“Just as … the immune cells heal the diseased cells that are there, so to be a living cell in the Body of Christ is to have the same disposition of total self-giving or self-surrender, including the willingness to suffer our slice of the human condition for the love of God and the healing of humanity.

“We are accountable to everybody else. What you do, I do. What you are doing, your virtue, I can claim. I can also burden you with my vices. Everything is in common.”

Thomas Keating, God is All in All

Q: I have a 30-year daily contemplative practice with numerous multi-day, self-directed silent sitting retreats and long, intensive Zen retreats. I’d like to do a self-guided, multi-day Centering Prayer intensive retreat. What resources are available that guide one through the typical format/schedule for a Centering Prayer Intensive?

A: Read Leslee’s response here.

You can read the full e-bulletin at     https://mailchi.mp/coutreach/2026-june-e-bulletin-6066571?e=9aa0837e74

“Forgiveness is central to the Christian religion. It was Jesus’ chief concern on the night of his resurrection when he revealed himself to the Apostles gathered together behind locked doors, breathed on them, and said, ‘Receive the Holy Spirit. Whose sins you forgive are forgiven them. Whose sins you retain are retained.’ (John 20:22) … We too must practice forgiveness to be God’s children. There may be events and people in our conscious and unconscious memories that we have not forgiven. This leaves them in deep, even if repressed, psychological pain. It is in our power to heal them or to leave them in their pain. The true self in us – the Divine Indwelling – wants to forgive, but is overlain by layers of the false self that keeps the disposition of unforgiveness in place. In actual fact, not to forgive others is not to forgive ourselves. At the deepest level we are everyone else. We can only enjoy the world of unconditional love with hearts that are completely open to everyone..” 

Thomas Keating, Manifesting God

The latest issue of the CO NEWS is now available online here, along with a complete archive of previous newsletters. It includes these articles from the community, as well as embedded links for easy access to featured resources:

• “I’m Dying the Way I lived” — a Thomas Keating oral history excerpt from Rabbi Rami Shapiro
• How Thomas Keating Became Father Thomas to Me, by SÁRA TÓTH
• Exploring the Divine Economy, by Tom Smith
• How My Long-Time Contemplative Practice is Serving Me in My Later Years, by Sr. Linda Snow
• Centering Prayer and the “Tablet Wave”, by Jon Andreas
• When I Grow Up I Want to Be Kind, by Leon L.
• Take the Holy Mountain with You, by MARU LADRÓN DE GUEVARA
• Resources & more

You can read the complete bulletin here              https://mailchi.mp/coutreach/2026-april-e-bulletin-6066423?e=9aa0837e74

“I was speaking [with Thomas Keating] on this topic of unity, what a prayer of Christian unity and unity practice might be, and how it would relate to Centering Prayer. It was a lively topic for [Thomas]. And he said, “Well, it’s a very subtle thing. If you share it with people, it’s not easily communicated. You’re going to have to be very subtle yourself.” So you can almost call it subtle prayer, a kind of consciousness that’s always here, that we’re ‘living and moving and having our being in’, but we’re not awake and alive to it. So that’s what Centering Prayer practice does. It brings us into contact with something that is hidden and subtle and vast, but we need to be refined in our consciousness in order to experience it.”

David Frenette, from the 2026 January dialogue with Cynthia Bourgeault

Recording:
Cynthia Bourgeault and David Frenette in Dialogue
Nonduality and Unity Consciousness

In case you missed this free spiritual enrichment offered in early January, you may find the video recording here (about 60 minutes). If you would like to donate to support this free offering, you may do so here.

Q: … To avoid ‘thoughts’ during Centering Prayer, I find it helpful to pray in tongues, but I have never heard this mentioned in this connection…. Do you have some useful advice on this subject: pro or con?

A: Read the full question and Leslee’s response here.

+++

The full archive of Q&As can be found here.

Have questions? Submit your questions about your Centering Prayer practice or other contemplative practices, the spiritual journey and the contemplative life to any of our contributors by emailing pamela@coutreach.org.

You can read the complete e-bulletin at    https://mailchi.mp/coutreach/2026-january-e-bulletin?e=9aa0837e74

The spiral galaxy NGC 3285B, a member of the Hydra I cluster of galaxies. ESA/Hubble & NASA, R. J. Foley (UC Santa Cruz)

“We are dealing with the God whom we can know in some degree through
creation, through grace, and through sound teaching. That knowledge always
implies that we must develop practices that help human nature to heal its wounds, such as practices that are proposed by almost every religious tradition. This evolutionary healing process teaches, in effect, that creation was not a one-time event. Furthermore, it’s not only continuous, but going someplace – towards a divine relationship that involves the whole human family and not just the great mystics, in a movement into the Unknowable.

“The idea that this process is continuing, or maybe has just begun, is fascinating because there is no telling where it might go. The end is fairly clear in the words of the Bible which affirm that “God will be all in all.” Or, in the language of St. Paul, “Christ will be everything in everyone.” What does that mean?”

Thomas Keating, God is All in All: The Evolution of the Contemplative Christian Spiritual Journey

Q: I thought Centering Prayer was just for Christians. When reviewing your website, it seems that Buddhist, Sufi and others can use it to get close to God. But isn’t it only through Christ you can get that connection? Just wondering.

A: Read Lindsay’s response here.

You can read the complete bulletin at   https://mailchi.mp/coutreach/2025-oct-e-bulletin?e=9aa0837e74

February 21, 2018
Long conversation with TK. He is still in pain, but it is less constant than before. All the medications for pain make him very sick. He knows his vocation now is to suffer identified with the Passion of Christ and he is happy (his word) to live that vocation. His voice was strong.

March 1, 2018
TK’s request to me (and he was totally serious): “Pray for my conversion.” At that I laughed and replied that his conversion had taken place a long time ago. His answer: “Pray for my conversion that I may grow into deeper levels of faith and union.”

Telephone Conversations Between Thomas Keating & Isabel Castellanos
April 7, 2015 – October 31, 2018
See the full article in the July 2025 issue of the CO NEWS

The 2025 July issue of CO NEWS is now available online here, along with a full archive of previous issues.

In addition to the article mentioned above, you’ll find:

• Zen in a Christian Monastery – Fertile Ground, Open Mind, by Ron Barnett pg 7
• Letters from Thomas Keating – correspondence shared by Nancy Cord-Baran pg 9
• The First Consent: Our Basic Core of Goodness, by a practitioner of the prayer currently experiencing incarceration in California  pg 10
• Trusting in the Slow Work of God, by Patricia Hutchinson pg 11
• Eyes of Faith, by Walter Martinez, pg 13
• Resources & more pg 14

For the Complete E-bulletin go to    https://mailchi.mp/coutreach/2025-august-e-bulletin?e=9aa0837e74