Wednesday is Question and Answer Day on the blog…a time for exploring many of the questions that people have recently asked about the nine Conversations with God books and the New Spirituality. Here’s this week’s entry…
Question: Hello Neale…My life partner & I have read almost all of your books except maybe one and enjoyed every one of them. We’re both Catholics from birth and some of the new spirituality are a little bit shocking at first, but we’re understanding them as we go along. We’ve only been reading for two or three months. There were times when we couldn’t put the book down. Thank you so much and thank God for inspiring you to write these books. Would you be kind enough to share your thoughts on the following…

l. As Catholics, how best can we relate to the Catholic community, as our ll yr-old son is attending Cathecism and we’re still active in the church?
2.How do we start sharing our new-found spiritual readings and eventually our new faith with our grown children and/or our friends?
3.You mention Jesus only on occasions and usually compare him with other prophets. Could you expound on this?
We know that you’re quite busy, so we’ll dispense with more questions, but again we just want to thank you and to thank God for inspiring you to write these books and for coming into our lives.
L & Dave
Neale’s Response: Dear new friends…Let’s take your questions one at a time.
1. Many Catholics around the world have found information of value and inspiration in the Conversations with God material. So your exploration of the CwG material should in no way negatively affect your participation with the Catholic Churc. There are many Catholics who do not embrace or accept every single doctrine of the church (the prohibition on birth control, for example), but continue to attend the church because they deeply resonate with its main teachings of love and spiritual-social activism.
I do not see, however, that it would be necessary to share the intensely private information about your personal spiritual journey with others in your church community. You may do so if you wish, but your certainly are not required to—so I do not see any serious complication in relating to your church community.
As for your son, I encourage you to simply share with him from time to time your own personal feelings and understandings about God and Life, and talk about those ideas as they compare to certain doctrines of Roman Catholicism. You may wish to use the book What God Wants as a guide in those discussions. In a year or so you may also wish to introduce your son to Conversations with God for Teens.
2. Sharing your new spiritual understandings with older children should be easy, assuming you have a comfortable relationship with them. Simply tell them your truth. Once again, the book What God Wants may be helpful here. You might give it to them and say, “If you want to know what we are thinking about around all of this these days, read this…”
I would not get into sharing your new found understandings with your friends unless they ask you to. I am sure that you have some friends who are not Catholic. Do you go around telling them that you are? Is this a subject at the parties in your home, or at other social events? I suspect not. Neither, then, should you worry about how to “share” your embracing of some of the messages of Conversations with God. Simply use common sense. If personal or spiritual beliefs happen to come up in any casual discussion, simply, once again, just speak your truth.
I am reminded of this wonderful injunction, shared with me by a master: “Speak your truth, but soothe your words with peace.”
3. Jesus was the Son of God. We are all sons and daughters of God. There is scarcely more to say. God and we are One. There is no separation.
Thanks for your questions!
Best thoughts…Neale.
(Ask Neale may be accessed on a daily basis in the Messengers’ Circle at Neale’s personal website: www.nealedonaldwalsch.com. Each week Neale selects a question from those posted there and publishes it in this blog.)