Listen to our fifth FREE weekly podcast of David Torkington’s spiritual classic set in the Outer Hebrides
This week The Catholic Network presents the fifth podcast episode of David Torkington’s spiritual classic, Wisdom from the Western Isles.
Published originally as three separate books: Peter Calvay – Hermit, Peter Calvay – Prophet and Peter Calvay – Mystic, David has thoughtfully re-edited and abridged the work for FREE broadcast to you our subscribers; and he is also the narrator.
The Catholic Network has worked closely with David to provide a visual context and backdrop to the novel, separated out into concise weekly episodes.
This much-loved classic of Christian spirituality centres around Peter Calvay, a Catholic mystic living on a remote Scottish island who becomes a spiritual guide to a Protestant academic called James Robertson.
In the first episode – From Glasgow to Barra –Peter introduces himself and describes his spiritual journey, which led to him living the eremitical life on a remote island off the Scottish Outer Hebrides. James, the academic who visits Barra with the intention of seeking spiritual help from Peter, takes up the story. He describes how he came to know of Peter and how he persuaded him to see him over a period of a week. He describes his journey on the island plane landing on the famous cockleshell beach. He arrives filled with the expectation of how Peter, the Hermit, will change his life over the forthcoming week.
In the second episode – A man who speaks with Authority – it is James Robertson’s first meeting with Peter Calvay. James describes his initial impressions and admits to some misgivings and doubts that a hermit who had separated himself from the world could ever fully understand his predicament. He considers cutting his visit short, but when Peter begins to speak about the spiritual life with confidence and conviction, James is left in no doubt that here indeed was a man who spoke with authority.
Peter leaves James with his memorable words, “Knowledge will never change anyone decisively and permanently for the better, but the experience of being loved will.”
In the third episode – Knowledge alone is not enough – Experiencing Love – James has been waiting eagerly for Peter’s second visit. He asks Peter to explain what he meant when he said that there is all the difference in the world between knowing that we are loved, and experiencing being loved. Peter describes how the experience of human love can change a person for the better. But he takes the analogy further, describing how God’s love can change us permanently for the better. James is left with the conviction that he has now to learn anew how to welcome God’s love into his life and how to start again at square one, to begin again to learn how to pray”
In the fourth episode – Freedom Demands Discipline – James sits at the jetty awaiting Peter’s arrival for their third meeting. Peter takes up the theme of the importance of God’s love because only his love can change human beings decisively and permanently for the better. Learning to pray, learning to open ourselves to God’s love is like anything else: it needs practice, and it takes time. Peter emphasises that there is no accomplishment of any worth that he knows of, that you can attain merely by desiring to have it. Freedom always demands discipline, and prayer is no exception to the rule.
In this week’s fifth Episode – Abba – Father, Context and Direction – it is James’ fourth meeting with Peter and he realises that there are only two more days left to speak with the hermit about his spiritual life. James asks Peter to teach him how to pray from the very beginning. The first time that question was asked of Christ by his first followers, was by giving them the prayer that we call the ‘Our Father’. Peter uses the first two words of that prayer, the word Our and the word Father, to sum up, the context and direction of all Christian prayer.
You can order the book here: https://amzn.to/36kJt2D
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David Torkington is an English Spiritual Theologian, author and speaker, specializing in Prayer, Christian Spirituality, and Mystical Theology. Educated at the Franciscan Study Centre, England, he served as Dean of Studies at the National Catholic Radio and Television Centre, London. He was an extra-mural lecturer in Mystical Theology at the Angelicum, the Dominican University in Rome, and has received invitations to speak to Religious, Monks, Diocesan Priests and laypeople from all over the world, including Equatorial Africa, where he gave three prolonged lecture tours speaking on Christian prayer.
Visit his website: www.davidtorkington.com