Falling Upward: A Spirituality For The Two Halves Of Life

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Then—a crisis. "Some kind of falling," Rohr says, is necessary for continued spiritual development. "Normally a job, fortune, or reputation has to be lost," writes Rohr, "a death has to be suffered, a house has to be flooded, or a disease has to be endured." The crisis can be devastating. The crisis undoes you. The flood doesn't just flood your house—it washes out your spiritual life. What you thought you knew about living the spiritual life no longer suffices for the life you are living.

Falling Upward, and Unlearning Breathing Under Water, Falling Upward, and Unlearning

RR: And you know, much of my middle years was men’s work. If you think that’s true for women, it’s very true for men. We have a much more defended ego, a much more self-sufficient, well, I don’t have to tell women that, but we got a huge problem with the male in our culture. Look at the Senate and the House. I mean, my God.

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RR: That’s right, it is talked about in a number of books. People have had great experiences there. And it’s like the work of art. We have a lot of art around the place that’s sent to us, but this one was here already and gathered us, I think. A bit about me: I have been married to Monica for over thirty years now and we have served in various pastoral, teaching, missions and leadership roles for the whole of our lives together. We have three incredible adult children who with their partners, are the delight of our lives. RR: I know. What good day did I say that on? That says a lot in one paragraph because, forgive me, but it’s true. It’s really true. If you don’t come to the contemplative, mystical, non-dual mind, Christianity ends up being more a part of the problem. I hate to be so critical of my own religion, but I think the recent years have proven it. The amount of Christians who are racist or misogynistic or greedy. We’re not really transforming people in the modern age. I think we did at one time in culture, but now, it’s an accoutrement for our superiority, our saved-ness, or…

Falling Upward Quotes by Richard Rohr - Goodreads Falling Upward Quotes by Richard Rohr - Goodreads

Soul Brothers: Men in the Bible Speak to Men Today (with art by Louis S. Glanzman) (Orbis Books (USA), 2004) ISBN 978-1-57075-534-7 This book is a guide for realizing your path, shedding your excess and becoming wiser. Its definitely not suited for most people under 40. As it states, it defines and targets the second phase of ones life; where most of the tools in your toolbox from the first phase (that were so useful in excelling in life and constructing your shell), simply won't work. This book focuses on the meaning of ones naked existence (without titles, riches, possessions); the role of evil, the difference between suffering and enduring. Its a great book if you are at a point in life where you are counting your gains and losses, and ready to dive into a new adventure behind the looking glass. BB: I don’t know whether it was you or Anne LaMott because in the version of the book that I have, Anne LaMott wrote the foreword and someone said, “For all the things that we are finally able to give away, they all have claw marks on them.” If change and growth are not programmed into your spirituality, if there are not serious warnings about the blinding nature of fear and fanaticism, your religion will always end up worshiping the status quo and protecting your present ego position and personal advantage as if it were God.” For example, his treatment of sin is rather light, with statements like "you cannot avoid sin...anyway". I find it too absolute - cannot...anyway. Yes, it is difficult to avoid sin, but something we can do and should strive to do.

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BB: I reread it before this podcast, and I wonder sometimes, I think about my church and other churches, I wonder if the people who run churches gather and say, “Don’t forget everybody. Our supreme task is healing.” BB: I was interviewing Chris Germer, who is a Buddhist and teaches mindful self-compassion. And I asked him… We were talking about spirituality, and I said, “What is your favorite kind of compassion?” And he said, “I like in-the-trenches compassion.” And I said, “Yeah, me too.” I’m really close to a very specific kind of honky tonk Jesus. So when I saw your shiner, I was like, “Yeah, this is the home of honky tonk Jesus.” I like it.

Richard Rohr Quotes (Author of Falling Upward) - Goodreads Richard Rohr Quotes (Author of Falling Upward) - Goodreads

BB: Yeah. I mean, it’s incredible. “We suffer to get well. We surrender to win. We die to live. We give it away to keep it. This counterintuitive wisdom will forever be resisted as true. It’ll be denied and avoided until it’s forced upon us by some reality over which we are powerless, and if we are honest, we are all powerless to the presence of full reality.” Much of this falling upward has involved what Rohr calls a "necessary suffering" - to strip away some of the ego agendas that comprise so much of the "first half of life". Two of the greatest "wisdom" gifts I have been given in the last 5 years are offered by Rohr in two of his previous books - a willingness to accept necessary suffering ("Everything Belongs") and the freedom to move beyond the judging, categorizing dualistic mind into the freedom of non-dualistic thinking ("The Naked Now"). In this book, Rohr further develops these ideas, among others, to illustrate the journey into a second-half-of-life.This is both a transcendent God and also my deepest me at the same time. To discover one is to discover the other. This is why good theology and good psychology work together so well. You have touched upon the soul, the unshakable reality of my True Self, where “I and the Father are one” (John 10:30). The second half of life is about learning to recognize, honor, and love this voice and this indwelling Presence, which feels like your own voice too. All love is now one. [5] Falling Upward is one of his most well-known books, and takes a spiritual approach that can be read universally for any religion. Even if you aren’t religious, many of the concepts in this book still appeal to a spiritual center. BB: Let me go into this because this is the sentence that I’ve probably read, no joke, a hundred times.

Falling Upward: A Spirituality for the Two Halves of Life Falling Upward: A Spirituality for the Two Halves of Life

His views about how life in reality is true and I agree with him. I also agree with him that many areas of our lives and the church needs to undergo a more radical transformation than they have. But I could not agree with his means, and his treatment of theology and Scripture. He gives statements that are blatant and I could not agree with his explanation and justification. Rohr's audience extends beyond Christian boundaries and includes many people who follow other faiths or identify as spiritual but not religious. One of his publishers has described his largest demographic as Millennial Christians, "not Catholics but post-evangelicals." [34] He has been interviewed twice by Oprah Winfrey for her Super Soul Sunday program and author Brené Brown on her podcast. [35] Bono of U2 is also a fan of his work. [18] Naked, and You Clothed Me: Homilies and Reflections for Cycle A, Jim Knipper, ed. (Clear Faith Publishing, 2013) Offers a refreshing critique of culture – and sometimes church-based values so often imprisoned in a ‘first life’ sensibility . . . Rohr sees the arc of ageing as bewilderingly complex, shifting, unquantifiable and tragic in the truest sense of the word: the art of dying becomes the crowning glory of human life itself, the only route, it seems, to our eternal home. - Manna MagazineForeword" in Meal Stories: The Gospel of Our Lives by Kathleen Casey (Thomas More Association, 2000) ISBN 978-0-88347-495-2 Creation as the Body of God" in Spiritual Ecology: The Cry of the Earth, Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee, ed. (The Golden Sufi Center, 2016) ISBN 978-1941394144 Rohr emphasizes "alternative orthodoxy", a term the Franciscan tradition has applied to itself, referring to a focus on " orthopraxy"—a belief that lifestyle and practice are much more important than mere verbal orthodoxy, [15] which he feels is much overlooked in Catholic preaching today. [16] [17] It’s not age that leads us to maturity, but how we handle suffering and what we learn from those experiences.