During Lent, St. John’s faith community is invited to journey into Owning Your Own Shadow: Understanding the Dark Side of the Psyche by acclaimed Jungian analyst and best-selling author Robert A. Johnson. This classic text provides powerful and accessible wisdom for “turning back” to our whole, true self during this Holy Season of “Metanoia.” Johnson writes, “To own one’s own shadow is to reach a holy place – an inner center – not attainable in any other way. To fail this is to fail one’s own sainthood and to miss the purpose of life.”
During my Curacy at St. John the Baptist Episcopal Church in Minneapolis, I had the privilege of studying this book at the invitation of the Rev. Susan J. Barnes: the Rector supervising my internships first as a transitional deacon and then as a curate. As a Priest in my first year of ministry I came to appreciate the importance of doing the essential “inner work” of owning my shadow as a daily spiritual discipline in order to cultivate resilience, authenticity, and wholeness as servant leader. I am continually challenged and inspired by Johnson’s invitation to people of faith, who together, “must restore the word religious to its true meaning; then it will regain its healing power. To heal, to bond, to join, to bridge, to put back together again — these are our sacred faculties.”
Members of St. John’s Men’s Group studied and discussed this book during their annual retreat in February, and St. John’s Thursday Book Group studied and discussed it in January and February. Here are some reflections on Owning Your Own Shadow from members of our Thursday Book Group:
Robert Johnson says that unless we own our shadow (and do conscious work on it), we will lay our shadow on others. Throughout history, human beings have “projected” their darkness onto other groups. (Given the current divide in our country) I now see this problem in technicolor. Ahh!!! And I see the opportunity of digging for the “gold.” The Thursday Book Group is a place to be vulnerable, to share our experiences, to see something new and transformative – and perhaps, just perhaps, gain the courage to take action in an area that was previously hidden from our view. —Jill Thompson
In the second half of life. I find myself feeling incomplete. The construct of the shadow gives me a framework with which to seek completeness. Transforming conflict into paradox points a way forward. The religious experience is a way past the conflict rationality has trapped me in, letting me dwell in paradox to see a path forward.
—Dan Vogel
The mandorla, the space created when two circles overlap, is a powerful visual construct of healing in a world torn apart. This is a space of reconciliation and hope that will help me in moving forward to keep “the painful contradictions of life at bay.” I had not heard of this concept before. It will stay with me.
—Diane Wallace-Reid
Dave Borton shared the following prayer, whose author is anonymous, with our Book Group in response to the wisdom disclosed in Robert Johnson’s book. Perhaps, as a community of faith, we could each offer this prayer in our daily devotions during the Holy Season of Lent.
Lord, enlighten what is dark in me,
Strengthen what is weak in me,
Mend what is broken in me,
Heal what is bruised in me,
Revive whatever peace and love has died in me,
that in this journey through time and space
I may bring your healing and love to others. Amen.
-The Rev. Craig Lemming
Originally published in the March-April 2019 Evangelist.
