About the Contributor(s): Michael C. Voigts is an Affiliate Professor of Spiritual Formation at Asbury Theological Seminary in Wilmore, Kentucky, and an ordained minister in The United Methodist Church. He holds a PhD from Brunel University/London School of Theology in the area of Historical Theology.

Spiritual direction involves two willing participants: a director and a person or persons being directed. It happens more in the reality of life rather than in esoteric statements in books worth quoting from generation to generation. To understand Bernard of Clairvaux as a spiritual director, a basic understanding of the real Bernard, set in time and culture, is necessary. Modern readers have very little in common with medieval Europeans. Language, worldview, culture, politics, and economics are foreign to us. Other than an understanding of God, we share with medievals only our human...