Celtic
Spirituality
Its Rich Legacy
and Future Promise
By Ed Sellner
Ed Sellner, Ph.D., is professor of theology and spirituality at Saint
Catherine University in St. Paul, Minnesota, where he has taught
undergraduate and graduate courses and administered pastoral
ministry, spiritual direction, and Masters degree programs for
the over thirty years. He is the author of numerous articles and
books, including Wisdom of the Celtic Saints, Stories of the Celtic
Soul Friends, and, most recently, Finding the Monk Within. Ed is
also a popular speaker on Celtic spirituality, has given workshops,
retreats, and lectures at local, national, and international conferences, and led pilgrimages to Ireland and Brittany. Ed is one of the
founders of Wisdom Ways Center for Spirituality.
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O
ver a century ago, in 1893, the Irish poet, W. B. Yeats, published a short reflective book entitled, The Celtic Twilight,
in which he described something of the vision, beliefs,
and spirituality of a largely forgotten people, living on the edge
of Europe’s mainland. Motivated by his hunger for the recovery
of that spiritual tradition and with a note of sadness, he wrote of
what seemed to be a lost past, and of a “Celtic longing for infinite
things the world has never seen.” In our own time, here in the
United States as well as in Ireland and the British Isles, more and
more people, Celtic and otherwise, have begun to appreciate the
spirituality that Yeats articulated and defended. This contemporary appreciation is reflected in music, popular movies and shows,
the many books being published on the subject for scholarly and
lay audiences alike. By exploring some of the history of the Early Celtic Church and
characteristics of its spirituality, we can gain intimations of the
future, a type of spirituality that can and is already drawing many
people together from diverse traditions, both Eastern and Western, beyond historical differences, dogmas, and theological views.
The Early Celtic
Church and Its
Spirituality
The Early Celtic
Church was made up
primarily of numerous small monastic
communities in rural
areas of what we now
call Ireland, England,
Scotland, Wales, Brittany, and the Isle of Man. It was one of
Christianity’s most ancient and creative churches and existed quite
independently of Rome from the fifth through the twelfth centuries That which definitely made the Celtic Church unique was its
embracing of so many of the values and beliefs of the Celtic pagan
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culture which had preceded the arrival of Christianity. Honoring and integrating the two spiritual traditions of their ancestors,
pagan and Christian, into a new synthesis, the Celts created a form
of Christianity that came to be associated with particular qualities
grounded in their awareness and celebration of the sacred, that is,
in their spirituality.
1. Kinship with Nature
The first characteristic of this spirituality that typified early Celtic Christians
was their outright mystical connection with nature, seeing their daily
lives and work united with the natural
landscape and the changing seasons.
The Celts themselves, before the coming of Christianity, believed that the
divine pervaded every aspect of life,
and that spirits were everywhere. The
earth was regarded as the source of all
fertility, and the great forces of nature
(moon, ocean, sun, and wind) were worshipped as manifestations
of the divine.
The Celts, living so close to bodies of water with their dream-like
fogs and mists, also developed a respect for the mystical. They
came to associate water itself with mystery and with personal and
communal transformation. The Celts, both pagan and Christian,
had a profound respect for the earth and the natural rhythms of
body and soul, precisely because they did not see themselves as
“lords” over creation, but spiritually, emotionally, and intellectually connected with it.
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2. Women’s Leadership
A second distinct characteristic of
the Celts was their appreciation of
women’s leadership and gifts. They
were far ahead of other cultures
which recognized few if any rights
of women. In Ireland, for example,
under the Brehon Laws, women had
specific legal rights that allowed
them to divorce their husbands as
well as to protect, when necessary,
their dowries. Early Celtic sagas
contain numerous references to the
leadership of women as warriors and druidesses, and women held
important ministerial positions in the Early Celtic Church.
Some of the greatest and most well-known of spiritual leaders in
the early church in Ireland were women. It is clear that, while the
other Christian churches increasingly isolated women from positions of authority and relationships of friendship with males, the
Celtic Church encouraged their leadership.
3. Collaboration
A third quality of their ecclesiology
and spirituality was the high degree
of collaboration between female
and male church leaders, as well as
ordained people and lay. In descriptions of the early Celtic monasteries,
we find that both celibate members
within the monastic communities as
well as lay people experienced the fruits of collaboration. Education, pastoral care, and liturgical leadership were provided by the
monks or religious women; in turn, lay people and their families
helped the monasteries grow their crops, manage their farms,
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fish, plant trees, and keep their bees. All benefited from this mutual sharing of gifts.
4. Appreciation for the Marginalized
A fourth characteristic was the appreciation the Celts had for the marginalized, as well as for the marginalized places in their lives. The Celts
themselves, once the dominant race
in Europe, were originally a nomadic
people who experienced little stability and who possessed little wealth.
Throughout much of their history,
they lived close to nature and the
elements, as well as close to homelessness, poverty, God. Precisely because of this, their Christian
spirituality, reflected in the stories of the early saints, reveals a
sensitivity toward those whose lives, for whatever reason, were
considered of less value, and a genuine outreach toward those
whom others treated as outcasts. Even their art expressed the
sometimes “terrible beauty” of marginality, for the most beautiful
images and extraordinary poetic passages are not in the main text
of such illuminated gospels as the Book of Kells, but in the margins, on the boundaries, where, for them, the sacred and wisdom
itself are found.
5. Appreciation of Beauty
A fifth quality of their spirituality is related to their broad understanding and
appreciation of beauty. Their ancient
pagan stories, passed on for generations
by druids, bards, and poets, are filled
with vivid descriptions of handsome
warriors, beautiful women, translucent
landscapes, and bright colors. This love
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of beauty and passion for living were passed on to the Christian Celts, and found expression in high crosses and illuminated
manuscripts, in the finely-designed chalices, croziers, and saints’
reliquaries and was also expressed in their early prayers, hymns,
and poetry. In their spirituality, Celts recognized, as Plato did, that
beauty, in all its manifestations, reflects and ultimately leads to
the source and creator of all beauty, the holy one, God.
6. Valuing Eros
The sixth characteristic of the Celts
is their valuing
of eros, whether
expressed genitally
or sublimated in family relationships, friendships, daily work, creativity, art. The ancients considered eros to be, fundamentally, a
spiritual power, and did not associate it, as we do today, only with
sex Greeks, Romans, and Celts understood eros to be a source
of creativity and wholeness, a mysterious yearning and desire
for connection, wisdom, the divine. The early pagan Celts were
known for their tribal, familial, kinship ties, and their deep desire
for intimacy. Among Christian Celts this trait was reflected in their
monasteries made up of families, both “religious” and ordinary.
Eros was and is especially reflected in the Celts’ appreciation of
friendship itself. In Christian times, the stories of the Celtic saints
are filled with numerous examples of friendship relationships between men and women, men and men, and women and women.
Perhaps the greatest legacy, in fact, that the Early Celtic Church
passed on to the universal Church was its gift of the tradition of
the soul friend: a person who acted as a teacher, confessor, counselor, or spiritual guide. With its one-to-one focus, Celtic soulfriend ministry contributed greatly to Western culture’s emphasis
on the integrity and worth of the individual person and upon his
or her spiritual and psychological development. It was the predecessor of our modern disciplines of counseling, psychotherapy,
and spiritual direction.
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7. Appreciation of Storytelling
A seventh characteristic of the
Celts, reflected in their ecclesiology and spirituality, was their
profound appreciation of the
spoken and written word; that is,
of storytelling. They knew firsthand that stories feed the soul
the way food feeds the body.
The responsibility of all of these
storytellers was to remember
and narrate the great sagas of their tribal and spiritual ancestors
whom they considered, even if long dead, intimate members of
their families. Whenever and wherever they were told, these
stories about their heroes were perhaps the clearest expression of
the Celts’ religious beliefs, values, and spirituality.
The Future:
Intimations
From the Past
All of the above
characteristics or
qualities of the Celts
are basic patterns of
the Celtic soul. For
all people of Celtic
origins, whether
they are consciously aware of it or not, these psychic patterns
live on in the unconscious, in what the Swiss psychotherapist,
Carl Jung, called “ancestral memories.” But one does not have to
be a Celt to appreciate the implications of these patterns for our
churches and society today, and, in particular, for our own spirituality. They manifest what many people have already learned is of
utmost importance to their daily lives and work: the need to respect nature and to unite oneself with the natural rhythms of the
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seasons, and of day and night; the great need to truly value and
encourage women’s leadership in practice as well as in words; the
need to collaborate with other individuals, groups, and churches
in the belief that all benefit and more is accomplished by doing
things together; the need to be attentive to those who have been
marginalized, for whatever reason, and to our own marginal sides;
the need to appreciate and celebrate beauty, and allow its many
forms to enrich and inspire our creativity; the need to acknowledge the holy mystery of desire and to be respectful of eros in
all its manifestations and orientations; the need to honor storytellers, beginning with a deep appreciation of our own stories and
their profoundly sacred quality.
Sharing this Celtic spirituality, we can begin together to build a
more just and compassionate church, society, and world.
The wisdom of Celtic spirituality was and is rooted in compassion,
an attitude and discipline that no longer lets us judge others and
ourselves in the worst possible light, but places all in the loving,
accepting hands of God. With that letting go, we can become mirrors ourselves. As Yeats so wisely suggests in The Celtic Twilight,
his book that became not so much an expression of that spirituality’s demise as a plea for it continued growth:
We can make our lives so like still water that beings
gather about us that they may see their own images,
and so live for a moment with a clearer, perhaps even
with a fiercer life because of our serenity.
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Wisdom Ways Center for Spirituality
Explorations and Celebrations of Celtic Spirituality
T
he exploration and celebration of Celtic spirituality has been a
consistent theme ever since Wisdom Ways Center for Spirituality was founded on November 1 of 1994. In fact, the date of November 1 marks the ancient Celtic festival of Samhain and is the
beginning of the Celtic new year! The year of 1995 was devoted
to the development of Wisdom Ways and included extensive planning and preparation for the first Celtic Soul conference.
Wisdom Ways offerings focused on Celtic spirituality have included three major international, interdisciplinary conferences, several
series, and multiple single offerings. In a particular way, the nearly
– annual celebrations of St. Brigid’s Day on or near February 1
offer opportunities to deepen these explorations on a yearly basis.
Details regarding some of these offering over the years are as
follows:
Conferences:
1) Celtic Soul: An International Conference Celebrating Celtic Spirituality – Art, Music and Storytelling Date: November 30-December 2, 1995
Presenters: scholars Esther de Waal, Rosemary Haughton, Noel
Dermot O’Donohue, James Charles Roy, Edward Sellner; woodcarver Michael Quirke, playwright Karen Lee, musicians Ann and
Charlie Heymann.
2) Celtic Voice, Celtic Vision: A Celebration of the Celtic Soul
Date: July 15-18, 1999
Major Presenters: scholars and theologians Rosemary Haughton,
Noirin ni Riain, John O’Donohue and Edward Sellner.
3) Celtic Soul: Ecology, Spirituality and Sacred Journeys Date: May
11-13, 2006
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Major Presenters: theologians Rev. David Keller, Mary Low, John
Phillip Newell, Edward Sellner
Saint Brigid’s Day Celebrations:
1996: Introduction to Celtic Spirituality - three part series presented by Ed Sellner, Rev. David Keller and Mary Catherine Casey, CSJ.
2007: The Spiritual Quest in Irish
2008: Festival of St. Brigid with Folklorist Padraigin Clancy and
Harpist Dennis Doyle
2009: “A Habit of the Wildest Bounty” with Jan Richardson, artist
and writer.
Other Celtic Offerings:
2007: Introduction to Celtic Spirituality
2007: Courage for New Horizons: Inner Stillness, Prophetic Imagination with Celtic Theologian John O’Donohue
2007: The Celtic Way of Prayer – A Day with Esther DeWaal.
2008: Celtic Spirit: Remembering John O’Donohue
2009: Christ of the Celts by J. Philip Newell: A Book Study ,
2009: Sacred Conversations: Longing for Healing and Wholeness
with John Phillip Newell,
2009: Drumming the Ancestral Heartbeat
2009: A River Hard to See: A Celtic View of the Patterns of Life
with John Phillip Newell,
2010: A Day with J. Philip Newell – A New Harmony: The Spirit, the
Earth and the Human Soul
2011: The Globalization of God – Celtic Christianity’s Nemesis,
with Dara Molloy
2012: The Pilgrim’s Way: Setting the Direction for a Future Life
with David Whyte
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Upcoming Celtic events at Wisdom Ways:
“Who Really Was St. Patrick? The Truth Behind the Legend” with
Marcus Losack, Wednesday, March 13, 6:30-8:30pm.
“To Journey as a Pilgrim: A Day Retreat” with Marcus Losack and
Ed Sellner, Friday, March 15, 9:00am-4:00pm. Marcus will also be
preaching at Pilgrim Lutheran Church on Sunday, March 17, for
their morning services (1935 St. Clair Ave., St. Paul, www.pilgrimstpaul.org).
Save the Date: Rev. John Philip Newell - October 29-30, 2013
2012/2013 Celtic Soul Advisory Circle:
Ann Cahill, Diane Gardner, Rev. Sally Johnson, Lisa Moriarty, Rev.
Julie Neraas, Dr. Ed Sellner, Terry Shaughnessy, and Rev. Carol
Tomer.
A Ministry of the Sisters of St. Joseph of Carondelet
Carondelet Center, 1890 Randolph Ave.,
St. Paul, MN 55105
651-696-2788
www.wisdomwayscenter.og