Prayer to Contemplation – Free Course on Essentialist Press
Published on: 11 October, 2023
By: David Torkington
To listen to all 15 of the talks on prayer, please go to the Essentialist Press website Episode 1: Contemplation and the fruits of Contemplation (full episode) Some time ago the Founder of Essentialist Press came across the website and works of David Torkington, a renowned (and properly titled) ‘Mystical Theologian’. With a love and…
A Course in Mystical Theology – Thirty Seventh Episode – From Meditation to Contemplation
Published on: 19 July, 2023
By: David Torkington
A rare and ancient book on mystical theology that was so small and dishevelled that the censors must have overlooked it in the noviciate library, gave me the advice that I needed. “When sweet meditation” it said, “leads you into dark contemplation, be sure that you give to your new prayer exactly the same time…
A Course in Mystical Theology – Thirty Sixth Episode – From Loving the Christ of History, to Union with Christ in Majesty
Published on: 21 June, 2023
By: David Torkington
My comparative success in my prayer life, and in such a short time, deceived me as it would deceive many others into believing I had arrived at what the great saints and mystics call the Mystical Marriage or the Transforming Union. I had in fact only arrived at the heights of first enthusiasm or first…
A Course in Mystical Theology – Thirty Fifth Episode – The Mass and Mystical Prayer
Published on: 30 May, 2023
By: David Torkington
The word enthusiasm comes from the Greek and it means to be wrapped in God. The first part of the spiritual adventure on which we have embarked leads us onwards to be wrapped in God when meditation reaches its climax. But this is only first enthusiasm that reaches its high point in what I have…
A Course in Mystical Theology – Thirty Fourth Episode – True Catholic Meditation
Published on: 23 May, 2023
By: David Torkington
A famous Benedictine mystical writer, William of St Thierry, who was a personal friend and follower of St Bernard, said, “You will never love someone unless you know them, but you will never really know them unless you love them”. We can only come to know God in such a way that we can love…
A Course in Mystical Theology – Thirty Third Episode – Time to Return to Our Origins
Published on: 7 May, 2023
By: David Torkington
Editors do not like repetition or self-indulgence, nor for that matter do readers. However, I am not a novelist trying to entertain, but a teacher trying to make known the Good News. But it has been so watered down and diluted, that it is only Good News for those who want to live it superficially,…
A Course in Mystical Theology – Thirty Second Episode – The Liturgy and Personal Prayer
Published on: 30 April, 2023
By: David Torkington
Many of the great theologians and scripture scholars who preceded and had such an influence on the Second Vatican Council had for the historical reasons that I have shown, been deprived of mystical spirituality in their training. Unfortunately, therefore, it played little if any part in that Council. There was another reason too that reinforced…
A Course in Mystical Theology – Thirty First Episode – The Spirit of Love, Truth and Unity
Published on: 27 March, 2023
By: David Torkington
I do not believe that the Enlightenment could have taken off at the beginning of the seventeenth century if the Reformation had not taken place at the beginning of the sixteenth century. The reformers encouraged their followers to doubt everything that they thought they knew about the faith that had been thrust on them and…
A Course in Mystical Theology – Thirtieth Episode – From Mysticism to Moralism
Published on: 13 March, 2023
By: David Torkington
The new activity centred congregations founded in and after the sixteenth century were in such a hurry to get out into the fray that they were not fully equipped for the task ahead of them. They were over eager to win back the Church from the Protestant heresy, win for the Church new converts, evangelise …
A Course in Mystical Theology – Twenty Ninth Episode – Into the Sacred Heart
Published on: 25 February, 2023
By: David Torkington
Almost three hundred years after St Thomas defined contemplation, as used by the first apostles and other apostles who tried to emulate them, another definition of contemplation caused great confusion. True contemplation is a pure gift of God to which we respond in the simplest of prayers that express our current relationship with him. However,…
A Course in Mystical Theology – Twenty Eighth Episode – The Meaning of Mystical Contemplation
Published on: 12 February, 2023
By: David Torkington
After laxity begun to seep into the Church after Christianity had been made the official religion of the Roman Empire, it was to monasticism that the Church turned for help to renew itself. Although monks, particularly the Irish monks, did a great job to begin with, as the centuries rolled by they fell into decline….
A Course in Mystical Theology – Twenty Seventh Episode – Beginning the Journey
Published on: 3 February, 2023
By: David Torkington
Dean Swift, the author of Gulliver’s Travels said that we have just enough religion to make us hate, but not enough to make us love one another. It is for this reason that we must return to the sources of our religion to discover and steep ourselves in the love that was the heart and…