“One advantage that Centering Prayer offers is that it establishes the letting go of self, the total sacrifice of ourselves, as the orientation and direction that grows along with our relationship with God. But, sacrifice in this world is not like it is in Heaven. It can be very difficult, very painful, even unbearable at […]
Nicholas Roerich, Behest of the Sky, 1915 “Suppose you’re in mythic membership consciousness and totally absorbed in your particular belief system. Remember belief systems are the effort of people who haven’t had the experience to explain the founder’s experience of the Ultimate Reality. Most religions begin by some gigantic experience of someone or some group of […]
Om Lotus Tibetan Mandala, hand painted in Kathmandu, Nepal “The Word of God, named Jesus (Savior) by divine command, was active before the incarnation. The Word and its activity is not limited by the historical reality of the man Jesus, whose humanity it possessed. The Eternal Word may have manifested in other persons, such as Krishna, […]
Centering Prayer Retreats – Contemplative Outreach Dublin 2023 Mercy International Centre, Baggot Street, Dubin Sunday – Friday, August 20 – 25, 2023 SILENT CENTERING PRAYER RETREAT This five-day retreat will provide a contemplative space to centre yourself in prayer and explore a call to deeper listening. This silent method of meditation will lead participants on […]
Vela Zanetti, Mural of Human Rights. Emblem Un (detail), 1953 Seekers are people of faith even if they do not belong to a particular religion. Faith in this sense is deeper than one’s belief system. Belief systems belong to the level of pluralism; faith to the level of unity. Faith is constitutive of human […]
Hilma af Klint, What a Human Being Is, 1910 “Bonding with others takes place as the love of the Spirit is poured forth in our hearts. We feel that we belong to our community, to the human family, to the cosmos. We feel that our prayer is not just a privatized journey but is […]
The Helix Nebula, NASA and Tommaso Stella “God is manifesting in each moment as the human condition in each of us. … ‘We are icons of God.’ God experiences Godself in us and awakens God’s dispositions in us, especially humility, forgiveness and compassion. … “Christ lives in us means that Christ prays, acts, thinks, loves, […]
“Be still, and you will know, not by the knowledge of the mind, but by the knowledge of the heart, who God is and who you are.” Thomas Keating Consenting to God as God Is Q: Sometimes during Centering Prayer, an emotional pain comes up that causes me to cry from a deep level. Is […]
Giacomo Balla, Spirit-form transformation, 1918 New wine is a marvelous image of the Holy Spirit. As we move to the intuitive level of consciousness through contemplative prayer, the energy of the Spirit cannot be contained in old structures. They are not flexible enough. They may have to be left aside or adapted. The new […]
So, if you accept the view that [the self] is a dynamic experience, that the self can keep on growing, then it becomes a true self in the image and likeness of God, then there is the possibility that there is only one Self. There is only God. There is only one Self, or one […]