Why the Fullness of Joy?
How Julian of Norwich inspires a more inclusive spirituality today
Julian of Norwich said “the fullness of joy is to behold God in all.”
This statement caught my imagination the first time I encountered it, and it continues to inspire me, after many years.
To put it in context: Julian makes this statement in chapter 35 of her visionary book, Revelations of Divine (the long text), also known simply as her Showings. Here’s a bit of context: Julian is praying about the welfare of a particular person (she never tells us who it is), expressing the desire to know if this person will persevere in their faith. She quickly discovers that the Spirit does not want to give her an answer. She receives this explanation: “see the graciousness of God as it is revealed to you; for it is more honor to God for you to behold God in all things, rather than seeking to behold God in any special thing.”
In other words: when we get caught up in trying to figure out how the Spirit relates to any one person, or any one situation or circumstance, we run the risk of viewing life (and faith) in a dualistic way — as if God could be more present here than there. We mortals do this all the time: we believe that the Creator is more present in our religion than in “their” religion (whoever “they” might be); that God is more present in our political values than in the values of any other party — or, my personal favorite: we see God as being more fully on the side of our nation, our football team, our point of view (notice how God is always on “our” side, and never seems to be on “their” side).
This is where Julian comes to recognize that if we want the greatest measure of happiness, in other words, “the fullness of joy” — then our task is to learn to see the presence of the Divine literally everywhere, and not just in the people or places or circumstances that we care about especially.
We could even interpret this as Julian, in her medieval way, was called into a nondual spirituality: a spirituality where the categories that we use to organize our lives: good and evil, right and wrong, just and unjust, war and peace, conflict and reconciliation… all begin to fade away in the light of the omnipresent reality of Divine love and grace.
Not that those categories just disappear. Whether we are beholding God in all or not, injustice is still injustice, and we need to work for greater justice. We still must heal the sick, feed the poor, clean the mess, right the wrongs. But if we do all this in a nondual way, we avoid hating our adversaries — we have compassion for them, we seek reconciliation with them, we hope for a path forward where a just unity will triumph over the divisions of injustice.
Granted, I’m getting philosophical here. But these are the ideas in the back of my mind that inspired me to name this new Substack newsletter the “Fullness of Joy.”
As I mentioned in this newsletter’s first email, it was Julian who inspired me. I love “the fullness of joy” because I see those words embodying inclusivity, and hospitality, and the coming together even of opposites.
That’s what I want this Substack to be about. In the words of Richard Rohr, I want this to be a newsletter where “everything belongs.”
And I would add to that, “everyone belongs.”
This is not always easy. We live in a messy and imperfect world, which means our efforts at bringing people together will be messy and imperfect too. But that’s no reason to give up.
This newsletter will be very humble. I see it as the continuation of my blog (www.anamchara.com). For many years I focused my writing, whether books or the blog, on Christian Mysticism, and especially in its western/monastic form: think of the spiritual wisdom of Thomas Merton, Teilhard do Chardin, Simone Weil, Teresa of Ávila, Meister Eckhart, Thomas Keating, Evelyn Underhill, and so forth.
But I have a heart for mysticism and contemplation that goes beyond just the Catholic variety. Or the Christian variety. I’m particularly interested in Buddhism and Neopaganism. And other traditions of spiritual exploration, both ancient and modern.
In more recent years I’ve written more and more about interspirituality and interreligious/interfaith mysticism. In this newsletter I hope to explore that even further. Everything and everyone belongs, right?
Meanwhile, I’m also fascinated by more secular approaches to spirituality and mysticism: the psychology of C. G. Jung. The philosophy of Ken Wilber. The psychedelic spirituality of Timothy Leary and Ram Dass. The nonbinary experience of Pauli Murray. Even the atheist spirituality of some more recent writers like Alain de Botton or Sam Harris. I may not agree with all these writers, but I’m curious to see how their thought interacts with my own, whether in affirming or challenging ways.
The fullness of joy is to behold God in all. All religious traditions. All schools of mysticism. All philosophies. All controversial issues. All forms of culture and creativity. This list could go on and on. This is what is inspiring me, and I hope you’ll join in the conversation. How do we bring a contemplative sensibility to the challenging issues of our time? How do we gaze through the heart of silence to find insight into the many issues and concerns that face us in our time?
I certainly don’t have all the answers. But I think “the fullness of joy” is available to us even when we don’t have everything figured out. We can behold the Divine in mystery as well.
