Books
A Mystical Path Less Traveled:
A Jungian Psychological Perspective
Drawing on his personal journals, the Analytical Psychology of Carl Gustav Jung, on the discoveries of modern science, and on mystical traditions from numerous world religions, this book proposes a psychological mysticism that preceded, and now replaces, the historical theological mysticism that has been dependent on theistic images of god. Such images are no longer meaningful for many people - or necessary.
These pages explore an alternative spiritual path that has the character of a grounded, embodied mysticism and replaces the heavenly, disembodied escapism that has dominated the religious collective for more than 4,000 years.
Psychological mysticism expands the meanings of god, religion, mystic, and mystical and validates the universality of human experiences of the numinous. The mystical perspective is one of radical immanence.
The whole of the human enterprise is this: it is an experiment to accept both our inner angels and monsters, individually and collectively, and to live responsibly our social contract assigned by Nature.
When the divine is located within matter, within the natural world, and within the human psyche—rather than outside or beyond—the whole of life becomes a mystical sanctuary. This perspective promotes a practical or pragmatic mysticism that embraces what is and how to live what is responsibly.
Reimagining God and Religion:
Essays for the Psychologically Minded
With the necessary demise and death of antique cosmologies and traditional religious paradigms dependent on external deities and devils, the modern religious challenge involves two simultaneous sacred endeavors: to eulogize, bury, and grieve the theistic and monotheistic god-images and the religions dependent on them; and, secondly, to bring fresh imagination to the meanings of god and religion, which will satisfy both the modern mind and ancient soul.
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Drawing on the insights of Jungian or analytical psychology, Dr. Wright offers depth psychological analysis of our contemporary religious and political dilemmas, as well as invites readers to be midwives for the emerging religious myth that many believe to be on our collective horizon—a myth that will be more inclusive, intellectually and scientifically honest, and soul satisfying.
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The invitation is made urgent by his psychological conclusion: as long as our deities and devils are perceived to be beyond the physical domain and outside the human psyche, our species will continue to do great harm to each other and to our global nest.
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Combining personal testament and psychological commentary, the author explores heretofore taboo topics and reframes many traditional theological and Christological dogmas, making them more relevant to religious and non-religious alike.
“As finite beings in an infinite cosmos, perhaps the greatest puzzle of all is the mystery of the human psyche, the mystery we are to ourselves. That puzzle demands our primary attention since it governs all that we think, feel, know, and choose. The health of our world, including our religions, depends on the health of the human psyche or soul.”
Jerry R. Wright
Contact
Dr. Jerry R. Wright
322 Sycamore Dr.
Flat Rock, NC 28731
Tel: 770.656.3818
© 2021 by Jerry R. Wright.
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