THE SPIRITUALITY OF ADORATION (AD-ORATIO): REFLECTIONS BASED ON JEAN-LUC NANCY

Abstract

In the religious meaning, especially in Christianity, spirituality is distinguished from terms like Mystics, religiosity, religious life, religious sense and even faith. Spirituality would be the dimension of experience and life of religion. But there are also non-religious spiritualities, like the so called post-religious ones. We're going to talk, then, about spiritual consciousness, radical sense experience and the experience of the meaning itself. Jean-Luc Nancy follows that line, practicing a deconstruction or emptying of the (Christian) religious dimension of spirituality, an atheist re-interpretation of the relationship with God, and with the whole religious vocabulary. By reinterpreting the works of the author of Deconstruction of Christianity, we will try to rebuild a non-religious spirituality for the present time. Our analysis will be focused on the concept of ad-oration, in its various connotations and connections. Then, we will begin a comparison between the concept of Nancy and the traditional perspective of Catholic theology. In the final considerations, we highlight the main characteristics of spirituality according to the thoughts of Jean-Luc Nancy.