Written for The Letters of Paul and the New Evangelization (STL 977) under Dr. Peter Williamson, 19 August 2020, for the Licentiate in Sacred Theology.
Introduction
The fundamental idea is that Seminaries should form missionary disciples who are ‘in love’ with the Master, shepherds ‘with the smell of the sheep’, who live in their midst to bring the mercy of God to them. Hence every priest should always feel that he is a disciple on a journey, constantly needing an integrated formation, understood as a continuous configuration to Christ.
This description of the formation that should take place in Seminaries is rooted in the formation that should take place in all disciples of Christ. The call to ”continuous configuration to Christ” is fulfilled in the interior life of the disciple, bringing about the desired conclusion that can be expressed in the words of St. Paul, “It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me” (Gal 2:20 RSV). Such configuration follows the patterns of fatherhood and motherhood. A father begets a new life in the womb of a mother. The mother suffers to give birth to that new life and then continues to nurse her child, often with the help of others. Likewise, the father forms his child by exemplifying virtue, correcting vice, providing nourishment, teaching knowledge, guiding decisions and encouraging growth.
In speaking of the spiritual formation of Christians, St. Paul uses both paternal and maternal images towards his disciples as he assists them in their configuration to Christ. He speaks of begetting them through preaching the Gospel (1 Cor 4:15), suffering to give birth to Christ in them (Gal 4:19), nursing them with gentle care and affectionate desire (1 Thes 2:7-8) and exhorting, encouraging and charging them ”like a father with his children“ (1 Thes 2:11). St. Paul carried out this ministry with help from others (paidagōgos), but he claimed for himself a unique role (fatherhood) in the lives of his disciples (1 Cor 4:15). When applying the example of St. Paul to discipleship formation today, one clear analogue can be found in the unique role that a spiritual director is called to play in the life of a disciple.
In this paper we will examine the methodology of spiritual formation found in the letters of St. Paul, particularly as he describes his approach through paternal and maternal images in 1 Cor 4:14-16, Gal 4:19, and 1 Thes 2:7-12. We will then explore the theological significance of this approach for discipleship formation and apply it to the ministry of spiritual direction as it is understood in the Church’s standards for seminary formation and explained in a recent text co-authored by Fr. Tom Acklin and Fr. Boniface Hicks called Spiritual Direction: A Guide for Sharing the Father’s Love.
Biblical Exegesis
In his letters, St. Paul applies the term “father” (pater) to himself only two times (1 Cor 4:14-16 and 1 Thes 2:11-12). In one more passage he speaks about spiritual generation (Gal 4:19). Although we could consider other passages, such as 1 Tim 1:2 in which St. Paul refers to Timothy as “my true child in the faith” or Eph 3:15 in which the word patria is used, we focus our attention on these three pericopes as a significant representation of St. Paul’s teaching on spiritual formation as a spiritual father (or mother).
Galatians 4:19
In Gal 4:19, St. Paul writes: “My little children, with whom I am again in travail until Christ be formed in you!” St. Paul uses a maternal image here for describing the process of forming Christ in the disciples’ souls through the Apostle’s birth pangs (ōdinō). This verse stands out in the midst of the fuller passage Gal 4:12-20 with the surprising use of this maternal expression in the first half of the verse. Additionally, there is a twist in the second half of the verse in that St. Paul is not giving birth to the Galatians themselves, but to Christ who is being formed in them. This is a critical insight for the rest of our study, because St. Paul is expressing clearly how his work in spiritual formation applies to the Galatians to form Christ in them. Suprisingly, despite its provocative imagery, it has been studied sparsely in the scholarly literature according to Beverly Gaventa. We will examine these two points more closely—the word for birth pangs and the formation of Christ.
The word ōdinō specifically applies to the suffering of a woman as she is giving birth. Used in the plural, it only appears in St. Paul here and in Gal 4:27 quoting Is 54:1. It is found elsewhere in the New Testament in apocalyptic passages such as Rev 12:2, and Mk 13:8 (par. Mt 24:8). Together these other references flesh out the connotation of this term and help us see its importance for the second part of the verse. St. Paul is using apocalyptic language to describe his care for the Corinthian community. His suffering for them is not incidental or temporary, but apocalyptic, long-lasting and powerful. He suffers like a woman in labor and he finds joy in that suffering because of the effects that it has in his Corinthian disciples.
Those effects are described in the second half of the verse with an unexpected application: “until Christ be formed in you” (Gal 4:19b). It is unexpected in that although St. Paul is suffering birth pangs with the Galatians, it is not they who are being born but rather Christ is being formed in them. St. Paul uses the verb morphoun here, a hapax legoumenon in the New Testament. The related verb metamorphousthai meaning “transformation” is used in 2 Cor 3:18 and Rom 12:2 to describe the transformation of believers into the Lord and through the ”renewal of their minds,” respectively. Another related verb summorphousthai is used by St. Paul in his letter to the Philippians to describe being conformed to the death of Christ (Phil 3:10). We will explore this point further in the next section as we look more closely at the work of a spiritual formator or spiritual director whose goal is the formation of Christ in his or her disciples.
We also note that another maternal image is used to describe the kind of nurturing work that St. Paul carries out in 1 Thes 2:7: “we were gentle among you, like a nurse (trophos) taking care of her children.” This ongoing, gentle, maternal care for the disciples complements the kind of maternal suffering that Paul undergoes in order to foster in his disciples the formation of Christ.
1 Cor 4:14-16
St. Paul described his ministry in paternal terms when appealing to the Corinthian community, “I do not write this to make you ashamed, but to admonish you as my beloved children. For though you have countless guides in Christ, you do not have many fathers. For I became your father in Christ Jesus through the gospel. I urge you, then, be imitators of me” (1 Cor 4:14-16). Here St. Paul contrasted his role as pater with the work of a paidagōgos. To understand this image more fully we must explore the role of the paidagōgos in Paul’s time.
Paidagōgos can be translated as ”child’s attendant,“ ”disciplinarian,“ or “supervisor” according to EDNT or “guardian” according to the Dictionary of Biblical Languages with Semantic Domains: Greek, while the RSV translates it as “guide.” Overall, in Paul’s time, the paidagōgos did not have a great reputation. In a very insightful article, Norman Young thoroughly analyzed the role of the pedagogue in the extra-biblical, contemporaneous Greek and Roman literature. He noted that the pedagogue was often an older man, hired for a preventive, protective role. This role was often carried out with blows, shaming and other harsher forms of correction. The pedagogue was also a moral guide to be obeyed to assist with virtue, although he could not be counted on to demonstrate that virtue by example. The pedagogue was often a constant companion, but more likely to issue correction than to provide compassion. “The Emperor Julian blamed his pedagogue for his own morose character….Philo indicated that the appropriate behavior when a pedagogue approached was to look downcast and not to smile.”
In this passage, St. Paul clearly sets apart his unique role as father from the multitude of pedadgogues who had helped to guide the Corinthians. “According to St Paul, the ministry of spiritual fatherhood surpasses any, spiritual or otherwise, authority in the Church.” Furthermore, although St. Paul does not specifically elaborate it here when he contrasts himself with the Corinthians’ many pedagogues, we can certainly draw some contrasts between the loving fatherly role he identifies with and the harsher treatment of the pedagogue found in the contemporaneous literature. Even when he indicates that he must admonish the Corinthians (1 Cor 14:14) he still refers to them as his ”beloved children” and he contrasts his fatherly admonishment with the role of pedagogues. The pedagogues, as we can see from Young’s study, were known to be more rough and unsavory in disciplining their charges. A father’s admonishment is accompanied with tears (Acts 20:31).
1 Thes 2:11-12
In our last passage, St. Paul again describes himself as a father towards his disciples and indicates the fatherly way that he helps them grow and to what end: “you know how, like a father with his children, we exhorted each one of you and encouraged you and charged you to walk in a manner worthy of God, who calls you into his own kingdom and glory.” Drawing from medieval commentaries on this passage, Mayerhofer concludes, “Pauline fatherhood has only one aim: to strengthen the faith of the faithful and to protect them from apostasy, so that they may live in a Christian manner worthy of their calling (cf. 1 Th 2:11–12a; Gal 4:19).” The verbs St. Paul uses in this passage are rich in their meaning: exhorted (parakaleō), encouraged (paramytheomai), and charged (martyromai). In parakaleō we recognize the kind of comfort or encouragement (paraklēsis) that St. Paul offered to the Corinthians through his own afflictions (cf. 2 Cor 1:3-7). He reinforced the call to be tender by using the verb paramytheomai which is also used twice (Jn 11:19, 31) to describe the way the Jews comforted Mary and Martha on the loss of their brother, as well as again by St. Paul to speak of how the Thessalonians should care for the faint-hearted (1 Thes 5:14).
Paul’s use of the verb martyromai indicates the importance of personal witness. This is another important theme for Pauline spiritual formation. St. Paul does not hesitate to invite his disciples to imitate him. He does that in five different passages: 1 Thes 1:5-7, 1 Cor 4:16, 1 Cor 11:1, Phil 3:17, and Phil 4:9 covering a variety of roles (parent, teacher, and leader) as Victor Copan insightfully explores. The call to imitation is an observation that ethos is critical for spiritual formation, instead of merely logos and pathos. The spiritual father must give an example that can be imitated.
Theological Significance and Application to Spiritual Direction
One of the principal roles in spiritual formation is that of the spiritual director. The standard for seminary formation states, “Spiritual direction is a privileged means for the integral growth of the person,” and insists that the very minimum staffing for every seminary must therefore include both a Rector and a Spiritual Director. Furthermore, it summarizes the spiritual journey in this way:
This is a transformative journey that involves the whole community. Through the specific role of the formators and, in a special way, the Spiritual Director, a pedagogical itinerary is proposed, which sustains the candidate in the process of growth, helping him to become aware of his own poverty and, at the same time, of his need for the grace of God and fraternal correction.
Although we quote from the standard for seminary formation, these passages, like the passage at the beginning of this article, apply universally to discipleship formation.
In the scriptures we have been exploring from St. Paul on spiritual formation we see three themes that emerge for the one who would spiritually form disciples, namely the importance of love to the point of suffering, the importance of communicating truth, and the importance of giving a Christ-like witness that should be imitated. In this section, we briefly explore each of these themes, building on the exegesis in the previous section on the scripture passages from Gal 4:19, 1 Cor 4:14-16 and 1 Thes 2:7-12. Then we apply each of these themes to the ministry of Spiritual Direction by comparing and contrasting them with the approach to spiritual direction described by Acklin and Hicks in their book Spiritual Direction: A Guide for Sharing the Father’s Love. We will see that we have some important lessons to learn from St. Paul about this important ministry for the New Evangelization.
Birth pangs
Suffering is required that Christ may come to birth (Gal 4:19) and ongoing self-giving, like a nursing mother, feeds the disciples as Christ is being formed in them (1 Thes 2:7). The suffering that allows Christ to be formed in spiritual children works at several levels. First it is a witness of Christ’s love. Paul told the Galatians about his birth pangs (Gal 4:19) after he had already written about being crucified with Christ and that his life was no longer his own but was fully the life of Christ within him (Gal 2:20). Second, there is a mystical way that affliction produces consolation (2 Cor 1:3-7) and that suffering builds up the Body of Christ (Col 1:24). Third, there is an apocalyptic and universal quality to it that is united with Mary and the Church bringing forth disciples through labor pains (Rev 12:2). Fourth, it is a proof of the spiritual father’s own love that, like Christ’s love, will never stop until the Lord is fully formed in the life of the disciple. St. Paul’s use of this maternal image holds rich connotations for the spiritual formator.
The first characteristic we learn from St. Paul about spiritual formation, then, is not an action so much as an attitude. It is the love which fills the heart of the spiritual father that creates a womb-like space in which the disciple can be formed, even at the cost of the father’s great suffering. The spiritual father takes on an ontological relationship with the disciple before he can take on a functional one.
In the book on Spiritual Direction, we see that there is a suffering the Spiritual Director must undergo in the way he receives, listens to, and loves his spiritual directees:
[T]he quality of the spiritual director’s listening must … be vulnerable. The director’s loving attention and reverence for the interior of the directee must be such that the directee feels truly heard and loved. This will only happen from a posture of vulnerability and genuine compassion, to the point that the director allows his heart to be moved, even pierced, by the vulnerable sharing of the directee. Vulnerability elicits vulnerability.
Likewise, when describing listening, Acklin and Hicks explain the importance and value of feeling poor and simply entrusting the directee to God. There is a kind of birth pang in this process that gives birth to Christ in a mysterious way as the director remains present in his poverty and offers the directee to the Lord: “In the feelings of uselessness and helplessness, the spiritual director must learn to remain poor and united with the poor, crucified Christ, praying and entrusting the directee and his struggles to the mercy of God.”
While there is a strong resonance between St. Paul’s teaching and this book on Spiritual Direction, there is also a deeper insight that emerges when considering the mystical dimension of suffering and the way that suffering witnesses God’s love and expresses the director’s love for the disciple. As we can see in St. Paul, suffering is not simply a regular, unfortunate side-effect of spiritual direction but is rather part and parcel of forming Christ in souls and as such should be actively embraced by spiritual directors.
Communicating
St. Paul notes that he begot the Corinthians through the Gospel (1 Cor 4:15). Presumably he is referring to his preaching and teaching here. The preacher sows the seed of the Gospel, and in a fatherly way he begets life outside of himself as his hearers take the word to heart. Then the spiritual father must intentionally care for that new life through several concrete actions. With gentleness, he admonishes, exhorts, and encourages his disciples to live in a many worthy of the call they have received to enter God’s own kingdom and glory (1 Thes 2:11-12). He does not act like a hired slave (paidagōgos), but rather like a loving father. His communication to his spiritual child must be tailored to the particular weaknesses and strengths he comes to know through loving listening and careful observation. His admonitions are intended to promote growth with a clear goal that the disciple would become more worthy of the kingdom. That does not happen merely through hard work, but rather is only possible because of divine grace. In other words, the spiritual father lovingly nurtures the seeds of divine grace that make the disciple more fit for the kingdom and able to be clothed with divine glory.
We intentionally consider the role of communicating in ongoing spiritual formation after the role of listening and suffering. Apart from the earliest stage of begetting that takes place through the initiative of preaching the Gospel (1 Cor 4:15), the subsequent discipleship formation leans heavily on suffering, patience, and listening in accompaniment as described above. After listening long enough to truly understand, suffer with, and love the spiritual child, however, there is clearly an important place for guidance. The role of communicating is expressed through the verbs that St. Paul uses to describe the ministry of the spiritual father, namely parakaleō, paramytheomai, martyromai.
In the book on Spiritual Direction we read a similar preference given to listening over speaking, but also a clarification of when the time is right for speaking: “Before reflecting further on the spoken response of the spiritual director, it is necessary to emphasize once again how important empathic, prayerful, affirmative listening—vulnerable attentiveness—is in spiritual direction. This must be the foundation from which any spoken communication emerges in spiritual direction.” Then when addressing the role of communicating, similar to the insight of St. Paul who emphasizes parakaleō and paramytheomai, Acklin and Hicks entitle their first sections in the chapter on Communication, “A Loving Response” and “Affirmation.” Their approach to communication in spiritual direction is like St. Paul’s in preferring the gentle admonitions of the spiritual father to the harsh rebukes of the paidagōgos.
A Witness to be Imitated
Spiritual formation is not a set of skills so much as it is a way of life. The spiritual father must, himself, undergo a transformation into Christ so that he can truly witness (martyromai) how it is Christ who lives in him (1 Thes 2:12, 1 Cor 4:16). By coupling together the command to imitate him with his claims to spiritual fatherhood, St. Paul clearly expects a high level of integrity in spiritual formation.
The Congregation for the Clergy likewise asserts this for Seminary Spiritual Directors: “The Spiritual Director, or Spiritual Father, must be a true master of the interior life and of prayer, one who helps the seminarian to welcome the divine calling and to develop a free and generous response.” Copan derives six implications from his study on imitation as a key part of applying Paul’s doctrine to spiritual direction: “Ethos trumps technique…Personal presence as of primary importance…Relationship based on genuine love and concern…Christocentric focus…Developing Christocentric virtues…Acknowledging the corporate dimension of spiritual direction.”
In this area we see a deficiency in the Spiritual Direction book where the specific witness of the spiritual director is not highlighted so much as particular virtues that support particular aspects of the ministry of spiritual direction. In the chapter entitled ”The Spiritual Director,” the authors refer to knowledge, experience, prudence, patience, an integrated humanity and a zeal for souls. They do not focus on the dimension of holiness, however, nor the importance of the spiritual director’s witness as such. Although they are clear to distinguish spiritual direction from psychological counseling, they acknowledge that the spiritual director will generally be somewhat opaque to the directee, perhaps only ever seeing each other in the confines of the spiritual direction appointment. While this may be a necessity in some cases, St. Paul’s teaching and example clearly point to the value of witness and imitation. At least in the Seminary environment, that will be the case with the Director of Spiritual Formation, and it helps us understand the Program for Priestly Formation’s encouragement for even the adjunct spiritual directors to reside in and play an active role in the Seminary community.
Spiritual Direction for the New Evangelization
St. Paul placed a high importance on spiritual formation. The use of both maternal and paternal images for this unique ministry demonstrate a level of importance comparable to motherhood and fatherhood in natural life. He distinguished his role as spiritual father from other church ministries (1 Cor 4:14-16). He described it in terms of fulfilling the goal of all mission, namely to give birth to Christ in his disciples (Gal 4:19). He also expected the spiritual father to be conformed to Christ in such a way that others could imitate him (1 Thes 2:12).
Although St. Paul formed his communities in various ways including preaching, letter-writing, delegating leadership, and meeting with both small groups and mid-sized groups, he maintained an importance for the one-on-one ministry of spiritual formation. Using maternal images, he wrote passionately about the suffering he endured for individuals to give birth to Christ in them. Using paternal images he described the kind of witness that is needed for the formation of disciples. He also explained the kinds of loving admonition and encouragement that a spiritual father provides for his children. Furthermore, we see in St. Paul’s teaching on spiritual formation what the goal of discipleship is, namely the formation of the disciple into Christ so that the disciple can walk in a manner worthy of the call he has received.
Although St. Paul does not refer to his spiritual fatherhood as “spiritual direction,” we can see the expectations of St. Paul for spiritual formation fulfilled in today’s understanding of spiritual direction. We see several points that St. Paul makes echoed by the Church’s standards for seminary formation. Likewise, in their work on Spiritual Direction, Fr. Tom Acklin and Fr. Boniface Hicks describe the ministry of spiritual direction in terms that are reinforced by the teaching of St. Paul. At the same time, one dimension of St. Paul’s teaching on spiritual formation, namely the importance of being an example that can be imitated, is stated more implicitly than explicitly in this book, and the authors could improve their presentation by including this point from the teaching of St. Paul.
As we seek to configure missionary disciples to Christ in the New Evangelization, we must include the one-on-one ministry of spiritual direction as a key part of our strategy. This is clearly part of Pope Francis’s approach as well when he holds up the importance of the “art of accompaniment” and states that ”The Church will have to initiate everyone – priests, religious and laity – into this ‘art of accompaniment’…” Quoting Pope Saint John Paul II, he calls for this accompaniment to be “a pedagogy which will introduce people step by step to the full appropriation of the mystery.”
Bibliography
Acklin, Fr Thomas, and Fr Boniface Hicks. Spiritual Direction: A Guide for Sharing the Father’s Love. Steubenville, Ohio: Emmaus Road Publishing, 2017.
Balz, Horst. Exegetical Dictionary of the New Testament. Edited by Gerhard Schneider. Eerdmans Pub Co, 1994.
Barbu, Liviu. “Spiritual Formation as an Art: Adult Faith Formation in the Eastern Orthodox Tradition.” Journal of Adult Theological Education 9, no. 1 (June 2012): 28–43.
Congregation for the Clergy. “The Gift of the Priestly Vocation: Ratio Fundamentalis Institutionis Sacerdotalis,” December 8, 2016.
Copan, Victor. “Spiritual Formation and St. Paul as Spiritual Direction: Determining the Primary Aims.” Journal of Spiritual Formation & Soul Care 3, no. 2 (2010): 140–54.
Davies, J. P. “What to Expect When You’re Expecting: Maternity, Salvation History, and the ‘Apocalyptic Paul’.” Journal for the Study of the New Testament 38, no. 3 (March 2016): 301–15.
Gaventa, Beverly R. “The Maternity of Paul: An Exegetical Study of Galatians 4:19.” The Conversation Continues: Studies in Paul & John in Honor of J Louis Martyn, 1990, 189–201.
Lee, Max J. “Ancient Mentors and Moral Progress According to Galen and Paul.” The Covenant Quarterly 72, no. 3–4 (August 2014): 55–70.
Louw, Johannes P., ed. Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament: Based on Semantic Domains. 2nd edition. New York: Fortress Press, 1988.
Mayerhofer, Fr. Martin. “The Spiritual Fatherhood of the Priest in Patristic and Medieval Pauline Commentaries.” Logos: A Journal of Catholic Thought & Culture 23, no. 2 (2020): 105–28.
Pope Francis. “Evangelii Gaudium : Apostolic Exhortation on the Proclamation of the Gospel in Today’s World,” November 24, 2013. http://w2.vatican.va/content/francesco/en/apost_exhortations/documents/papa-francesco_esortazione-ap_20131124_evangelii-gaudium.html.
United States Conference of Catholic Bishops. Program for Priestly Formation. 5th ed. Washington, D.C: USCCB Publications, 2005.
Young, Norman H. “Paidagogos: The Social Setting of a Pauline Metaphor.” Novum Testamentum 29, no. 2 (April 1987): 150–76.
Notes and references
Congregation for the Clergy, “The Gift of the Priestly Vocation: Ratio Fundamentalis Institutionis Sacerdotalis ,” ( December 8, 2016 ) , 4. Fr Thomas Acklin and Fr Boniface Hicks, Spiritual Direction: A Guide for Sharing the Father ’ s Love (Steubenville, Ohio: Emmaus Road Publishing, 2017). Fr. Mayerhof er surveyed the relevant passages on fatherhood from St. Paul and explored medieval commentaries on those passages in Fr. Martin Mayerhofer , “The Spiritual Fatherhood of the Priest in Patristic and Medieval Pauline Commentaries.,” Logos: A Journal of Catholic Thought & Culture 23 (2020): 105–28. Fr. Mayerhofer considered this passage from Ephesians, but it is less relevant for our purposes. Beverly R. Gaventa , “The Maternity of Paul: An Exegetical Study of Galatians 4:19,” in The Conversation Cont inues: Studies in Paul & John in Honor of J Louis Martyn , eds. Robert T. Fortna and Beverly R. Gaventa (Nashville: Abingdon Pr , 1990), 189–201. W. Radl , “ ὠ δίνω ” in Exegetical Dictionary of the New Testament . eds. Balz , H. R., & Schneider, G. (Grand Rapi ds, Mich.: Eerdmans, 1990–), 3:506. Abbreviated EDNT hereafter. This analysis draws heavily from and summarizes the work of Gaventa’s “The Maternity of Paul.” G. Schneider, “ πα ιδ α γωγός ” in EDNT 3:2. James Swanson. Dictionary of Biblical Languages with Semantic Domains: Greek (New Testament) . (Oak Harbor: Logos Research Systems, 1997), electronic version. Norman H Young, “ Paidagogos : The Social Setting of a Pauline Metaphor,” Novum Testamentum 29 (1987): 150–76. Ibid, 161. Liviu Barb u , “Spiritual Formation as an Art: Adult Faith Formation in the Eastern Orthodox Tradition.,” Journal of Adult Theological Education 9 (2012): 35. Mayerhofer , “The Spiritual Fatherhood,” 112. Victor Copan, “Spiritual Formation and St. Paul as Spiritual Direction: Determining the Primary Aims,” Journal of Spiritual Formation & Soul Care 3 (2010): 140–54. Gift of the Priestly Vocation, 107. Ibid, 133. Ibid, 65. Acklin and Hicks, Spiritual Direction . Ibid, 53. Ibid, 83. Ibid, 107. Gift of the Priestly Vocation, 136. Copan, “Spiritual Formation”, 152-3. United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, Program for Priestly Formation , 5th ed. (Washington, D.C: USCCB Publications, 2005), no. 353. Pope Francis, Evangelii Gaudium , 169-173. Ibid, 171 quoting John Paul II, Ecclesia in Asia (6 November 1999), 20.