Anam Cara

Dúcas also refers to a person’s deepest nature. It probes beneath the surface images and impressions of a life and reaches into that which flows naturally from the deepest well in the clay of the soul. It refers in this sense to that whole intuitive and quickness of longing in us that tells us immediately how to think and act; we call this instinct. An old Irish proverb believes that instinct is a powerful force within us. It may remain latent for ages but it can always break out: “Briseann an dúcas amac trí súile an cait,” i.e., Dúcas will break forth even through the eyes of the cat. Dúcas is often used to interpret, explain, or excuse something in a person. “He cannot help it—he has the dúcas for that. In some sense, dúcas seems to be a deeper force than history. You belong to your dúcas; your dúcas is your belonging. In each individual there is a roster of longing that nothing can suppress.

Dúcas suggests the natural wildness of uninhibited Nature. There is also the proverb which says dúcas is impervious to outside training: “Is treise an dúcas na an oillúint,” i.e., Dúcas is stronger than education or upbringing. Dúcas shows the faithfulness of memory but accents the inevitable results of instinct. Without an awareness of dúcas, we are blind to what we do. Soul-searching is the excavation of the dúcas in and around us in order to belong more fully to ourselves and to participate in our inner heritage in a critical and creative way. Given the sense of homelessness in modern life, there is anxiety and fear and a tendency to prescribe a style of belonging that has no self-criticism and wants to corral longing in fixed, empirical frames. This is fundamentalism.

Fundamentalism: False Longing and Forced Belonging

Unable to read or decipher the labyrinth of absence, the homeless mind often reverts to nostalgia. It begins to imagine that our present dilemma, rather than being a new threshold of possibility, is in fact a disastrous fall from an ideal past. Fundamentalism laments the absence of the time when everything was as it should be. Family values, perfect morality, and pure faith existed without the chagrin of question, critique, or the horror of such notorious practices as alternative lifestyles or morality. Such perfection of course never existed. Neither experience nor culture has ever been monolithic. Fundamentalism is based on faulty and fear-filled perception. It constructs a fake absence, the absence of something that never in fact existed in the first place. It then uses this fake absence to demand a future constructed on a false ideal. Fundamentalism pretends to have found an absolute access point to the inner mind of the mystery. Such certainty cannot sustain itself in real conversation that is critical or questioning.

Fundamentalism does not converse or explore. It presents truth. It is essentially noncognitive. This false certainty can only endure through the belief that everyone else is wrong. It is not surprising that such fundamentalism desires power in order to implement its vision and force the others to do as prescribed. Fundamentalism is dangerous and destructive. There is neither acceptance nor generosity in its differences with the world. It presumes it knows the truth that everyone should follow. There is often an over-cosy alliance between fundamentalism and official religion. Disillusioned functionaries sometimes see fundamentalism as the true remnant which has succeeded in remaining impervious to the virus of pluralism. When people on the higher rungs of hierarchy believe this, the results are catastrophic. Blind loyalty replaces critical belonging. The creative and mystical individuals within an institution become caricatured as the enemy; they become marginalised or driven out. Some of the most sinister forms of fundamentalism are practised in cults.

Cults and Sects