The Fire Within: Desire, Sexuality, Longing, and God - Paperback

by Ronald Rolheiser (Author)

For most religious people, the words God and sex never go together.

God is conceived of as holy, pure, sexless, and as morally above the raw desires that so powerfully beset us. Sex, on the other hand, is conceived of as earthy and unholy, something we must snatch, and not without guilt, from the gods. Christianity has struggled mightily with sex; so too have most other religions. And yet when we look at sexual desire and ask where it comes from, there can be only one answer. It comes from God.

This is a book on desire, its experience, its origins, its meaning, and how it might be generatively channeled. Sexuality is inside us to help lure us back to God, but dealing with this fire inside us is a lifelong struggle. Ron Rolheiser sheds light on this mystery and the journey it takes us on in these tantalizing fragments that help give us permission to feel what we feel and know that God is still smiling on us.

Author Biography

Ronald Rolheiser is a specialist in the fields of spirituality and systematic theology. He is president emeritus of the Oblate School of Theology in San Antonio, Texas, and is a full-time professor of spirituality there. His books, notably The Holy Longing, Sacred Fire, and Insane for the Light are popular throughout the English-speaking world. His recent books Domestic Monastery and Bruised and Wounded are bestsellers, and his weekly column is carried by many newspapers worldwide.