You are what you live: Some recent data from neurosciences and the spiritual experiences of Philocalia

  1. Lemma
  2. Esti ceea ce traiesti. Cateva date recente din neurostiinte si experientele duhovnicesti ale Filocaliei
  3. Romanian
  4. Mihalache, Sorin
  5. Scientific theories and disciplines > Psychology-Psychoanalysis - Concepts of knowledge and modes of reasoning > Mysticism and Orthodox spiritual experience - Scientific theories and disciplines > Modern physics :QM - Concepts of knowledge and modes of reasoning > Philosophy of science/epistemology
  6. 2017
  7. You are what you live: Some recent data from neurosciences and the spiritual experiences of Philocalia - Bucharest: Trinitas, 2017.
  8. neuroscience - love - health - passions - compassion - Greek Church Fathers - Meditation - genetics - happiness - scientific knowledge - self-knowledge

    1. "You are what you live". Some Recent Data from the Neuroscience and Spiritual Experiences of Philocalia, by Father Deacon Adrian Sorin Mihalache, was an unusual editorial event in the Romanian culture. The author's approach helps us to understand that both neuroscience research and the teachings of the Holy Fathers reflect in a unitary way the complex, profound and unique reality of God's creation as well as its implications in our daily life and in society. The volume brings together texts that were published during the years 2011-2016 in "Ziarul Lumina", the journal of the Romanian Patriarchate. The book is structured in six chapters: Spiritual life and the challenges of consumer society; The value of maternal love; Life in Contemporary Society; Inner life and renewal of life; The state of well-being. Theological considerations and neuroscientific explorations; The Mystery of the Person. The latest challenges for the spiritual life neurosciences and possible phylocallic responses with therapeutic potential. The significance and messages of this work are extremely dense, specialized, profound and complex. They bring into the spotlight the distortions and the ways in which the contemporary secularized society promotes confusion, hides, replaces or distorts the natural reference systems on the existential level, trying to create an irreversible fracture between faith in God and science. The understanding of the subtle functioning of the human brain and mind, for example, together and in correlation with the freshness and accuracy of the teaching of the Holy Fathers of the Orthodox Church, makes us rediscover today in their true light the values of knowledge through faith, the normal, practical life style, relating existence with the work of God. "Neuroscience has, however, become one of the most convincing advocates of spiritual life, reinforcing the openness of science to philosophy and theology," the author writes in the introduction, with a concrete analysis of some features of recent culture (mass media, consumerism, the competitive environment) and some of the effects that they may have on the person's dispositions. The author focuses on what matters most for spiritual life: attention to self, humility, silence, experience of compassion, vigilance. Dumitru Manolache, who provides a short but sharp presentation of the book, agrees with prof. Dr. Ovidiu-Alexandru Bajenaru of the Carol Davila University of Medicine and Pharmacy, who signs the afterword: "Reading and understanding the fundamental texts of Orthodoxy in parallel with the understanding of the data that neuroscience reveals on the structures and mechanisms of the brain, of the mind, and of the human soul, not only gives us a confirmation of the unique truth regarding human existence, but also helps us to understand in a unitary way ... the unique reality of God's Creation. The book of Father Adrian Sorin Mihalache gives a good idea about this unique reality. At the same time, it warns against the pitfalls to which we are quite easily lured today by deformed, pseudo-scientific accounts, based on the cultivation of selfishness and pleasure, in a society which attempts to overthrow the fundamental values of mankind. "