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THE RELIGIOUS DEPRESSION
great public catastrophe or a private excitement or grief there
is invariably a period of emotional paralysis or emptiness, wholly
natural, by which nature protects us from ourselves.
To experience this kind of emotional depletion is very painful.
It may arouse the most anxious questionings, doubts and fears;
and will often destroy, for the time being, all sense of religious
assurance. Some people seem to be so constituted that periods
of emotional exuberance and apathy succeed each other in a
more or less regular alternation. Sometimes the changes occur
quite abruptly, for no obvious reason; but the occurrence is
very common among people who engage in religious activities
in order to satisfy their desire for emotional excitement.
St. John of the Cross has described another type of religious
depression which he called ‘The Dark Night of the Soul’. It is
a state of spiritual drought when no happiness or consolation
can be found in prayer or meditation. A strange distaste for
eternal things is accompanied by strong feelings of personal
impotence and helplessness. There is no desire for spiritual
exercises. Secular studies can go on unhindered, and the
intellectual faculties are not impaired, but the devotional life is in
abeyance. The soul desires to turn to God, but it cannot feel his
nearness or rejoice in communion with him.
This state of mind must not be confused with spiritual
coolness or indifference, where there is no thirst or longing; nor is
it identical with melancholy. There is no general blunting of
emotional sensitivity, nor are there any special inhibitions to
explain the change of mood. The condition is not related to
ordinary tiredness nor has it any known physical occasion.
It is difficult to find natural causes for this state. Nevertheless,
as the old teachers of piety have observed, it is directly related to
the spiritual life. It often occurs after a course of strict exercises,
especially when a period of meditation has been rewarded by a
very strong sense of the Divine Presence. It may well be the
result of over-intense devotions, marking the transition from
one plane of spiritual experience to another. Many of the
Christian mystics agree that a movement to a higher realm of
spiritual awareness is accompanied by depression. The soul
enters a dark and silent place from which even God seems
absent. There is an acute sense of longing which may persist even
when illumination has occurred, so that the new clarity of
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