Title: Visions, revelations and the church
Description: "In this book Father Laurent Volken traces and analyzes the guideposts in the history of the Church's attitude toward revelations. In apostolic as in biblical times revelations were made chiefly to priests and prophets; later God revealed Himself to religious--chiefly women--and in recent centuries He or His heavely representatives have appeared to the humble and ignornat. Where the Apostles freely welcomed revelations, later Fathers were forced to exercise caution in confronting the extremist claims of the "new prophecy" of the ecstatic Montanists. Joachimism also provoked a reaction within the Church with its predictions of a new gospel. But the dangers from pseudo-revelations did not--and should not--obscure the enrichment to be derived from true revelations. Father Volken brings psychological as well as spiritual light to bear upon the question of discernment by showing how the findings of psychiatry supplement the wisdom of the clergy in distinguishing true from false revelations. In developing a "theology of revelations," he draws upon the experiences of holy persons and the teaching of popes, saints and theologians including Augustine and Thomas Aquinas, Teresa of Avila and John of the Cross, and Popes Leo VIII and Pius XII." -- book jacket.
Subjects: Private revelations