Ways People Seek God

R210A
Spiritual Formation
Lawrence Pascual
• These are six models of how people seek God
• From James Martin’s book The Jesuit Guide to
(Almost) Everything (Ignatian Spirituality)
• The models are broad and can even overlap
• Person can belong to multiple models
• Path of Independence
• Path of Disbelief
• Path of Exploration
• Path of Return
• Path of Confusion
• Path of Belief
• Separate from organized religion
• Believe in God (theist)
• Church is meaningless, offensive, dull, or all
three
• Though away from religious institutions, finds
comfort in religious practices learned as child
• Comfort in the familiar
• Maybe hurt by church
• Insulted (or abused) by priest, pastor, rabbi, and
etc.
• Bored
• Church services are boring, meaningless
• Worship is not lively
• Disagreements
• E.g., sexual abuse scandals of the clergy
• E.g,. teaching on sexual morality
• E.g., political stance
• Healthy independence
• See things in new ways (Outsider perspective)
• Not restricted by rules
• Be more honest
• E.g., Critique of Church during sex scandals –
Did they handle it correctly? Who did they take
care of?
• Sometimes entrenched in church, we sometimes
fail to see its flaws
• No commitment to any religion
• Perfectionism: “All organized religion is imperfect,
therefore, belong to no one”
• Forgets that everybody is more or less imperfect
(even him or herself)
• Separate from organized religion
• Atheistic or Agnostic
• Scientific approach
• Seeks proofs for God’s existence
• Finding none that is suitable, reject theism
• Does not take religion for granted
• Religion is not just something adopted as child
• Requires thinking and choice
• May think about religion more critically than
believers
• Critical of beliefs
• Does not accept things blindly
• E.g., “People suffer because it is God’s will”
• What does that even mean?
• Too much reliance on science and intellect
• Becomes a wall/fortress
• Blindness and unwillingness to see divine in
creation
• They need concrete, hard evidence proof of God’s
existence (which is almost impossible)
• Story of Atheist avoiding a flood on top of a
house
• Began in religious family, drifted away, but returns
to church (or other tradition)
• Forced to attend religious services but find it dull,
meaningless, boring (similar to Path of
Independence)
• Religion is distant, but appealing
• Curiosity about God
• Desire for maturity
• Desire to reeducate themselves to understand
faith in mature way
• E.g., God as problem solver
• Prayed but God would not answer all prayers
• Does God give what we want or what we need?
• If God is not a problem solver, who is God?
• Return to religion
• James Martin does not list any dangers
• What dangers do you see?
• Stepping into other religious traditions
• Exploration: Searching for a religion that fits
• Desire for God, for community or spiritual home
• One finds an understanding of God and a
community that suits one’s personality
• If returning to home religion, new appreciation for
faith
• No commitment to current religion
• Not settling to one tradition since all are imperfect
• No tradition suits them
• God is someone who satisfies their needs
• E.g., Cafeteria Christian
• Pick and choose what to believe about God
• Ignore other aspects
• Pick the Christ of suffering, but forget the Christ
of loving relationship
• They haven’t left religion, but they are confused
about God
• God is a problem and mystery
• In between religious and nonreligious
• Participates in worship services
• Problems of belonging
• Do they feel they are Catholic?
• Do they consider themselves fully Catholic?
• Fine-tuning their faith
• In between religious and nonreligious
• Haven’t made up their minds, refining ideas about
belonging to religion
• Confusion becomes laziness
• Too much work to think about religion
• part of organized religion
• believe in God
• Maybe born into religious family
• Cradle Catholic
• Confidence in their belief in God
• Faith puts meaning into their lives: joys and
struggles in life
• Never alone: God is always there
• Overcame confusion: Certainty and Confidence
• Inability to understand people on other paths
• Judge others on their doubt or disbelief
• Certainty prevents compassion, sympathy, and
sometimes tolerance towards those that are
uncertain, nonbelieving
• Complacency in one’s relationship with God
• E.g., cling to childhood faith. When tragedy
strikes, abandon God of youth, and sometimes
God completely
• “Think of it this way: you wouldn’t consider
yourself equipped to face life with a third-grader’s
understanding of math. Yet people often expect
the religious instruction they had in grammar
school to sustain them in the adult world” (James
Martin)
• “Just as an adult child needs to relate to his or her
parent in a new way, so adult believers need to
relate to God in new ways as they mature.
Otherwise, one remains stuck in a childlike view of
God that prevents fully embracing a mature faith”
(James Martin)