admin, Author at The Evelyn Underhill Association

by Dana Greene

This article first appeared in SPIRITUALITY TODAY Spring 1987, Vol. 39, pp. 22-38. Used with permission.

BIOGRAPHY has power to move, inspire, and provoke. It provides a model of personal integration, and in times like our own when the sense of the world’s complexity and the loss of shared meaning cripple us, the individual attempt to make sense of life has great appeal.

The life of Evelyn Underhill¹ the twentieth century British religious writer, offers us not only inspiration, but an example of a modern woman, who was not broken by confrontation with complexity and the disintegration of meaning, but in fact worked to heal that confusion and brokenness. She has particular appeal for us because she is a modern woman. I mean by that not only that she lived in our century, but that she … Read more

Download the PDF version of this newsletter.

Annual Day of Quiet Reflection

Saturday, June 13, 2015 9:30am – 3:30pm

Sayre House
The Washington National Cathedral

“The Mastery of Time”
Directed by Donna Osthaus

Download Registration Form

“He that believeth shall not make haste.” Isaiah 28:16

A lately discovered article by Evelyn Underhill from a time near the end of her life (and the beginning of World War II) will bring us to contemplate this very contemporary issue of our time. We will explore the subject through Underhill’s essay, through a scriptural reference to Jesus’s attitude toward his use of time (Matthew 15:21-28), and briefly through the references to the subject of time in the contemporary poetry of her colleague and friend, T. S. Eliot.

The Quiet Day will be directed by Donna Osthaus, formerly Director of Program at the College … Read more

by Nadia Delicata

The following was delivered at the 2013 Evelyn Underhill Day by Merrill Ware Carrington.

Evelyn Underhill (1875-1941), a pioneer of the scientific study of mysticism and a spiritual master, tirelessly grappled throughout her life to express clearly and creatively the dynamic vitality of her own flourishing spirituality¹. Her earliest attempts are revealed in fictional writings composed in her youth, just as the journal written in her later years is a soul-bearing tribute to her quest for spiritual authenticity.

In this paper, I will attempt to study glimpses of Underhill’s spiritual transformation through her little known, but, as I will argue, powerfully revealing, collection of poems, titled Theophanies³. Published after Underhill had established a strong reputation as a scholar of mysticism, the poetry contains snapshots of those interim years of personal spiritual metamorphosis from … Read more

by Merrill Ware Carrington

Over the years, the annual Days of Quiet honoring Evelyn Underhill have offered the opportunity to explore many facets of her identity — her work as a philosopher and biographer, novelist and poet, essayist and book critic. We have explored the evolution of her calling as a conductor of retreats and teacher of prayer. We have looked at her interfaith conversations and her courageous stand as a pacifist during the Second World War. We have learned about her marriage, her rather arid-seeming relationships with her parents, her travels, her sailing trips, her bookbinding, her gardening, her cats!

But the dimension of Underhill’s life and work about which I’ve felt a particular ongoing curiosity is her role as what we would today describe as a spiritual director. (She was herself more inclined to speak of her “cases” … Read more

Download the PDF version of this newsletter.

Annual Day of Quiet Reflection

Saturday, June 21, 2014 9:30am – 3:30pm
Sayre House
The Washington National Cathedral

“The Poet as Mystic; the Mystic as Poet”

Directed by Kathleen Staudt
Download Registration Form

In Essentials of Mysticism, Evelyn Underhill writes that “Poetry ever goes like the royal banners before ascending life; therefore man may safely follow its leadership in his prayer.” Underhill was always reserved about reporting the details of her own spiritual experience, but her poetry, published early in her career, gives us glimpses into the intensity of the life of prayer and the ardor of her early quest for God. In this day of quiet reflection, we will let the langue of Underhill’s poetic writing invite us to a deepening of our own life of prayer, as we listen for … Read more

by John R. Francis

What is authentic spirituality and what is the role of contemplation in the spiritual life? Throughout her life, Evelyn Underhill journeyed on a process of discovering the answers to these questions. The life of the Christian involves ongoing conversion, and Underhill’s was no exception. Her works reveal Underhill’s developing thought on the goal and nature of the spiritual life, self-surrender, and contemplation. In Underhill’s life and work the integration of spirituality and theology can be seen, in that her discovery of truth coincides with her deepening conversion and vice versa. Beginning in 1907, Underhill’s Christian life began to move away from neoplatonic spirituality and thought toward Christocentric contemplative action. To facilitate a demonstration of this process, in this essay a selection of Underhill’s works are divided into three periods, beginning with and her thought is examined … Read more

by Kathy Staudt

For many years now the annual day of Quiet Reflection in honor of Evelyn Underhill has been an important spiritual resting-point in my life. It is always held in June, near Evelyn’s June 15 feast day. At that time of year the cathedral close is beautiful, the roses blooming in the Bishop’s garden, with quiet green places to walk and pray, and a lovely sense of “home” in the living room of Sayre House, where we meet. Even though I usually have leadership responsibilities, that June quiet day has become for me an annual time of rerooting, reconnecting to my own deepening experience of God’s presence in my life. It is a time to rest in what Evelyn Underhill somewhere calls “that deep place where the soul is at home with God.”

I first heard of Evelyn … Read more

Download the PDF version of this newsletter.

Part 1 – Roundup of 100th Anniversary of Mysticism – Noteworthy News – “My Journey with Evelyn Underhill” by Kathy Staudt

Part 2 – “Evelyn Underhill’s Developing Spiritual Theology: A Discovery of Authentic Spiritual Life and the Place of Contemplation” by John R. Francis

Part 3 – Dana Greene Research Collection on Evelyn Underhill

Part 4 – “Reflections on the Inter-Faith Conversations of Evelyn Underhill: Symbolic Narratives of Mysticism” by Michael Stoeber

Annual Day of Quiet Reflection

Saturday June 15, 2013
“Becoming the Parent of New Life”

Sayre House
The Washington National Cathedral

Directed by Merrill Ware Carrington

Download Registration Form

During her lifetime, Evelyn Underhill was admired and appreciated for her personality as well as for her ideas – for her groundedness and integrity, for her humor, for her transparency as a … Read more

by Joy Milos

At the time of her death, The Times of London acclaimed Evenly Underhill as a writer with “an insight into the meaning both of the culture and of the individual groupings of the soul that was unmatched by any of the professional teachers of her day.”¹ This spiritual guide to her generation, one of the most widely read spiritual writers of the Anglican tradition during the twentieth century, first emerged as a major figure with the 1911 publication of her classic work, Mysticism. At the centennial of its publication, Underhill‘s magnum opus on the topic merits a reexamination since it is still used in most courses that explore the experience of God called mysticism and still attracts contemporary spiritual seekers. In this article I will examine three aspects of the book: first of all, the … Read more

Download the PDF version of this newsletter.

The Annual Day of Quiet Reflection

“Reflections on the Inter-faith Conversations of Evelyn Underhill”

directed by Michael Stoeber

June 15-16, 2012
The Washington National Cathedral

annual-quiet-day-2011

In her writings, Evelyn Underhill includes some reference to non-Christian religions, especially to themes in Jewish, Hindu, and Islamic mysticism. She draws these mystics generally into positive relationship with their Christian cousins, by postulating a common ground to all authentic mystical experience. On this Day of Quiet Reflection, we will explore various aspects of Underhill’s inter-faith conversations, paying special attention to her reflections on the poetry of the great Sufi mystic Kabir and on the life of the co-founder of the Hindu Brahmo Samaj, Devandranath Tagore. Our contemplative reflections will include also reference to Underhill’s own experiences and poetry related to this inter-faith dialogue. 9:30 a.m. – 3:30 … Read more

Author: admin

Annual Day of Quiet Reflection

Annual Day of Quiet Reflection

“The Poet as Mystic; the Mystic as Poet”

Annual Day of Quiet Reflection

The Annual Day of Quiet Reflection