Margaret Guenther is Professor of Ascetical Theology and Director of the Center for Christian Spirituality at The General Theological Seminary in New York. She is also an Episcopal priest serving as Priest Associate at Church of the Holy Trinity. In this top-drawer paperback Guenther spells out the nature and meaning of the art of spiritual direction. She writes as a woman, a teacher, and an Episcopal priest and makes it clear that spiritual direction is not psychotherapy or fixing people.
The Christian community offers a safe space for people to share and prayerfully reflect upon their spiritual journeys. With full attention and presence, the spiritual director incarnates the same hospitality that Jesus demonstrated. Guenther looks at other qualities of the spiritual director: they are hopeful, vulnerable, playful, learners, able to evaluate progress, gifted as questioners, and cognizant of the limitations of their directees.
In helping individuals to define their relationship with God and with the world, the spiritual director proclaims the bounties of mystery, silence, celebration, a rule of life, and regular spiritual practices. Here Guenther describes this role as like that of a midwife. In spiritual direction it is the Spirit who brings about new life.
Holy Listening by Margaret Guenther is a pioneering work in the art of spiritual direction.
