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Wholesaling the Sacred
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20256 |
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Section : |
BOOK WORLD
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| Issue
Date : |
7 / 1992 |
2,998 Words |
| Author
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Paul V. Mankowski
Paul V. mankowski is a Jesuit priest and frequent contributor
to First Things. |
Thomas Moore's Care of the Soul describes itself as a "guide for cultivating depth and sacredness in everyday life." The author makes his pitch to those of our generation who feel their lives to be superficial and profane, lacking in meaning and devoid of fulfillment, and he draws on some of the more appetizing notions of religion, psychology, magic, and myth to construct what he calls a "fiction of self-help"--a process of alchemy for extracting the gold of contentment and self-esteem out of the base metal or ordinary experience.
The path of fulfillment endorsed by this book, the path that Moore himself has taken, is a kind of genial paganism--a paganism that is broad minded, tolerant, intellectually curious, eclectic, and detached from strong conviction. The author champions a return to polytheism, insisting that he has in mind a psychological orientation rather than a theological one; he is not really interested in the reliability of religious assertions of truth. A Jungian therapist, Moore proposes that we pay homage to Mars, Saturn, Aphrodite, and their kin not as real god but as "claims made on us from a deep place."
Multiplicity and flexibility are key; unity and consistency are dangers. Whereas Kierkegaard insisted that "purity of heart is to will one thing," for Moore, singleness of mind is the prime curse:
The most rewarding quality of polytheism is the intimacy it can make possible with one's own heart. Whenever we try to keep life in order with a monotheistic attitude--do the right thing, keep up the traditions, make sure life makes sense--our moralism against ourselves can keep certain parts of our nature at a distance and little known . . . An attitude of polytheism permits a degree of acceptance of human nature that is otherwise blocked by single-mindedness.
Moore himself claims to have been a monk for twelve years and to have become a "lapsed Catholic." Although he does not say explicitly what he has lapsed into, it is clear from this work that his paganism is conventionally "post-Christian." He is happy to quarry the church's tradition (and others) for mythic beauties and traces of folk wisdom, but his attachment goes no further.
The title Care of the Soul itself echoes a commonplace of church practice, although what Moore means by "soul" is light-years away from the Christian understanding of the term. In classical theology, the soul is the constitutive element by which human existence is capable of attaining
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