ABSTRACT

Spirituality is a big and important theme and it is more political than many people realise. “Tout commence en mystique et finit en politique [Everything starts in mysticism and ends in politics], was Charles Péguy’s (1910) thought. I have found that, paradoxically, the bigger and more important the theme, the more personal the author’s connection to it is likely to be. When I began to have children, as often seems to happen with men, something went on in me which we could call “spiritual”. This mixed in with my interests in psychotherapy and politics—so there were now three sides of a coin! After the impact of having children, and the turning towards both organised religion and private religion fatherhood induced in me, I began trying to link up the practice of psychotherapy with my emerging spiritual and existing political concerns.