The insurmountable darkness of love: Mysticism, loss, and the common life

Abstract

responses when integrating spirituality and religion into our social work practice. A key concern often raised when considering the inclusion of religion and spirituality in social work is that of individual bias and how the biases and beliefs of individual students, lecturers or practitioners will be ‘pushed upon’ students/clients/service-users/colleagues. The strong focus on critical reflective/reflexive practice, encouraging one to identify and challenge biases and to be open and inclusive of other approaches to religion and spirituality as outlined in this text, responds directly to these concerns. As does the significant emphasis on social justice and ethical practice. The dedicated attention to and inclusion of First Nations’ knowledge helps to address issues of cultural competence and anti-discrimination and is particularly relevant for practice in the Australian context (and other colonised countries). Such critical practice was addressed directly and practically in this text as Gardner states, ‘I am starting here with First Nations’ knowledges partly to affirm this equality of place and to seek to redress the balance of these so often being seen as an “add on” rather than a fundamentally important way of seeing the world’ (p. 46). These are notable accomplishments of the text, making a valuable contribution to the social work knowledge base. A critique of Gardner’s critical spiritual practice is that it seems to be a critical approach to practice that allows for the exploration of religion and spirituality and how it impacts clients and practitioners through processes such as critical reflexivity rather than an inclusion of religious or spiritual ways of knowing, being and doing, in their own right. This is perhaps reflective of the concerns held by the discipline regarding the integration of religion and spirituality and, as such, lays another crucial stepping-stone on the path to social work’s inclusion of religion and spirituality in practice. This text helps move the reader along this path to inclusion and provides real-world processes and practices one can immediately begin to use in one’s own practice. Knowing the importance that religion and spirituality hold for many of those we work with, as social workers, it is imperative that we are versed in an appropriate and ethical way to respond, and Gardner’s text provides one pathway to this end.