Summary: Modern translation/paraphrase of the spiritual direction letters of François Fénelon.
As I regularly say, I appreciate book clubs in part because they make me read things I might not read on my own. This was the second book in this year’s Renovare book club. Generally I do not participate in any of the online message boards for the book club and I do not go to any of the in person meetings that I could go to. But I do listen to the podcasts about the book. This one was with Winn Collier, who was responsible for editing this book.
Spiritual direction is an old practice. And I think that many people met with their spiritual directors in person, but we only have records of spiritual direction that was done by letter because no one as the audio or video of spiritual direction from the 16th century. And except in the cases of spiritual direction supervision, which often has the practice of the spiritual director transcribing their memory of the sessions for purposes of discussion and learning, spiritual direction is intended to be private. As a spiritual director I don’t share about the people I meet with except with my own spiritual director who occasionally gives me advice. I occasionally do write about my work of spiritual direction because I find writing to be helpful as I clarify to myself what I think about things. But I tend to get rid of those writings immediately because I want to honor people’s privacy.
I have read several other collections of spiritual direction writing from Henri Nouwen and Evelyn Underhill and some others, but I just don’t tend to like the type of short writing that letter collections tend to be. I get bored and I rarely finish them. I did finish this one, but it took me about four months. I rarely read more than two letters at a sitting. I tended to read them at night before I go to bed. I often read a couple chapters of whatever I am currently reading until I am too tired to read and for this book I would often read one or two of these and then do my regular reading. The problem with this is that I am not giving myself time to think about them. It would be better if I read them and then went on a walk and was able to reflect on them for a while.
There is lots to reflect on here. The letters tend to be about 1-2 pages long. I suspect they are edited because there are rarely the types of greetings or personal comments that I would assume are going to be in a 16th century letter. These are more like a devotional reading than anything else. The titles that Collier gives each letter gives a sense of what Fenelon is trying to communicate.
I do have theological disagreements with Fenelon on more than a few points. But that often is less important because while our view of God does impact how we relate to God, the spiritual practices of life often are similar regardless of theological specifics. People still pray and sin and have high and low points in our spiritual lives. How we think about God does matter in those, but there is a care here to help people where they are at, not just by telling them where they should be.
I do think this is a book that would make a good discussion with other spiritual directors because there would be disagreement about his comments. In part, that is going to be natural because people are different, situations are different, our discernment will be different because no situation is exactly the same as another.
But at the same time, I still don’t like reading short devotional length collections because I have a hard time with my engagement at that length. I need more to fully engage.
Let God: Spiritual Conversations with François Fénelon by Winn Collier Purchase Links: Paperback, Kindle Edition