Rev Jo Lane

Presenter/Workshop Leader

Rev Jo Lane has been the minister of the Unitarian Church of South Australia since September 2006. She has a Bachelor of Arts degree, majoring in comparative religion, from the University of South Australia and a Master of Theology from the University of Liverpool.

Presentation

MIDLIFE: A CRISIS AND AN OPPORTUNITY FOR LIBERAL RELIGIONISTS.

Midlife, in the urban, liberal democracies of the western world, is a time of disillusionment. It is a time when we surrender our fantasies about how perfect our lives will be when we have achieved the seniority at work we have worked towards for so long; when we have secured that committed long term relationship, when our bank statement is finally out of the red, and when we finally have enough of that thing we call 'life experience.' But, as Buddhists say, all these things are Dukkha. They come and go. They arise and they fall away. They delight and then they disappoint. Dukkha is disillusionment; the loss of a cherished and pleasurable fantasy. We each ensure that Dukkha is inevitable in our lives when we put our hopes and fantasies into things and people, all of which will disappoint us. Because of course, they will, and they must. Midlife is awash with Dukkha.

There is a sense of crisis inherent in midlife, hence the cliched 'The Midlife Crisis'. But there is also a sense of opportunity. The renowned psychotherapist Carl Jung claimed that most psychological distress in midlife needs to be worked with, at least in part, with a religious or spiritual approach. The Australian writers and sociologists Andrew Metcalfe and Ann Game say in their book The Mystery of Everyday Life: Just like floating on water, middle age brings a sense of lightness and gravity. However, this lightness isn't weightlessness. As Milan Kundera observes in 'The Unbearable Lightness of Being', life becomes unbearably light when lived as a series of unique and individual events, without a sense of eternity and repetition. It is ungrounded, unreal and insignificant. The realisation in middle life that life is borne not by oneself alone brings a lightness of self and of spirit, but the awareness of bearing the carriage of others' lives gives a form of being that is soulfully attuned to the ground of eternal repetition.

In this presentation I would like to explore ways in which religious leaders and communities can help individuals to navigate this challenging and testing phase of their lives. In doing this, we seek to make religion a crucible within which people can begin the long and tortuous journey towards the wisdom that enables them to live with lightness and gravity within this ground of eternal repetition.

About Rev Jo Lane

Rev Jo Lane has been the minister of the Unitarian Church of South Australia since September 2006. She has a Bachelor of Arts degree, majoring in comparative religion, from the University of South Australia and a Master of Theology from the University of Liverpool. Jo trained for the Unitarian ministry at Unitarian College Manchester and worked as a student minister in Macclesfield, in the north of England. Jo was the minister of the Richmond and Putney Unitarian Church in west London for six years.

Prior to training for the ministry Jo spent 13 years working as a Registered Nurse in South Australia in a variety of settings including mental health and aged care.

Jo has particular interests in the spiritual life of people in middle age; the psychology and sociology of worship, and the value and possibilities of pastoral care in the post modern age.

She is married to Rory, a teacher, and they have two daughters Imogen 7 and Mairead 4.