Religion in Exile: A Spiritual Homecoming

by Diarmuid O'Murchu

Diarmuid O'Murchu offers pentrating and original insights into the changing spiritual awareness of our time. He believes that we are rapidly out-growing the time honored but exhausted vision of formal religion.

Genres: Spirituality

256 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2000

About the author

Diarmuid O'Murchu, a member of the Sacred Heart Missionary Order, and a graduate of Trinity College, Dublin Ireland, is a social psychologist most of whose working life has been in social ministry, predominantly in London, UK. In that capacity he has worked as a couple's counsellor, in bereavement work, AIDS-HIV counselling, and laterally with homeless people and refugees. As a workshop leader and group facilitator he has worked in Europe, USA, Canada, Australia, The Philippines, Thailand,
India, Peru and in several African countries, facilitating programmes on Adult Faith Development.

His best known books include Quantum Theology (1996 - revised in 2004), Reclaiming Spirituality (1998), Evolutionary Faith (2002), Catching Up with Jesus (2005), The Transformation of Desire (2007), Ancestral Grace (2008), Jesus in the Power of Poetry (2009).

Reviews

[Allan Savage]

O'Murchu states that he seeks to befriend religious questions rather than seek answers to them and, in fact, he does just that. Not much by way of an answer is provided. He offers a critique of the underlying assumptions to religious and spiritual issues which he has identified as problematic for the individual seeking a spiritual home, or an understanding of a world in which to be "at home." His is a phenomenological approach that presents current religious and spiritual issues in the popular vocabulary of religious critique. I can identify with his critique. However, doubt I can agree with all of his interpretations. Agreement among academics is a perpetual problem. For theologians who read about religious issues treated by competent individuals in other disciplines agreement seems particularly problematic. Although theologically trained, O'Murchu thinks about religious issues from a perspective more properly psychological than theological. This is not necessarily an undesirable approach but a theologian needs to be cautious and not accept psychological thinking as theological thinking. As I understand him, O'Murchu speaks more of the psyche than of the pneuma. The psychological perspective of the book makes this a good "self-help" resource for those troubled or curious minds who desire more than a shallow presentation or description of spiritual or religious issues. O'Murch says: "The need to talk things out is the pastoral context where possibilities begin to unfold"(p.198). Issues are "talked out" in the book. But as I read I found myself asking: "So what?" and "Yes, but how is change to happen?" Thus, while I have no reservation about his description about returning home, I am disappointed to find no suggested direction on "how to return home." I suggest that theologians could benefit from reading this psychological work.

[Joan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Author presents lots of novel ideas about the history and state of religion, politics and culture. It is a dense book; one that makes me feel like I need to reread it or unpack all of the ideas with a fellow reader.