What is an underlying question that gives form
to your work or interest in this field?
To open the Divine Imagination in the individual and
in groups
What is your personal experience of collective
wisdom in groups?
My work is focused on evolving human consciousness through
large group spiritual activity. The centerpiece is the eleven-circuit
medieval labyrinth that was inlaid in the floor of Chartres Cathedral
in France in 1201 and neglected for the last 250 years. The backbone
is the integration of psyche and spirit through walking “the path”
in one’s own natural rhythm. The winding labyrinth path then becomes
a metaphor for the individual journey and the collective’s process.
We replicated the labyrinth form and placed it in Grace
Cathedral San Francisco, to be used as walking meditation for individuals
and groups. During our weekend conferences and workshops --- at home
and one the road --- about fifty people walk, dance, crawl etc., the
labyrinth as many times as they want. Through the use of ritual, music,
candlelight, lecture, small group discussions, clay, mandala drawing,
etc. I attempt to “wake up the old mind” (Margo Adler).
From this work, the inner world and the outer world become “wedded”
(Hildegard). The outer world begins to speak in metaphor and a spiritual
perspective is gained. The symbolic world is ignited and the Divine
Imagination opens.
What is it about the work in this field that excites
you and connects you to your own deepest self?
I cannot name all that is happening with the labyrinth.
However, I know that it is having a profound, yet invisible effect on
the transformation of human consciousness both in the individual and
the groups of people walking it together. The labyrinth--and Rupert
Sheldrake agrees with me on this--is a stabilized morphic field. Some
one may enter in grief, and find solace. Another may walk in with a
question and find guidance. There is something sacred about the eleven-circuit
labyrinth that heals and helps people realize their deepest longing
and clearest intentions.
Please provide a brief storyline or written snapshoot of what
brought you to this work.
I have always been interested in the integration of psyche
and spirit. I am fascinated as to how people, myself included, change
their behavior, attitudes and values. After studying religious education
at Princeton Theological Seminary, I eventually found my way to the
Blanton-Peale Graduate Institute in New York to train as a Pastoral
Counselor and Marriage and Family Therapist. I maintained a private
psychotherapeutic practice, supervised young therapists and was adjunct
faculty in the Spiritual Direction Center at General Theological Seminary.
Sensing my work needed to evolve, I worked with Jean Houston in her
Mystey School in 1985. In 1986, I was asked to serve a Canon Pastor
at Grace Cathedral in San Francisco. Through a generous grant from Laurance
S. Rockefeller, I set up a center called Quest, Grace Cathedral Center
for Spiritual Wholeness. This programming was shaped around the four
tenets to encourag psycho-spiritual growth: Creativity as A Spiritual
Path, Balancing the Masculine and Feminine Principles, The Marriage
of East and West, and the Rediscovery of the Mystical Tradition. These
programs eventaully led me to the rediscovery of the labyrinth in 1991
when I returned to the Mystery School for one weekend.
The labyrinth is a magnet for spiritual seekers from
all walks of life. We reproduced it on canvas, introduced it at Grace
Catheddral twice a month and began traveling with it to introduce it
to others. I have been working with Chartres Cathedral in France since
1995 through designing a program called Let Us Walk with Mary, which
helps 300 participants to open to the Sacred Feminine.
In 1995 I set up Veriditas, the World-Wode Labyrinth
Project, a 501(c)3 not-for-profit to support to encourage labyrinths
to be placed in hospitals, churches, schools, spiritual centers, prisons,
parks, play grounds, retirement centers, hotels and memorial parks.
A second part of the mission is to teach its use as a spiritual tool.
My work has developed intuitively over the years. Walking
the labyrinth is a spiritual exercise. My approach is to offer the labyrinth
as a free and save space for personal exploration. There is no right
way to walk a labyrinth. Using this guideline, the walker’s inner
world becomes transparent to them. Dynamics not ordinarily recognized
---one’s relatioinship to rules, projections of judgment, impatience
--- become crystallized into metaphor. The labyrinth is a place where
the mind empties and one discovers interior silence. The path of the
labyrinth becomes a metaphor for our spiritual lives. It is a safe container
with clear boundaries.
I work quite a bit in the archetypal space of Cathedrals,
so I use that setting, with candle light, rose petals and music to enhance
mystery and beauty, for which many of us hunger. Walking the labyrinth
is a profound meditation that differs each time one walks it.
Through walking the labyrinth, I teach a process that
opens the Divine Imagination. This is based on family systems theory;
psychdynamic group work based on the English school of object-relation
theory. The work of symbolic fields has a Jungian base, since I am working
with archetypes, symbol, shadow and encounters with collective unconscious.
Transpersonal theory and methods of change is also woven into my lectures
and the designing of each event.
