You've met Teresa and John, but have you met the new cast of mystics?
Meet all 12 at the Modern Mystics School!
the
SPIRITUAL OFF-ROADING PROGRAM
Meet Your Facilitators
KELLY DEUTSCH
From Nun to Spiritual Off-Roader
It all started when I left the convent.
I had been the poster child of conservative Catholicism:
I served the poor -
prayed for hours a day -
and entered a religious community.
Friends knew me as the big-hearted, joyful servant who was going to change the world. I studied theology in English and Italian, I shared God’s love with strangers, and I led retreats and missions.
And then life crashed and burned.
After feeling off for months, my health failed. I was so weak I was flown home from Rome in a wheelchair. I proceeded to spend the next 18 months mostly bedridden.
I reeled.
Everything was taken away from me. No more joyful servant. No more mass or breviary or meditation to make me feel like I was good and holy. No more mission to go and change the world.
Instead, I was left grappling with the big questions:
Who is God?
Who am I, if not who I once was?
What is spirituality?
My ego fell, and it fell hard.
During those 18 months, as I was shuttled from doctor to doctor, the mystics became my lifeline. It's like they, and no one else, spoke my language and knew my experience. I also clung to the threads of sanity through the wisdom of my spiritual director, and some very dear friends. They saw me, and could be present to my pain without trying to fix me. I never again underestimated the power of this kind of presence.
As I spent hour after hour looking out my parents' big bay windows and gazed upon the purple Coteau Hills, my messiness began to unwind itself.
A deeper knowing, which some mystics call Unknowing, settled into my bones.
The big questions that once taunted me revealed themselves as allies and friends. They weren't matters to be settled, but mysteries to be lived.
Far from the nicely ordered orthodoxy of my early life, I found myself in a wilderness of exquisite Beauty.
Instead of being fenced in by fear and shame and restrictive guilt, this wilderness was marked by its SPACIOUSNESS... and even a sacred mischief. ;)
DO YOU HEAR THIS WILDERNESS BECKONING?
After this whole experience, I decided to dedicate my life to this path.
There is so much FREEDOM out here! And the BLISS of divine intimacy...
Ineffable.
I want you to know this too.
Come join us.
Come find the UNION your heart so longs for.
Come live the questions that have no clear answers, but are rich with meaning.
Come connect with other kindred spirits who see you, understand you, and want to journey with you. You don't have to do this alone.
AMY PIATT
From People-Pleaser to Self-Proclaimed Heretic
My name is Amy Piatt.
I’m an ordained minister, podcaster, mom, wife, and self-proclaimed heretic.
I spent the first 40(ish) years of my life on the inside of the church, playing mostly by the rules. Were it not for those pesky X chromosomes of mine, I’d probably have stayed safely within the bounds of the institution, but feminine subversion is in my DNA, so I eventually rejected the limitations and patriarchy and walked away… without telling my husband, without a plan for the future, and in the midst of a spiritual crisis.
It destroyed me. Really, it did. The compliant, accommodating, people pleaser was obliterated the day I walked away from church. The last few years have been spent finding my way through death and into new life.
But I’m learning that women have always been the bearers of new life.
...and in the Christian story, we’re the only ones who stuck around to witness Jesus’ death, burial and resurrection. So I feel no need to reject my Christian heritage. But it’s time to tell the whole story, and flip the narrative to include the outcasts, the losers, the unwanted and the unseen.
Through contemplative prayer (aka meditation/silence), I’m discovering a way to release my tiny, fearful, false self and have stumbled upon the wide-open space of a much more beautiful life. It’s not my life, it’s our Life - the one that mystics and seekers have been sharing since breath entered our bodies and gave us a voice.
So, I breathe more deeply these days, and try to take in the pain and suffering around me. I hold it in love and allow the Love within to transform it in to something new. Then, I try to let it go - simple, but not easy - but I’m pretty sure it’s the start of something wild.
YOU?
From Isolated and Hungry to Connected and Satiated
Is this your story?
Are you ready to find your tribe and explore this wide world of Mystery together?
In just a short time, the next cohort of the Spiritual Off-Roading program will begin.
For four full months, we'll journey together through juicy themes like divine intimacy, embodied spirituality (and sexuality!), finding wholeness, and wonder.
The cohort will meet monthly as a group, with your own private DEEP DIVES with one of our guides to ensure you get a swarthy, heaping serving of the depth you crave.
There's no need to feel alone in the wilderness.
There's no need for overwhelm or confusion.
Come join us, and find all the meaning, mischief, and mirth there is to be had.
Click below to dive in. We can't wait to see you there. :)