Friday, 25th October, 2024, 8:00pm to 10:00pm St. John’s Church, Bridgetown
(Both live and streamed)
Consciousness, Mystical Experience, and the Ground of Being
A conversation between Fr. Jim Barlow and Prof Max Velmans
Topics to be touched on will
include:
Different levels of
consciousness and their grounding.
What is “mystical” and is it
universal?
What is meant by “The Ground of
Being” and is it the same thing as God?
Jim is Rector of St Mary’s Totnes
and of the wider Totnes Team Ministry in the Church of England. He has a
life-long interest in religious experience and mystical theology.
Although this interest is primarily practical, he has engaged with the study of
mystical experience in general and the historical origins of Christian mystical
theology in the wider Mediterranean context. He has a particular interest
in the East Syrian mystical school of the 5th to 8th centuries of the common
era and is collaborating with other scholars to produce critical editions and
translations of texts from that tradition.
Max is Professor Emeritus of
Psychology, Goldsmiths, University of London, and a fellow of the British
Psychological Society and the Academy of the Social Sciences. His
main research focus is on integrating work on the philosophy, cognitive
psychology, and neuropsychology of consciousness, and, more recently, on
East–West integrative approaches. He has over 130 publications on these topics,
including his books Understanding Consciousness (2009), Towards a
Deeper Understanding of Consciousness (2017), and the co-edited Blackwell
Companion to Consciousness (2017). He has been a Fulbright Scholar at UC
Berkeley (1984), and National Visiting Professor for 2010-2011 of the Indian
Council of Philosophical Research, Government of India.
Cost: £5
Booking via Eventbrite HERE
| 
