Kataphatic Spirituality

 

KATAPHATIC SPIRITUALITY 

Your word is a lamp for my feet, a light for my path. I make a solemn vow to observe your righteous judgments. (Psalm 119:105-106)

https://oddsandendsgonzalinhodacosta.blogspot.com/2024/05/images-and-symbols-of-holy-spirit.html

“If you love me, you will keep my commandments. And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate to be with you always” (Jn 14:15-16). Your reception of the Holy Spirit depends on following Christ as best you can, repenting when you fall short. By following God’s commandments, you say “yes” to receiving the Holy Spirit, to living in the world with a supernatural outlook.

Though we must follow Christ in order to receive the Holy Spirit, the Spirit is a gift. No one can earn Him or His insight. In His mercy, God gives us the Holy Spirit because He wants us to live in communion with Him. He wants us to see the world more as He sees it so that we can accomplish His will on earth and, at the end, enter into His glory, where we will be present with the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit forever.

https://www.thedivinemercy.org/articles/seeing-light-holy-spirit

—Marc Massery, “Seeing by the Light of the Holy Spirit,” The Divine Mercy, May 14, 2020

Paying heed to revelation—both public and private—and discerning the spirits is a type of kataphatic spirituality. However, because the practice of the Christian faith is enwrapped in mystery, the practice of Christian spirituality necessarily entails some degree of darkness (obscurity).