this relational aspect to our faith that I think is the charismatic spring. So that's what comes to mind for me for that particular quadrant.

Kristina Kaiser  09:35

Yeah. And there's this heart kind of expression in the charismatic quadrant. And I was very drawn to that. As I kind of came into early adulthood, I felt like yes, this is how you know that God is alive because there's all this expression. And I still appreciate it to this day. I think I ended up having questions ultimately about what it means if someone feels like they've been manipulated or drummed up unhelpfully into the question. But I think that conversation we were having before, just briefly before, about living a little closer to the middle of these types of things are like kind of interweaving them. Somebody said something like this. That is probably what would have helped me as I was having those questions, you know, several years back, but I love the charismatic quadrant, I'm all about heart.

Chris Roberts  10:29

Yes, I too, have spent much of my life in the charismatic quadrant, super valuable and beneficial to my life. One of the things, the dangers of the charismatic quadrant are living there, living as like, as far to the extreme of the quadrant as possible leads to emotionalism. Like, you're just caught up in all these different emotions. And so I think that's what caused me maybe to explore other quadrants, whenever I was a young adult, is the emotionalism that I saw.   I got many, many wonderful things from the charismatic quadrant personally. But I think that called into question some of the things that were going on around me. And so I began to explore some of these other quadrants. 

There's another book out there, by Ken Wilson, Jesus Brand Spirituality. And it has a similar diagram of the quadrants. And he talks about the people that live in the most extreme corners of these different quadrants, the extremist and the dangers of that. And what he tries to call people to in the spiritual life is living more towards the center of, you know, where you're kind of like, in and out of these different quadrants experiencing the best of all of these worlds. So as I say that what comes up for you guys?

Christina Roberts  12:02

I think there's a lot of wisdom in that. I think there's, you know, diversity in that.  I think that you're right, when we are hanging out in our corner, we have one aspect of faith, and usually that's rich and wonderful. And often we then stall, because I don't think that that's how we're designed to be just in one corner. And so I think we can stall, we can get bored with our faith, we can feel like we're not growing. And I think it's when we are able to kind of move towards the center and experience through maybe visiting another church community, having these conversations, learning from others that have maybe lived in these other quadrants. I think there's a lot of wisdom in trying to be more towards that center space.

Kristina Kaiser  12:41

Yes. And now as you're talking, I'm reminded when you were talking about the energy that now needs to be released a little bit earlier.  Oh, I was in this quiet space and now I need to, like get something out. That's this, right?  That's that experience of sharing all the aspects of who we are, in our personal life, you know, with God, with others, you know, just who we are. So I do like this notion of, I see all of these, and I can flow in them. And if I don't know as much about this one, there's a way for me to grow, right? There's places for me to experience this more like some churches focus on this one more than another, or wherever your place of community is spiritually. But I like that idea.

Chris Roberts  13:24

Yeah, and I think when we're young, I think a place to belong is what keeps us, right? We feel like we belong in this quadrant, we feel like this is my home, this is where I live, I have this sense of belonging to these quadrants. And I just think as we become older and we become wiser, we then are soft to these other spiritualities, these other quadrants. And we say, well, I want to explore more. And I think that's the Spirit's work in our life, right is to soften us to say, I don't just belong or my identity is not as charismatic or my identity is not as mystical. My identity is in spiritual life, like getting the most out of it. And I think one has to probably go through this process of disentanglement from their quadrant in order to see the benefits of the other quadrants.

Kristina Kaiser  14:27

I think what comes to mind is you say that is, and we need permission, right to be able to do that. Because I think part of what I experienced at one point was this notion of wherever I'm camped out, that's the best. And there's clear, good reasons for why that's the best as opposed to that there's so much good to be found in each of these. It is holistic as an experience of being able to pull back from a judgment or a sense of what is better or worse and just being able to embrace all of these things. This inclusivity I guess is what comes to mind is I hear you talk.

Christina Roberts  15:02

Yeah. And I think I have wonderful opportunities to be in ecumenical environments, which is just a fancy word for kind of interdenominational spaces. And it's interesting just sort of noticing, wow, this person's language around how she's expressing this going on in her faith, and he's expressing it this way. Or even how we pray, you know, this person loves a scripted prayer, this person is very spontaneous. And so just kind of like sitting back and thinking, wow, this is beautiful to see the different varying expressions and trying to come together with those common places. And yet allowing for that, I think is a very rich, rich place to be.

Chris Roberts  15:37

Yes. Very, very rich. And I think in closing, one of the things that is striking to me is the sacramental and charismatic tend to be this scripted prayer, lots of words, and the apostolic and the mystical, lend itself to more meditative centering prayer types of ways of being in the world. So yeah, thanks for bringing that up. What a generative conversation that we've had today. I really appreciate talking to you both. It's been a wonderful, wonderful time this morning.

Well, this is the part of the podcast where we talk about what we are into, what are we into today,

Christina Roberts  16:25

I am into the book Braiding Sweetgrass, and I'm listening to the audible version. And it is a beautiful book written by an indigenous woman sharing about her life with her tribe and Oklahoma, how she's a scientist, professor, and just weaving in her indigenous wisdom, and it is just wonderful. So that is what I am into this week is Braiding Sweetgrass

Kristina Kaiser  16:46

Love it. Well, I'm into my new camera for my computer. I think for like, a long time now, because we've been doing all this virtual work. And we had discovered that the camera on my laptop was severely lacking. When my husband and I are together, he has white hair, and it just turns the whole picture like why and it can't find color. It's 25 bucks. We fixed our problem. And now I look like everybody else looks and it makes me so happy.

Chris Roberts  17:18

I am into jalapeno fruit spread or pepper spread. And I cannot get enough of it. I put it on my toast. I put it on everything. I love it on a good piece of toast with something like goat cheese. And so I've been letting my children experiment with it and watching their faces deal with the complexity of those flavors. And they're not as intuitive as I am. But I am fully into jalapeno jam spread. 

Well, thank you for joining us today. If you're looking to go deeper in your spiritual journey. We invite you to check out the spiritual direction page on our website, which includes even more practical information about what spiritual direction and companioning is all about.   Until next time, make it a great week.