There is often a conflation of mysticism with Christianity and with the Bible, so that many believe that Christianity is mystical, or that the Bible speaks of mystical events. Is this the case? And what is mysticism anyway?
The reason this question is important is due to the surge of Contemplative Spirituality in the church over the last two decades, especially the last several years. The essence of Contemplative Spirituality is mysticism. With that in mind, I will be treating the terms Contemplatives and mystics as meaning the same thing since Contemplative Spirituality is derived from mysticism.
Defining Mysticism
It helps to first define what mysticism is, or at least get a sense of it, since there are many definitions. First of all, mysticism is not the same as mystery or mysterious. A mystery is something one has not yet figured out, but it contains knowable facts, whether one ever learns what they are or not. Mysticism is not about knowledge or facts; it is primarily about inner experiences as well as sensory experiences arising from that, usually spiritual in nature (it should be noted that there are views that there is a non-spiritual or Secular Mysticism which, obviously, is naturalist or secular in nature, but the discussion in this article specifically addresses what is called Christian mysticism)…….Read the rest of the article at Midwest Christian Outreach.
Image from Midwest Christian Outreach: “Two paths — choose wisely”
Short link to MCO article: https://tinyurl.com/uzsns9te