For a spiritual life is simply a life in which all that we do comes from the centre, [sic] where we are anchored in God: a life soaked through and through by a sense of His reality and claim, and self given to the great movement of His will"
(The Spiritual Life by Underhill, p.32)
Very few books do a great job at distilling "The Spiritual Life" into everyday language; Evelyn Underhill's "Spiritual Life" may very well be the best resource available on this topic. What makes Underhill qualified to speak on such a difficult topic? One of her greatest contributions to spirituality was a book called "Mysticism", a book she wrote after consulting numerous resources with the goal to discover the answer to the question, "What does it mean to be Holy?" Though originally not a believer in Christ while writing "Mysticism", she became highly familiar with those who spoke about and demonstrated the spiritual life. Later she ceased using the term "mysticism" and replaced it with the phrase "spiritual life", where upon conversion applied personal experience of what it meant to be holy. By 1936, at least twenty years later, Underhill set out to clarify the spiritual life giving four broadcasts on radio in England, thus compiling this book.
Influenced by the great spiritual formation pioneers she draws from the likes of St. Ignatius, St. John of the Cross, St. Francis, St. Catherine of Siena, St. Teresa of Avila and many more. Underhill desired to define and clarify what it meant to have a spiritual life. She does this with a series of three orientations of the soul: Adoration, Adherence or Communion, and Co-Operation. The first, Adoration, is an attitude of the soul. The spiritual life is hard pressed to find anything more pure than placing "delight in the splendour [sic] and beauty of God", because it delivers us from our self centeredness and it directs our hearts to the One for which all of life was made. This leads directly into Underhill's second focus, communion with or adherence to God. There certainly is an element of obedience to God, but Underhill points out that we were made for God and that He Himself invests and pours into His own creation. "Each human spirit is an unfinished product, on which the Creative Spirit is always at work." Our responsibility is responsiveness to God's action upon our souls. The third orientation is our Co-operation with God; "the Church is in the world to save the world". Part of our responsiveness is our generous love towards the world. The Spiritual life cannot develop if Christians sit idly as spectators while God daily and actively meets the world moment by moment. "We are transmitters not just receivers"; we are sufferers and lovers of others. This is the outpouring of a genuine spiritual life.
So what? Underhill gives the example from the Gospel's of the Publican and the Pharisee and what we find is polar opposite: one who possesses a spiritual life and one who has lost sight of it. The attitude of the Publican was that of recognizing the greatness of God while responding to the call of God's work upon his own soul. The Publican then would be the kind of man who could meet the world with generous love and the kind of charity that would co-operate perfectly with God at work in the world. The Pharisee was egotistic, proud of his own accomplishments and lacking in compassion toward others, and yet was deceived in that he thought he had a great spiritual life. Underhill helps us to reflect upon our own spiritual lives by reorienting our hearts back to what is most important to a healthy spiritual life, God Himself. I highly recommend that you not only have a copy of "The Spiritual LIfe" in your own library, but that you make it a point to read this book at minimum once a year. Take a moment and try to work through these questions for yourself:
1) What is the Spiritual life?
2) What elements need to be present for a healthy spiritual life?
3) Read Luke 18:9-14 (The Publican and the Pharisee) and spend time meditating on your own spiritual life. Are you more like the Publican or the Pharisee? Spend time journaling over this.
4) What does it mean to adore God?
5) What does it mean to "Be" with God, as opposed to "Wanting, Having or Doing"?