Author: Mark Vernon

An audio version of this talk is at my podcast, Talks and Thoughts, available via podcast feeds. Bishop Barron is another figure I think worth listening to, who spoke at ARC in London, alongside Jordan Peterson. And like Peterson, he simultaneously leaves me as wary as enthused. And so, like Peterson, I listened both to… Continue reading Desire is the way. Thoughts on Bishop Barron at ARC in London

​​ Peterson celebrates faith and responsibility, at the risk of losing love and response. Jordan Peterson has been in London and making speeches with which, I think, there is a lot to agree. The heart of his message is a link between faith and responsibility, as he puts it. Human beings need faith that an… Continue reading Faith & responsibility or love & response. Thoughts on Jordan Peterson at ARC in London

An audio version of this talk is at my podcast, Talks and Thoughts, available via podcast feeds. Thinking carefully, not just apocalyptically, about AIs requires a combination of skills – technological, sociological, psychological, philosophical, organisational. So I was delighted to talk with Eve Poole, who is a rare individual capable of bringing all these elements… Continue reading Loving AIs. Reducing risk & building intelligence. Mark Vernon talks with Eve Poole

An audio version of this talk is at my podcast, Talks and Thoughts, available via podcast feeds. Churches are in decline, certainly in the western world. People tend not to think to turn to a priest for spiritual insight or advice. But is a lived relationship with the sacred and wisdom traditions denuded as organised… Continue reading Can we do without organised religion? A conversation with Rupert Sheldrake

An audio version of this thought is at my podcast, Talks and Thoughts, available via podcast feeds. At the beginning of Idler Drinks (see www.idler.co.uk), I offer a thought. Here’s the one from this week.

Owen Barfield talked of an evolution of consciousness towards final participation. But what is that state or quality awareness? How does it relate to the life of Christ? How was it described by Rudolf Steiner? Can we see and know intimations of it now? In this second discussion with Landon Loftin and Max Leyf, we… Continue reading Christ consciousness and final participation. Max Leyf, Landon Loftin & Mark Vernon. #OwenBarfield

Why do we love? Is love inevitably a foolhardy endeavour? Or does it lead to a knowledge of reality beyond reason? In this discussion, Robert Rowland Smith and Mark Vernon discuss the ideas of Freud and Lacan, Bowlby and Winnicott, who had differing ideas about the nature of love and where it leads. Is love… Continue reading Love and Attachment Styles

An essay written for Beshara Magazine For more on my book, Spiritual Intelligence in Seven Steps Hysteria is a form of defence, according to psychoanalysis. Underneath the panic or mania lies something that it has become impossible to think about. Alarm and fever are a cover for what threatens to destroy. I have been pondering… Continue reading AI and Spiritual Intelligence

In the 1930s, Carl Jung stayed in Ravenna and visited the Baptistery of the Orthodox, also known as the Neonian Baptistery. In Memories, Dreams, Reflections, he described the experience he had there as “among the most curious events in my life”. He and his companion saw brilliant mosaics that weren’t there, though they did not… Continue reading “A most curious event in my life.” Carl Jung, Ravenna and the mystery of the Neonian Baptistery

This recently published fictionalised autobiography is, I suspect, an instant spiritual classic. It follows the life of the anchorite and mystic, Mother Julian of Norwich, related against the backdrop of the terrors of the 14th century, which some say was the worst in which to have lived. Julian’s despair, illness, revelations and final conviction that… Continue reading The Problem of Suffering & I, Julian by Claire Gilbert