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Entering the Castle: An Inner Path to God and Your Soul by Caroline Myss 356 pp. Simon and Schuster, Inc., 2008 By Father Gregory Houck, O.Carm. The word that kept coming to mind while reading Entering the Castle was ‘indicting.’ That may seem a strange word, but Caroline Myss, the author, says in the introduction, “I LNTCR INC CASTLE An Inner Path to God and your soul Caroline My'ss want to burst through your ideas and preconceptions about spirituality and intuition and enter into a deeper, more authentic experience of God.” That is quite a goal, but she suceeds masterfully, weaving her own story with Saint Teresa of Avila’s The Interior Castle. In doing this, Caroline Myss writes about all the ‘mind games’ we play with God, with others and with ourselves, so that we keep the upper hand—even with God. This is where I found the book ‘indicting’ because I would put down the book down after reading some sections and say to myself, “wow, she’s describing me.” Indicting. This book is not meant for a quick reading, though. Each chapter offers a lot to reflect about and the deeper one goes into the book, the deeper and longer you will have to ponder your own journey, and your own indictments. The book begins with a long introduction which offers a short biography of Saint Teresa and then provides a ‘short course’ (from A to Z) of Christian spirituality. The introduction may well be worth a few re-readings. If you are familiar with Teresa’s Interior Castle you will know that Teresa describes the spiritual journey as a journey through seven mansions that make up the castle of oneself. Each mansion is more and more interior. Caroline Myss follows the same format but she is not writing a biography of Teresa of Avila (although Teresa enters in a lot); rather, she is writing her own spiritual autobiography. And because she is writing in the 21st century, as she journeys through the mansions she brings in plenty of pyschology and plenty of modern idioms and metaphors that we quickly understand. Caroline also references lots of spiritual writers and spiritual maxims as she goes to show the universality of each mansion in the human journey. Caroline does not just ‘indict’ the reader with our resistances, our own ‘mind games,’ and our own self-righteousnesses; she also provides lots of prayer-exercises and spiritual exercises to help the reader interiorize and grow past them, so as to enter the next mansion. Lots to think about. Some commentators consider The Interior Castle Teresa of Avila’s magnum opus. Caroline Myss is a well-published author and lecturer, but I cannot imagine how she can write another book of this depth and power. This may be her own magnum opus.
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