BOOKS

Books are available at the linked sites

Contemplative: Autobiography of the Early Years

Now available in paper-back on Amazon, published by Contemplative Christians. Also available as a Kindle book. 

  

An excerpt from the introduction to the book:  "This book is an account of my spiritual journey from birth to seventeen. Since my book The Path to No-Self, begins at age seventeen, the present book covers the earlier years and my initial steps in the contemplative path. The purpose of this writing is both to give this background and give witness to God’s work in a single soul. Since God is at work in every soul, it is up to each of us to give our own account, no one else can do this for us."

The Christian Contemplative Journey: Essays on the Path

Now available in paper-back and Kindle format on Amazon, published by Contemplative Christians.

To order go to contemplativechristians.com
Essays include: The Spiritual Journey Recapitulates the History of Religion ○ Cessation of Self  ○  Nonduality ○ Mystical Theology and No-Self ○ Image and Likeness ○ Apatheia ○ Means-End ○ The Ox Herding Pictures ○ The Eucharist, A Christian Path ○ "What is Self?" - a Research Paper ○ Christ as the Definition of "Non-duality"

This book is also available in Kindle format: Essays on the Path - Kindle

The Real Christ

Bernadette has requested that no one order this book until they have read the warning below.

Contemplative Christians, 516 pages

The Real Christ also available in Kindle format,
 Link to Kindle version: The Real Christ

 

"The Real Christ is simply the E=MC of theology, unfolding the deepest mysteries of the Trinity with profound clarity. This is a must read book for anyone who has struggled with remaining a Christian or grown frustrated with the banality of what seems to be the “Jesus Industry” of corporate Christianity. Please prayerfully and slowly read The Real Christ. It is full of some of the most liberating and transforming ideas currently available to humankind. It is what Christianity was meant to be and, quite truthfully, must still become. We are urged to take up and read, and consider again the complete superstructure that is Christianity so to really discover and really become Christ."  Rev. Peter Haas

WARNING 

Those who believe the man Jesus who walked this earth 2000 years ago was God, should read no further. Since I hold no human being is God, those who disagree will only find this book upsetting and disagreeable. This writing is not for those convinced they have the last word on Christ, but those searching for the real Christ. While I believe all Christians have the right Faith, I do not think all Christians have the right beliefs, right understanding or right view of Christ. Given all the Jesus-talk these days, Christianity comes across as a personality cult, the worship of a human being, which has nothing to do with Christ, it even turns people away. The reason for this writing is my perception that the real Christ has been all but lost to Christianity.

Of first importance is to define the major terms used in this book, namely “Logos”, “Christ”, and “Jesus”. Those who think these terms are interchangeable, synonymous, or refer to the same Reality, will never understand a thing in this book. Indiscriminate use of these terms has already thrown people off track, thus it is of the utmost importance to define these terms from the outset. Those who disagree with these definitions will only become addled or irate and should read no further.

Because God is not a being, but Infinite Existence, we must be careful not to anthropomorphize God’s Triune essence or Trinity as three beings or three entities – three gods, in other words. Also, because God transcends all gender, we have to be careful not to get caught up in the metaphors used for the Trinity as “Father and Son”. Since God is neither mother, father, son or daughter, these metaphors must not be taken literally or understood as God ad intra (God-in-Itself). To avoid this pitfall, this book refers to God’s Triune essence as “Transcendent-Logos-Spirit”.

The Incarnation was God creating Its own human nature - i.e., man's one universal human nature - eternally one with Itself. It is the oneness of God’s divine nature and man’s universal human nature that we know and call “Christ”. The term, word, or title “Christ” is not the name of any human being, but refers solely to God’s eternal oneness with Man. The Incarnation was not God uniting Itself to any particular human being or person. Christ is not the oneness of two persons, two individuals or two beings, nor is Christ a divine being or a human being, rather, Christ is the eternal oneness of two natures, divine and human. Thus the Incarnation was the revelation of Man (Universal Man) and God’s Plan for all mankind, and this Truth, this revelation, is everything we know and call “Christ”.

The purpose of the Incarnation was not to reveal the man Jesus – give us another god for the pantheon – but to reveal Man, and God’s eternal plan for his eternal oneness with God. Prior to the Incarnation, Christ did not exist, nor did the man Jesus exist, only the divine Logos, God, eternally existed. Thus neither as a human being or a human person was the man Jesus divine, or even Christ. It is solely the oneness of God with Its own human nature that is Christ, and it is this mystery of God’s indivisible oneness with the essence of mankind we call the “Real Christ”.

Since there is only one common human nature, not many different kinds, or particular human natures, one can count heads, but not human natures. As the “instrument” for revealing Christ, the singular man born into this world was given the common Jewish name “Jesus”. It was not his individual person or particular human nature, however, that was Christ, rather, Christ is solely God’s own human nature and not the human nature of any particular human being or person. So where the term “Christ” is a reference to the indivisible oneness of two natures, the name “Jesus” is solely a reference to a particular human being or person.

This book permits no anthropomorphic view of God, the Trinity, or Christ. Reference to the man Jesus is always to a particular human being and never to God. “Jesus” is the particular man of the Gospels, the historical person no longer with us. With his resurrection and ascension his human nature was totally changed, transfigured and glorified, thus he no longer is the historical figure of the past, but remains the example or icon of everyman’s journey and eternal oneness with God. We must never, then, mix our terms – the Logos is solely God, Jesus was solely a distinct human person, and Christ, the eternal oneness of God and man.

Those who disagree with these definitions should read no further, it would only confuse and upset them. Also, it would be useless to argue any of this since I’ve done my homework, am aware of all opposing views, and regard them as misconceived or wrong. Given the same Christian background and history as those who object, I already know where they are coming from, it is they, however, who do not know where I am coming from, and therein lies the difference.

Bernadette Roberts

The Experience of No-Self: A Contemplative Journey

Bernadette Roberts

State University of New York Press, Revised Edition (1993), 212 pages

(NOTE: E-book format available through Goodreads, A Google Site.)

Excerpts from the introduction to the book by Bernadette Roberts

"Within the traditional framework, the Christian notion of loss-of-self is generally regarded as the transformation or loss of the ego (lower self) as it attains to the higher or true self in its union with God. Thus, because self at its deepest center is a run-on with the divine, I had never found any true self apart from God, for to find the One is to find the other..."
"Because this was the limit of my expectations, I was all the more surprised and bewildered when many years later I came upon a permanent state in which there was no self, no higher self, true self, or anything that could be called a self. Clearly, I had fallen outside my own, as well as the traditional frame of reference, when I came upon a path that seemed to begin where the writers on the contemplative life had left off. But with the clear certitude of the self's disappearance, there automatically arose the question of what had fallen away--what was the self? What, exactly, had it been? Then too, there was the all-important question: what remained in its absence? This journey was the gradual revelation of the answers to these questions, answers that had to be derived solely from personal experience since no outside explanation was forthcoming..."

 

The Path to No-Self: Life at the Center

Bernadette Roberts
State University of New York Press, New Edition (1991), 236 pages

(NOTE: Currently out of print, available at used bookstores such as Thrift Books, and ABE Books. No e-book format available.)

 From the back jacket commentary by Father Thomas Keating.

"In our major religious traditions, the outstanding milestone in the spiritual journey is the permanent, irreversible transcendence of the self center or ego. The fact that a great deal has been written about the journey to this point means that many people have come this far. But what, we might ask, comes next? Looking ahead we see no path; even in the literature there seems to be nothing beyond an abiding awareness of oneness with God. Had this path been mapped in the literature, then at least we would have known that one existed; but where no such account exists, we assume there is no path and that union of self and God is the final goal to be achieved.

The main purpose of The Path to No-Self is to correct this assumption. It verifies that a path beyond union does indeed exist, that the eventual falling away of the unitive state happens as the culmination of a long experiential journey beyond the state. The author shows that a path exists between the transcendence of the ego (self-center), which begins the unitive state, and the later falling away of all self (the true self), which ends the unitive state."

 What is Self?  A Study of the Spiritual Journey in Terms of Consciousness 

Bernadette Roberts

Sentient Publications (2005),  208 pages 

 

 On one level, this book is a book for practitioners of higher levels of consciousness. At another level, it is for the general reader to understand the nature of consciousness. The author speaks about the subtleties of life in God as a Christian Catholic contemplative. The book is quite technical in that it is detailed for practitioners from all traditions to compare notes as opposed to an inspirational/motivational book. Readers will appreciate her precise, clear, and observant way.