Understanding Our Story

Understanding Our Story presents a concise introduction to the original, transformative thinking of Adrian van Kaam, CSSp, PhD (1920-2007). While many books are available on "spiritual formation" and "Christian disciplines," no other author of our time has offered such a holistic and comprehensive explanation of Christian formation and its relationship to the human spirituality of all persons. Understanding our Story culls the most seminal ideas and vocabulary from van Kaam's eleven volumes on formation science, formation anthropology, and formation theology, and provides examples of his theoretical-practical research drawn from everyday life, Scripture, Christian writers, and van Kaam's life story itself. In doing so, it makes his extensive work available to scholars in the field of spiritual formation, and gives all readers the opportunity to utilize his insightful thinking to more fully understand the myriad ways in which God reforms and transforms lives into the image of Christ. In the pluritraditional world in which we live, where so many faith and formation traditions demand our attention, van Kaam's formative spirituality provides a means of respectful dialogue with formationally relevant truths from others and of wise appraisal of ideas that are (and are not) conducive to, and compatible with, the Christian revelation.