by Don MacDougall

Tilden Edwards has spoken of three assumptions necessary for spiritual direction: that God is; God loves us unconditionally; and God is active in our lives.

It is my experience that participants who have entered into group spiritual direction do not have much trouble with making the first and second assumptions-that God is and that God loves us unconditionally -as necessary for spiritual direction. They have plenty of difficulty and challenge in living fully into these assumptions, but they don't tend to doubt their validity. They do have trouble with the third assumption, however- that God is active in our lives-both in understanding it and accepting it, with specific reference to the experience of group spiritual direction.

This came up in a very concrete way in a spiritual direction group and was a source of confusion for a while, both for the group and for me. The matter nevertheless helped me clarify the nature and reality of God in general and what God seems to be inviting us in to, as seen through the experience of group spiritual direction.

One of the participants over a period of two years would routinely begin her sharing with a circumstance in the wider world that affected her profoundly. She would share the pain she felt, weep inconsolably about it, and ask repeatedly through tears "where is God in that?" Such events, and the pain they caused her, were the reality of her spiritual journey at that time.

One consistent theme that came up in the conversation with her, in response to her sharing, was that, for better or for worse, it seemed that God did not intervene to stop such terrible things. Also there was talk in the group that God did not function or act that way anyway.

The question then became, what does it mean to say "God is active in our lives?" If God does not intervene out there in the world in very urgent circumstances, which we can relate to and feel deep pain about, God is certainly not going to intervene in our lives either, unless we see ourselves as special in some way, an unacceptable assumption.  To carry this further then, God is not apt to intervene in the concerns of this little spiritual direction group either, so what's this about? Why are we meeting? How can we assume, for purposes of spiritual direction, that God is active in our lives?

Some months later, during a spiritual direction group meeting, while someone was sharing, I was struck with the impression of creation taking place there right before my eyes in that person and in that group meeting.

I don't even know now what the person was talking about, but I could tell there was a profound deepening of awareness in the presenter and an enlarged capacity to see and to hear the movements of God in her own life and in the world she lived in. Along with this deepening of awareness in her, there was a relative dissipation of fear and judgment and a growth in compassion and tolerance. There was a new openness to the movements of spirit and grace and a creative energy leading toward openness, courage, strength, humility, gentleness, power, confidence, trust, outspokenness.

Along with these things happening in her, there was a deepening willingness in the group to walk with her and each other, expectantly and supportively, and share each others burdens, while continuing to confront each other vigorously when that was called for. It felt to me like creation-creation of soul, creation of spirit, creation of being-happening right there in the group.

It wasn't the creation of a galaxy or a solar system, a planet or a continent or a mountain, but it seemed to be the same creative energy that forms these things, taking place within the ongoing creation of a human being-in the womb of a group of other human beings-sitting around and attending together that ongoing birth. That was the sense I had.

The thought occurred to me: right there is "God active in our lives!" There was no sense of God "intervening" from outside, or needing to intervene from outside in some miraculous fashion, but of God active from within our lives, as individuals and as a group/ community, and as such it seemed completely natural.

So the God I am coming to know more fully, through and in spiritual direction, is a God of ongoing creation, who lives dynamically in the middle of creation, as well as outside it; in the middle of us, as well as outside us; in the middle of a spiritual direction group as well as outside it.  Furthermore, God seems to "emerge" (rather than "intervene") more fully or easily within such being together, when the people concerned are willing to consent to that creative energy together, and to participate in that creative energy here and now.

All of this convinced me once again of the viability of that third assumption, and clarified for me the way that seems to happen, or the way God seems to "do" it. In fact, from this experience I have added a fourth assumption for spiritual direction:  that God is not only active in our lives but also invites us into partnership in creation, in loving the world into being.  Perhaps that is only another way of saying that third assumption: "that God is active in our lives, calling us into partnership in creation with God, ourselves, each other, and together loving the world into being."

It is through community life, like a spiritual direction group, that this seems to happen; and it seems to be through partnership with us that God is choosing to go about continuing creation, if we will simply show up, with some trust in the process.  God does not seem to be limited to such partnership but seems to choose it if we are open to participation with something like our whole or true selves. This to me is a very exciting and energizing thought, and it renews and deepens the importance of how that happens in a spiritual direction group.

To partner with God in God's activity in our lives, within a spiritual direction group, is to hold and carry along with God the birth, the joy and the pain of ongoing creation.

Don is a graduate of Shalem's Facilitating Group Spiritual Direction Program, Class of 2003. This article is taken from one of his program papers.