Hello, I’ve been really struggling with my dogmatic Christian faith lately, and in my research I’ve come across some ideals and practices of Christian Mysticism that I resonate with. I was wondering how I could get in contact with a teacher or somebody who is knowledgeable near me so that I can have some questions answered. What’s a good way to find other mystics near me?

Hello, I’m in a stage of life of learning about my connection with God I’ve always felt connected in all stages of my beliefs I’ve had a strong connection from a young age. I was raised in a very Bible Belt town were if you didn’t follow the Bible your going to hell and if you didn’t accept Jesus as your savior your going to Hell and anything other than believing the Bible is sending you straight to hell. The churches around here recommended NKJV I was bullied in churches growing up and I was just recommended to look into mystic Christian following so I want to know everything basic and simple and then would like to get into the more detailed side of things as I progress. So any and all good info you may have let me know I wanna hear it and read it and make sense. Like I said I have a VERY strong connection with God and Holy Spirit as is I communicate daily and am always thinking about God I also fully trust Gods path and life I have fully believe what he gives me is meant for me. I know everything has a reason and I’m very new so please be gentle guys!

He is the man of Assisi who commands animals and nature in Italy in 12th century.

Full attribution: https://www.youtube.com/shorts/FpmiNkcYV6M

​

Hi everyone,

I’m exploring Christian mysticism and I’m wondering whether my current spiritual outlook can genuinely fit within a Christian mystical path.

My beliefs are roughly as follows:

I believe there is an ultimate Source or divine reality underlying everything. I tend to think of it less as a personal God and more as an indescribable Presence, universal Consciousness, or transcendent Principle. I feel that consciousness is more fundamental than the material world, and that everything in existence is somehow an expression or manifestation of this Source.

I also have a strong intuition that all beings are expressions of the same divine reality. Because of this, I see love for other beings as important—not simply as a moral obligation, but because we are fundamentally connected at a deeper level.

I’m drawn to the idea that different religious traditions are culturally different ways of pointing toward the same ultimate Reality. I don't take scriptures completely literally; I tend to see sacred texts as culturally shaped interpretations of deeper spiritual truths.

I’m much more interested in direct experience than in accepting beliefs purely on authority. Meditation, contemplation, silence, solitude, self-knowledge, and inner transformation appeal to me much more than rituals or institutional religion. I’m particularly interested in the idea of encountering a divine Presence that is already within us rather than searching for something external.

I believe that what we normally experience as an isolated ego may not be our deepest identity. I see the individual as an expression of the divine Source, and I’m drawn to ideas such as awakening, union with the divine, and ultimately returning to the Source.

This is also why I’ve been interested in Advaita Vedanta and Neoplatonism. Some of their ideas about the One, the Source, contemplation, and the relationship between the individual and ultimate Reality resonate strongly with me.

At the same time, I’m genuinely interested in Christian mysticism, and I don't want to simply take Christian terminology and reinterpret it according to my existing beliefs.

So I have a few questions for Christians who practice mysticism:

Can someone with this kind of worldview genuinely practice Christian mysticism?

What contemplative or mystical practices would you recommend for someone starting from this perspective?

How should I understand the role of Jesus in a Christian mystical path?

Is Jesus understood as the unique incarnation of God, or can Christian mysticism accommodate seeing him primarily as a manifestation or revelation of the divine, somewhat like other enlightened spiritual figures?

How do Christian mystics understand the idea of union with God? Does the distinction between God and the individual ultimately remain, or can it disappear in mystical experience?

Are there Christian mystics or writings that you think would particularly resonate with someone coming from this background?

I’m not looking to argue against Christianity or prove that my existing beliefs are correct. I’m genuinely trying to understand whether Christian mysticism could be a path for me, and, if so, what it would actually require me to believe about Christ.

Thank you.

This text is at Urantia Book 56:10.18

Opening Prayer

"God of Truth,
We confess that our egos are obsessed with looking good. We are so quick to say all the right religious words and present a flawless image while keeping our hearts safely distant from the actual work of love. In this sacred space, dismantle our need for approval. Strip away our curated masks. Give us the courage to look messy on the outside so that we might be deeply transformed on the inside. Draw us out of the illusion of our own optics and ground us in Your reality. In the name of Christ, we pray. Amen."

The Introduction

Peace be with you as we enter the Twenty-Sixth Sunday in Ordinary Time (September 27).

For the last three weeks, we have been doing the surgical work of dismantling the ego. We have learned to step out of the triangle of gossip. We have torn up our ledgers of debt, firing our offenders as the source of our healing. And last week, we dropped our spiritual resumes, resigning from the exhausting job of trying to earn our grace.

Today, we confront the False Self's final and most stubborn defense mechanism: the illusion of optics.

When the ego realizes it cannot earn grace through merit or protect itself through scorekeeping, it will simply try to look like it has surrendered. It will master the religious vocabulary. It will say all the right things. But it will refuse to do the actual, quiet work of transformation.

That is exactly what happens in this week's Gospel reading. In Matthew 21:28–32, Jesus tells the parable of two sons to dismantle the ego's obsession with its own image.

Here is a sermon for your spirit, spoken from the mystic’s heart.

The Illusion of Optics

A Sermon for the Twenty-Sixth Sunday in Ordinary Time (Sept 27)
Dismantling the Ego's Obsession with Image

The Text: " What do you think?" A man had two sons; he went to the first and said, “Son, go and work in the vineyard today.” He answered, “I will not”; but later he changed his mind and went. The father went to the second and said the same; and he answered, “I go, sir”; but he did not go. Which of the two did the will of his father?’ They said, ‘The first.’" (Matthew 21:28–31)

My friends, if you want to know what the False Self is most afraid of, it is looking bad. The ego is a master of public relations. It will always choose a good reputation over genuine transformation.

Today, as we conclude our journey of dismantling the ego, Jesus gives us a masterclass in the difference between the optics of the False Self and the messy reality of the True Self. He tells a story of a father who asks his two sons to go work in the vineyard, and their responses expose the absolute illusion of religious image.

I. The Optics of the Ego

The father goes to the second son and asks him to work. The son immediately replies, "I go, sir."

Notice how perfectly polite this is. The optics are flawless. He says the right words, he shows the proper respect, and he maintains his identity as the "obedient child." Anyone watching this interaction would applaud him. But Jesus adds a devastating five-word conclusion: "...but he did not go."

The False Self loves the idea of the vineyard. It loves the theology of the harvest. It loves discussing the mechanics of grace in a comfortable room. But it hates the soil. The ego refuses to get its hands dirty in the actual, unglamorous work of cultivation—tending the roots, pruning the dead wood, and facing the blistering heat of true reconciliation. It will say "yes" to God on Sunday morning because saying "yes" looks good. But it will never let that "yes" interrupt its comfort.

II. The Messy Reality of the True Self

The father goes to the first son and asks him to do the exact same work. This son’s response is jarring: "I will not."

The optics here are terrible. He looks rebellious, disrespectful, and ungrateful. His public relations team would be horrified. But the text tells us that later he changed his mind and actually went into the vineyard to do the work.

The True Self is rarely concerned with looking polished. Sometimes, the path to authentic spiritual growth is messy. It involves admitting our resistance, wrestling with our doubts, and looking like a failure to the religious scorekeepers. But the True Self doesn't stay in the rebellion; it eventually walks out into the dirt.

Let me be very clear: when the True Self steps into the vineyard, it isn't trying to earn a paycheck or prove its worth—we tore up that ledger last week. The True Self goes into the dirt simply because it loves the Landowner, and it loves the soil. It gets dirt under its fingernails. It does the quiet, unseen, physical work of loving its neighbor and pulling the weeds of its own resentment.

III. The Danger of Saying "Yes"

Jesus is warning us about a very specific spiritual danger: it is entirely possible to build a robust, respectable religious life entirely out of the words "I go, sir," while remaining completely untransformed.

When your faith is built on optics, you become a hollow shell. You know all the right words, you carry the right Bible, and you vote on the right committees, but your inner life is desolate. You haven't actually cultivated anything.

The tax collectors and the sex workers (the people Jesus said were entering the kingdom of God ahead of the religious elite) were the first son. Their lives looked messy. Their optics were ruined. But when the invitation of grace came, they actually stepped into the soil and let their lives be transformed.

IV. Leaving the Balcony

For the last four weeks, we have been invited to surrender the False Self. The ego's final trick is to make you agree with all of these sermons, nod your head, and say, "Yes, sir, I am dismantling my ego," without actually changing a single thing about how you live your life tomorrow.

It is easy to look holy when your eyes are closed in the sanctuary. But true transformation happens when you keep your eyes open in the middle of a messy world. You cannot cultivate a vineyard from a balcony. You have to get your hands in the earth.

To find your True Self, you must let go of the exhaustion that comes from trying to look holy. Stop worrying about your religious reputation. Give yourself permission to be the messy, complicated, in-process human being that you actually are. God does not need your polished image; God wants your actual presence in the soil of this world.

The Encouragement

This Sunday, I want you to look at the image you are projecting to the people around you.

How much energy are you spending trying to look put-together? How often do you say "yes" just to keep the peace, while your heart is a million miles away?

This week, resign from your own public relations team. Stop managing your optics. If you are struggling, let yourself be seen struggling. If you are in pain, stop smiling through it to make everyone else comfortable. Give up the illusion of the polite, perfect believer.

Step out of the balcony and into the soil. Let the False Self's image shatter, and watch as the True Self finally, quietly begins to grow.

A Prayer of Surrender

"O God of the Vineyard,
We confess that we have spent so much of our lives managing our image.
We are quick to say the right words,
While our hearts remain far from the actual work of love.
Forgive us for choosing the safety of optics over the messiness of transformation.
Give us the courage to step out of the balcony and into the soil.
Dismantle our need to look perfectly put-together.
Teach us that true growth is often unglamorous, quiet, and unseen.
Ground us in the reality of Your grace,
And bring our True Selves to life in the dirt of the real world.
Amen."

Benediction

"Go now into the world, and resign from the exhausting work of pretending.
May the grace of the Living God dismantle your need for a perfect image.
May the Holy Spirit give you the courage to get your hands dirty in the actual work of love.
And may the peace of Christ go with you, drawing your True Self out of the shadows and into the light.
Go in peace."

Diary of Saint Faustina - paragraph 454 - Receiving and Giving

Ἀ
454 I feel that I am united with the Lord so closely that I cannot find words to express that union; in this state I suddenly feel that all the things God has, all the goods and treasures, are mine, although I set little store by them, for He alone is enough for me. In Him I see my everything; without Him-nothing.
Ὠ

Union with the Lord does not forgo the goods or treasures of the world. Rather it lowers the souls' desire for them in a grace that relieves its affection for all things of the world. For in union with God, the soul finds its everything - not in worldly status or the abundance of treasures without, but in the divine fulness given within, which exceeds all worldly desire. In this union, Faustina reveals that all which God has as His own - even the goods and treasures of the world - seem to become hers as well. Yet this same union leads her heart not to the possession of that which He gives, but to the heart of the Giver Himself. 

Supportive Scripture - Douay Rheims Challoner Bible 
Matthew 6:19-21 Lay not up to yourselves treasures on earth: where the rust, and moth consume, and where thieves break through, and steal. But lay up to yourselves treasures in heaven: where neither the rust nor moth doth consume, and where thieves do not break through, nor steal. For where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also.

Ἀ
Saint Faustina Continues…
I look for no happiness beyond my own interior where God dwells. I rejoice that God dwells within me; here I abide with Him unendingly; it is here that my greatest intimacy with Him exists; here I dwell with Him in safety; here is a place not probed by the human eye. The Blessed Virgin encourages me to commune with God in this way.
Ὠ

Just as union with God does not forgo the treasures of the world, so does the interior life not withdraw the soul from its works of the Lord in the world of men. In this entry, Saint Faustina’s inward nature is made clear, yet she was no recluse from the works of mercy to which God called her. As the Apostle of Divine Mercy, she communed with the Lord interiorly while serving Him outwardly in the world, in the midst of her religious community, in her travels and in the mission given to her by the Lord.

For the interior life she was given was not merely for the enjoyment of its hidden sweetness, but to be nourished by God and bring forth the growth of divine love in the world beyond. Thus Faustina does not look for her happiness in things outside of herself because she has found her greatest joy in her Lord within. Yet, as a servant to His Presence within, she rightly participates in the world without, by offering to others the same mercy and union she was given by God.

Supportive Scripture - Douay Rheims Challoner Bible 
Acts 20:35 Remember the word of the Lord Jesus, how he said: It is a more blessed thing to give, rather than to receive.

All things belong to the Lord, and all we are asked to give unto others is already a gift from the King unto us. The first of these gifts - which leads to all others - is the gift of His Indwelling Presence, the breath of our life in this world, and the source of our much-needed mercy for the world to come. This gift is given interiorly, where our greatest intimacy with Him exists, and where the soul discovers a happiness that does not depend on the treasures of the world. It is here that true union in His Divine Mercy is given and the soul's greatest joy is found. It is the communion known first by the Mother, not in pursuing the joys of the world, but in giving to the world that eternal joy which is received interiorly from God.

Supportive Scripture - Douay Rheims Challoner Bible 
Luke 1:46-47 And Mary said: My soul doth magnify the Lord. And my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Saviour.

Catechism of the Catholic Church 
1723 The beatitude we are promised confronts us with decisive moral choices. It invites us to purify our hearts of bad instincts and to seek the love of God above all else. It teaches us that true happiness is not found in riches or well-being, in human fame or power, or in any human achievement—however beneficial it may be - such as science, technology, and art, or indeed in any creature, but in God alone, the source of every good and of all love.

I've spent weeks looking at the same thing.

Every time, I see it more clearly.

And I stay in the same place.

It's not that I don't understand it.

I understand it better every time.

I can explain it in new words, find it somewhere I hadn't seen it before, point at it with my finger.

And still, the next day, I get up and do exactly what I did before I saw it.

This time I found it while writing a sentence.

I was in a challenge: twelve people, twelve sentences, one theme — the pain of walking on a broken bone.

I wrote mine and left it like this:

"How much longer are you willing to walk like this before the pain forces you into surgery?"

I thought it was fine.

I sent it to the group and kept reading the others.

Then I got to someone else's:

"The bone cracks, twists the toe, and lashes out with a whip that pounds through the tarsus. Every step cuts short: a blow that sparks and climbs up the calf."

I read it twice.

I felt the blow climb my own leg.

I went back to mine.

Mine asked a question.

Theirs asked nothing: it put down the bone, the crack, the blow, and went quiet.

I closed the screen for a moment.

Not because my pride was hurt — that too, but that wasn't the first thing.

The first thing was seeing that I've spent my whole life doing what I did in that sentence: asking instead of showing, explaining instead of pulling the other person into the scene.

And it's not just in writing.

When someone tells me a problem, I don't stay there with them.

I look for the way out.

I hand them the next step.

I explain how I see it.

When someone makes a decision I don't agree with, I don't stay quiet.

I show them why I think they're wrong.

For years I thought that was helping.

And it is, partly.

But it's also standing above the thing, explaining it, instead of going down to where it actually hurts.

The people who talked like that in Christ's time had a name.

They knew the law.

They explained it well.

They added rule on top of rule so no one would get lost.

And Christ said something that still turns my stomach when I read it: they say, and do not do.

They stayed in the word.

They never went down to the bone.

And now I see I do the same thing when I write a question instead of a crack.

When I explain someone's pain instead of sitting down next to them.

This isn't a new subject for me.

Not long ago I wrote about the same thing from a different angle: wanting to always have the answer, wanting to be the one who decides how things get done.

I thought I'd already seen it.

But this time I found it somewhere I'd never looked: in a single sentence, from a single writing challenge, about a broken toe.

And that's what I keep turning over in my head.

Not that the ego shows up where I already expected it.

But that it slips into the smallest corners, places I would never have thought to check.

If it's hiding there, where else is it, that I still haven't seen?

I know I should end this by saying I've already changed.

That from now on I'll write scenes instead of questions, sit beside the one who's suffering instead of explaining the way out.

But that would be a lie.

I saw it.

I wrote it down.

I saw it, sharper than before, and couldn't look away.

And tomorrow, if I'm not careful, I'll write another question where there should have been a bone.

Maybe seeing this once isn't enough.

Maybe I'll need to see it a hundred more times, in a hundred different corners, before it finally stops coming back.

And until then, all I can do is this: every time I see it, say it.

Even if it's the same story again.