Christian mindfulness and the danger of self-contemplation
A lesson from the 19th century
Confession time: one of the significant misgivings I had about mindfulness was that it seemed an unhealthy form of self-contemplation. Luckily, Tim Stead’s book has helped me see differently, but that does not mean that the risk of self-contemplation is gone. But why is it a problem, you may ask? To explain my worries about self-contemplation, let me introduce you to one of my favourite teachers: saint John Henry Newman (1801-1890). Somewhere in the 1830s, he preached a sermon in Oxford in which he set out why self-contemplation is problematic and how it could even lead us away from God.
Before I start, I will have to make one caveat. John Henry Newman did not know the concept of mindfulness as such. Still, in all likelihood, he would have considered it part of what he calls contemplation: a critical examination of the emotions in our hearts before God.
In his sermon, he distinguishes between two popular forms of contemplation at the time. On the one hand, there was an inward-looking method. It focused solely on the feelings that ‘stir the heart’ when contemplating. The church, the faith, and the world were all considered unimportant, or at least of secondary importance, in comparison to the spiritual life of the mind. Hence, Newman called this method self-contemplation. On the other hand, there was an outward-looking method that tried to test inward feelings against the teachings of the faith and practical engagement with the world.
Newman’s criticism of Christian self-contemplation can be summarised as follows. Firstly, it reduces the whole Christian message to whether I feel justified by the faith. Secondly, my actions in the world, good or bad, do not matter as long as I feel myself in a spiritual state of mind. But, Newman wonders, how can I know that what I feel is true? How can one distinguish between the work of the Holy Spirit and delusions of our own making?
The ‘traditional’ way of contemplation tried to solve this by looking outward, to the faith, to doctrines, to the life of the saints that have gone before us and testing one’s feelings against this collective experience of finding happiness in a life with God. But self-contemplation rejected anything that could question or oppose the feelings in one’s heart. In this way, Newman warned, it could even lead people away from the faith. And he identified some evidence for that in the way that in some Christian circles, the Sermon on the Mount was reduced to spiritual reading and not a call to practical action or the tendency elsewhere to minimise the whole Christian message to just some spiritual passages from the letters of Saint Paul. Finally, Newman warns that self-contemplation also could lead to a rejection of the sacraments when they do not ‘produce’ a feeling - like a prayer or meditation - when one receives them.
But the worst thing, Newman said, is that self-contemplation can lead to spiritual pride and self-glorification. When I create and name the thoughts in my mind, I can be tempted to think that I am as powerful as God, creating a spiritual universe in my head that rejects the reality and sufferings of the world God created for us. Self-contemplation then becomes self-worship or pride. And Newman notices this pride can be spotted easily in the strange and unnatural solemn way some people start to talk when they share something about their contemplative life. They try too hard to appear “spiritual.”
I learned from Newman that a healthy Christian contemplation is a critical yet humble attempt to look at what is stirring in our hearts. It is outward-looking (a point Tim Stead also makes several times in his book introducing mindfulness). It links what is happening on the inside with the reality and wisdom that can be found in the faith and the world. It tries to discern what comes from God and what does not. And shows itself in its positive engagement with the world to work for mercy and justice. It encourages us to reach out to those at the margins of the church, the world, and our personal lives. In this context, mindfulness can be a tremendous help to get started.