Metodologia teologii duchowości
Methodology of Spiritual Theology

Summary/Abstract: Spiritual theology deals with the spiritual experience of individual persons. As a branch of theology, it builds on the assumption that every person is an image of God, and thus every human life contains a spiritual dimension. The sources of spiritual theology include any texts describing spiritual life, especially the works of the great Masters, but also the liturgy of the Church. The texts of the magisterium of the Church are also considered as a source, but, unlike in dogmatic or moral theology, their importance is limited. Spiritual theology aims to profoundly understand the inner structure of spiritual life in its various forms and demonstrate their mutual relations. The ultimate goal is to describe spiritual life in a way that helps to “discern the spirits”, to discriminate between the right and the erroneous paths of such life. The nature of the subject matter suggests that phenomenological method should be given priority in the research. Various methods of hermeneutics can also be helpful in the study of the texts. Spiritual theology is closely related to dogmatic and moral theology, but the nature of their mutual relationships is complex. Spiritual theology should maintain a distance towards the modern human sciences: it must not assume their perspective of human being.

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