An article from "CentreCOMM", May 1997 ...

The Modern Apostle
by Rev Richard Hall

Richard is a consulting psychologist and a staff member at the Australian College of Psychodrama. He was ordained into the Priesthood according to the Order of Melchizedek in 1996. This article is taken from an interview in which he spoke of the priestly role and his experience of the working of the Holy Spirit in his life and work. 

Personality, Spirit and the Therapist

In therapy, and in any area where we are working with human souls, there is an important distinction that must be made between spirit and personality. Since ordination that distinction has become very clear to me. Before we can even begin to do work that involves spirit we must first know what our own personality is like with both its progressive and problematic aspects. It is only with self knowledge that we can work towards development of our progressive uniqueness so that we become individuals who can stand alone and be a light in the darkness, and therefore be effective in the world. For example, Winston Churchill knew his own personality and the difficulties he had with depression, yet that didn’t stop him showing leadership and vision during the second world war. He was a voice in the wilderness and was able to perceive the dangers of the evil forces amassing in Europe in the 1930s.

I still have the same characteristics and difficulties in my personality that I’ve always had, yet I know my spirit can and must be active regardless. Over quite a long period of time I’ve developed myself and dealt with the skew within my personality. It meant that I’ve had to practise my thinking to be able to make a true assessment of myself. If you can do this you know your ability but you also know your developing aspects and your Achilles' heel. It means that what you present to others is what you are, so the inner and outer are the same and not in conflict. If I have this kind of self knowledge, then as a therapist I can more readily develop the potentials and abilities of my clients so that they are more in touch with their essence and consequently develop all the progressive aspects of themselves.

Then spirit can also begin to work. I have found this happening in surprising ways. If the people I work with come to me with a particular purpose, whether it has to do with grieving or a difficulty in their relationship, it has struck me lately that in the context of actually doing that work they experience spirit, despite myself. This presence was there before, but it is actually growing. I can feel it growing in me. I think that presence has power and I trust it. And by trusting it coaches me into new and unknown areas.

I was dealing with someone recently and the thought came to me that they were not connected up with their soul. I had to trust that idea and recognise that this actually was the work they had to do. Trust is earned; it doesn’t just happen by saying to someone, “Trust me.” So we talked about whatever they wanted to talk about, but the reality was that they were experiencing us together - with that extra presence. 

Into the Unknown

When you work this way you are in a here and now situation, and to me this is always the most exciting sort of work, because you don’t know what is going to happen. You throw yourself into the unknown and the person you are working with is in the unknown too. I experience this as letting the spirit work. I do the work through means of my personality but I also have a sense of this other aspect with me. It is a picture of having Christ with me, and it is a reassuring thing.

In therapy there are many opportunities for the spirit to become active because you work with the unconscious. In the psychodramatic process in particular, because it works through action, we are dealing with the unconscious processes to a greater degree than if we were, say, just talking. In talking the conscious mind may filter out certain things, but action stems directly from the deep unconscious level of the will.

In one of my recent psychodrama groups, a good deal of intimacy was achieved within the group, and I thought that it would be good for the last session to get each person to give a gift to the others in the group. I asked them to find a strength of their own, to intuitively be with the other person and give them that quality as a gift for their further development. They gave things like “endurance” or a “ticket” to go and walk in the bush or an invitation to the movies. It was quite lovely. I had a sense that one person needed the laying on of hands, so when the opportunity arose we all laid our hands on her. While I did this I was able to be still and trust. An image emerged in my mind. It was of a seed being implanted within her heart, a seed of life and light. It didn’t come from me, but from a deeper level in her. I would say it was her spirit.

Knowledge and the Imbuing of Spiritual Power

To do work of any value I think the therapist has to have sound knowledge. Without knowledge I don't think anyone can even begin to come to the door of perception, the door of enlightenment. But more is needed. I recently went to the first World Congress of Psychotherapy. In the middle of the opening ceremony a group of shamans from somewhere in Asia came on to the stage. They had great presence and you could see that they were perceptive and wise. The shamans ran some healing sessions and to my horror some of the therapists ran to them to be healed. When a real healer comes along people recognise it. They recognise when someone has power. The psychologists had been trained in their particular school, but the shamans had power, and the therapists ran to them because there was something lacking in their own being.

So knowledge is required and then the imbuing of spirit, the imbuing of power. This is the grace that is given at ordination. There are many ministers who become disillusioned and turn to psychology to find the answers. At The Centre we have people who are firstly psychologists or other professionals who have then come to the real healing power of esoteric teachings. In this way the knowledge of the craft and your own self knowledge and beingness is imbued with a deeper knowledge of a spiritual nature. It is not facts or a technique; it is a deeper sense of your own beingness. All any psychological method does is bring out what is within a person anyway. But healing is the ability to work from a spiritual perspective, to uplift and transform the soul.

If a person has developmental delays in this lifetime for whatever reason, and experiences that they have to go through, they can overcome these difficulties and then go on and fulfil their purpose if they come to experience the working of spirit. The knowledge of the spirit to me is very exciting. Knowledge stays dead unless you bring spirit into it and work actively with spirit.

If something comes to me I must trust and use it. It is the working of something greater than myself even though I may have a significant understanding of the sociometry of a situation. You have to trust - trust your training and also trust that good can come of whatever situation you are in. If I am asked for the sacrament of grace, then I give it, but there are other times where I have taken the initiative to do this. I also use the context of the gospels to work with people if they have that kind of background. My training says that as the leader I am the most spontaneous person there. If I start narrowing down, or getting anxious or afraid, I have to not give up but get up and keep going into the new. For spirit does not allow you to keep your old identity.

Spirit gives you the power to be an apostle. I remember in a school I where I was working I was the lowest of the low in the authority structure, but I had the ability to see what needed to happen and to push something in the right way. The Holy Spirit doesn’t think in terms of power over others; it gives you the ability to perceive. Spiritual perception is a result of knowledge being applied in relationship with the Christ spirit.

Seek for the Motivating Force

I would like to tell you something I recently learned in a group supervision session. Freud coined the phrase repetition compulsion, where a person repeats the same old script in the coping and dysfunctional categories of personality. You could say that such a person is like an echidna*, curled up tight, cutting off the outside. But within that person there is a light, a “motivating force”. This is what Freud forgot. There is always a motivating force in every human being. The curled up echidna has life within her. If a psychologist goes into a room and sees someone hiding under the table they may then label them. I would go under the table and sit with them. We all need to get together with someone who can perceive our motivating force, when we are like the echidna. Then we can sit together spirit with spirit.

An apostle must have a large vision, reaching beyond the parameters of their own personality, a world vision. A modern apostle is someone who is imbued with a presence that people are drawn to and that’s the spirit of Christ. That is the gift of the Holy Ones. You can work for it but you can’t acquire it. When the time is right it will be given to those who are called.

*An echidna is a small, Australian marsupial with a spiny coat