The Unshuttered Heart

Ann Ulanov, Abingdon Press

As an American, Professor Ulanov shares the shock and horror of the events of 9/11. “Our new century opening under that shadow cast into bold relief for me the preciousness of life and what we are living for, what we love, and what we find worth dying for.”

Individually and as “a shared common experience” life was dramatically altered. She likens this loss to a deadness in contrast to aliveness.

As a feminist, she looks to the “feminine mode of being” to “bring something to help heal the suffering all around us”. “Stripped of gender, we surrender ordinary identity for broader intimacy and allegiance.”

As a practising psychiatrist, she opens up the unconscious to enable people to come alive again.

“Shedding the badges of identity, class, money, poverty, health, titles, houses, successes, failures, traumas, illnesses … is not so much a dark night as a great light.”

As a Christian, she sees regeneration in Jesus in overcoming evil. “Though innocent, he suffers as if guilty and ends the logic of evil by taking our suffering onto his body and not being destroyed by it, nor by the death it inflicts.”

The experience of God entering our whole being is so greater than any of the symbols we cling to in our descriptions of this relationship.

As a lecturer, the various chapters making up this book were presented to a number of professionals over time in a variety of locations. Of necessity, the language of “deep psychology” is sometimes repetitive, often technical; making heavy reading, lightened as she puts so clearly insights from her Christian belief.

John Atkinson