Spirit Journal - April 2016 -

Preview

This April issue announces the date for our fifth annual Fall One Day Workshop, provides an introduction to the practice of Lectio Divina, offers a reflection on a recent visit to St. Benedict’s Monastery in Snowmass Colorado, and highlights several upcoming opportunities to deepen your Centering Prayer practice. It also presents Insights from Cynthia Bourgeault, Thomas Keating, Meister Eckhard, and Richard Rohr.

As always, we invite you to help us make Spirit Journal an interactive forum for Chicago-area contemplatives. Use the e-mail address at the end to send your ideas, contributions and feedback.

Save the Date: Annual Fall One-Day Workshop Coming October 15!

We know it’s early to ask you to start planning for October, but now would be an excellent time to block out Saturday October 15 so that you can attend our fifth annual Fall One-Day Centering Prayer Workshop, which will take place at Benedictine University in Lisle.

Each fall, Contemplative Outreach – Chicago sponsors a workshop offering in-depth introductory sessions on Centering Prayer, opportunities for silent contemplation, and a range of related topics to choose from. For example, last year’s agenda included sessions on Thomas Merton, Cosmology and Teilhard de Chardin, ways of listening and speaking to the Divine within, and the thoughts of Thomas Keating on Archetypes. The 2016 agenda is now under development and will be announced soon.

About 150 people participated in last fall’s workshop and the feedback we received from the attendees was extremely positive. The annual fall workshop offers a great opportunity to deepen your spiritual life and get to know others from around the Chicago region who follow a contemplative path. We hope you will consider joining us for the day.

Lectio Divina – A Complementary Practice

Many people who practice Centering Prayer find that another ancient practice, Lectio Divina, helps to augment the process of inner transformation. Unlike Centering Prayer, Lectio Divina is a participatory, active practice that uses thoughts, images and insights to enter into a conversation with God. The Latin phrase is difficult to translate precisely, but it may be thought of as “sacred reading” or “divine reading.”

During Lectio Divina, a person listens to the text of the Bible with the “ear of the heart,” as if he or she is in conversation with God, and God is suggesting the topics for discussion. The method of Lectio Divina includes moments of reading (lectio), reflecting on (meditatio), responding to (oratio) and resting in (contemplatio) the Word of God with the aim of nourishing and deepening one’s relationship with the Divine. Lectio Divina is an ancient practice from the Christian contemplative heritage. It was made a regular practice in monasteries by the time of St. Benedict in the 6th century.

You can find a lot more information about this practice on the national Contemplative Outreach website, or view this wonderful video introduction by Thomas Keating.

A Visit to St. Benedict’s Monastery, Snowmass Colorado – with Words of Encouragement from Father Thomas Keating

mountains snowmass — Photo: Gill Photography

by Alan Krema

This post was written on my way home from a recent five-day retreat at St. Benedict’s Monastery in Snowmass, Colorado. It was the first time I have visited there – the home of Fr. Thomas Keating and a Cistercian (Trappist) monastic community, part of a 900 year old tradition. The roots of the Order reach still further back to the Rule of St. Benedict, written 1,500 years ago. A small community of about 15 members, Snowmass has its own distinct personality and mission statement: “Through daily life in our Cistercian community, we aspire to be transformed in mind and heart by embodying Christ Jesus in ways appropriate to our times.”

The monastery is a place of prayer set in the beautiful Rocky Mountains. From any vantage point on the monastery grounds, you can see no other sign of activity other than the monastery itself, the retreat house, and farm buildings. Mountains surround you and, if I use my cosmic scale of time, these mountains walk on a fiery liquid lava bed, a geologic dance of creation. The beauty of nature here frames the presence I sense as vast and timeless. This is sacred space at the intersection of the valley in the mountain range and the small community dedicated to living prayer.

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As you may know, I recently accepted the invitation to serve as the new Coordinator for Contemplative Outreach – Chicago. I’ve been preparing to take that on, and so it was very serendipitous for me to attend a retreat at Contemplative Outreach’s place of origin. I have been trying to arrange a visit for a while and this turned up as a recent vacancy. It takes a bit of patience to reserve a place.

I was not attending an organized retreat, but I allowed the daily prayer routine of the monks to be my structure. I began after my arrival in early evening with vespers, the final prayer of the day. I was aware of a vast and deep presence in the chapel as I entered. I felt connected by the vibration of my heartbeat and the rhythm of my breathing.

The monks filed in, taking their place. The psalms were chanted in a resonant deep way, not with a focus on skill but with presence and interior emanation. Sometimes I could follow the words from a sheet, and other times not. Especially when I could not follow the words, I let the deep vibrations synchronize with my physical interior. These monks live faith as rhythm, a rhythm of chant, of praying the daily office, a rhythm of work and prayer, and a rhythm of a life felt as much as thought, on a scale that is simultaneously infinite and detailed.

The monks are happy to speak with the guests who come for daily mass. There is a meeting place in the bookstore, which is at the entrance to the cloister. The monks enthusiastically engage their rule of hospitality as they meet those who come. Anyone coming for the first time, like myself, is no longer a stranger once the prayer time is experienced and some of the monks welcome you afterward. It feels like a welcome home.

In conversation with one of the monks, I mentioned my acceptance to serve as Chicago chapter Coordinator. I was very surprised when, later the next day, this monk told me that Thomas Keating was interested in meeting me, to share and discuss news about the chapter. Thomas is very interested in our Chicago chapter. He remembers his visit here fondly, and we spoke of those he knew here. He sends best wishes to Phil Jackson, who has spent multiple retreats at St. Benedict’s, and he sends all of us his blessings and hopes for a fruitful future of communal participation in the work of the Spirit, in each of us and in us as a community.

Seek Your Own Level: Three Upcoming Opportunities to Deepen and Develop Your Centering Prayer Practice

After being introduced to Centering Prayer and practicing for some time, many people have an interest in attending workshops and retreats that offer the opportunity to deepen the contemplative experience.

Under the auspices of the national Contemplative Outreach organization, learning activities are offered that are designed to meet the needs of practitioners at various points along the spiritual path. Depending on how much experience you have with Centering Prayer, you may wish to consider participating in one of these three upcoming events:

Introductory Centering Prayer Workshop – July 16 – St. Charles Illinois

A great way to begin or solidify a regular practice of Centering Prayer. The presenters are specially trained and commissioned in teaching this short course, which covers the essentials and conceptual background of the method. After the first six-hour workshop, the program continues for 5-6 weeks with 90-minute gatherings to pray, view and discuss a video presentation by Fr. Thomas Keating and to support an emerging daily practice of Centering Prayer. For more information, visit the Healing Gardens website.

Intensive/Post Intensive Retreats – October 9-15 – Dittmer Missouri

Two different retreats will be offered simultaneously at the Il Ritiro Retreat Center, about an hour southwest of St. Louis. The Intensive Retreat provides an opportunity to deepen your established practice of Centering Prayer in an atmosphere of profound silence and community support. There are up to six thirty-minute Centering Prayer periods daily, and private interviews with the retreat guides may be scheduled. The Post-Intensive Retreat combines opportunities to further develop the practices of Centering Prayer and Lectio Divina in an atmosphere of profound silence. There are up to seven thirty-minute periods of Centering Prayer daily, and participants observe extended periods of Sacred Silence. (Previous participation in an eight- or ten-day Intensive Retreat is a prerequisite for the Post-Intensive.) For further information, please send an e-mail to cocemo1@gmail.com or call 573-864-1097.

Advanced/Post Intensive Retreats – August 12-18 – Benet Lake Wisconsin

Sponsored by Contemplative Outreach of Southeast Wisconsin, the Advanced/Post Intensive retreats will take place at St. Benedict’s Abbey and Retreat Center, about 90 minutes north of Chicago. These retreats will immerse participants in the practice of Centering Prayer. Participants will come together for prayer, liturgy and meal times, and the retreat will provide an atmosphere of silence, solitude and community. (The prerequisite for attending an Advanced/Post Intensive Retreat is previous attendance at an Intensive Retreat.) To find out more or to register, download this summer retreat flyer.

Insights

Most traditional methods of meditation aim for clarity of mind. Centering Prayer aims for purity (in other words, “singleness”) of heart.

– Cynthia Bourgeault

Consent is not an effort. Surrender is not an effort. And transformation is something only God can do. From that perspective, it should be easy. So, my heartfelt prayer for each of you is: Keep going! And, have invincible confidence that this is God’s work in you, and do not be afraid to ask that what he has begun in you might be completed.

– Thomas Keating

The eye with which I see God is the same one with which God sees me. My eye and God’s eye is one eye, and one sight, and one knowledge, and one love.

– Meister Eckhart

Enlightenment is to see and touch the big mystery, the big pattern, the Big Real. Jesus called it the kingdom of God; Buddha called it enlightenment. Philosophers might call it Truth. Many of us see it as a Foundational Love.

– Richard Rohr

Your Turn

Please write in to comment on or add to any of the items in this month’s newsletter. Let us know if you are aware of an upcoming event you think other contemplatives should know about. Send us an inspirational quote you’d like to share, or information about a book, website, podcast, or video you recommend. You are invited to contribute by emailing the newsletter editor at news@centeringprayerchicago.org.