Will You Know Him?
08 May 2011 2 Comments
in Centering Prayer, Jesus, Luke, Prayer, Spiritual Growth Tags: Christ, Emmaus, Luke
Most everyone is familiar with the story of the two disciples who meet Jesus on the road to Emmaus.
We are told the trip is some seven miles, so we may assume the trip took a good two hours, and probably a bit more. Moreover, Jesus stayed and had dinner with the two.
It was in the “breaking of the bread” that the eyes of the disciples was opened, and they realized it had been Jesus who had been with them.
Always a strange story. Yet, the post resurrection stories seem to reflect this kind of mystery again and again. We are forced to conclude that Jesus in his risen state is somehow different. Even Mary does not recognize him at first, thinking him the gardener.
We ask ourselves why is the glorified Jesus so very different from the earthly one? And I am forced to conclude that this is really not the case. What is going on here, in my opinion, is the author’s attempt to present the Christ as something quite different from what was imagined or thought of as Jesus the Nazarene.
What do I mean by this?
No more than what Jesus preached again and again–those who were caught up in old ways of thinking cannot “see” what he is talking about. They were limited by their “world view” in deciphering his message.
We see this in the rather amusing aside of the disciples telling Jesus what happened to Him in Jerusalem. At one point they say: “Our own hope had been that he would be the one to set Israel free.”
These two saw Jesus as the traditional Messiah, predicted to one day come and defeat the powers of Rome.
And we have seen, that to some degree, all the disciples for some period of time, minutes or hours, also did not “see” the risen Christ.
They were looking for Jesus, and were blind to the Christ before them.
We too can fail to “see”.
We too have our own worldview. Our own conceptions of who this man Jesus was and is. We have expectations of how and when he will “return”, as if he is somehow not yet here.
Some of us spend altogether too much time reading and studying, attempting to define Him, attempting to discover the definitive Jesus, the definitive sayings of Jesus. We seek to “know” Him perfectly.
More and more, I am convinced that we never will by this method. Not that it is not a laudable thing to do, for it certainly is. But it will only take us so far.
The Jesus who lives today is not discernible through a book or even through scripture. He is known only within us and in others. He lives forever in our hearts and souls and awaits us there. If we are to know him, we must become silent and then we must wait.
We must wait, even when nothing at all seems to be happening. We must trust that it is happening. We must let the healing and the teaching go on within, in a mind quieted of all the noise of everyday affairs.
We most assuredly must seek him in the depths of every being we encounter, for he is there, perhaps buried deep, but still there.
We must seek him in events, awful and wondrous.
We must seek him in the birds of the sky, and the chipmunk on the stump.
We must seek him in the storm and in the clouds.
In the oceans, streams and vast sands of the desert.
In the rocks and canyons, in vistas breathtaking.
In the dandelion and in the ditch lily.
Will you know Him?
Amen.
**Luke 24:13-35
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Rediscovering Ourselves
04 Apr 2011 4 Comments
in Centering Prayer, God, Lent, Prayer, Spiritual Growth Tags: centering prayer, God, Lent, meditation, spiritual growth
One of the complaints against meditation, is that it is seen as self-involved. In other words, it is perceived as all about me. And many in the religious world don’t like that.
Which is ironic in a sense, since so much of Christian teaching is all about personal salvation–what to do to get to heaven. If that isn’t me oriented, I don’t know what is.
Meditation is often seen as but a different method of psychoanalysis, a way to integrate the total personality, stirring up the dark sides of ourselves, healing and putting ourselves all back together in a package that can more successfully live.
Meditation does function in this way, or can, but it is but a stepping stone. It is a dangerous one in that some folks think that this is the goal, when they are still far from the end of the journey.
We often think of meditation as breaking down and eliminating that “ego” self that is afraid, that is needy, that is demanding of protection at all costs. Yet this is wrong too. It is truly to integrate those aspects of our “public” persona with the real “me” deeply in touch with the divine, but submerged under layers of sludge that is the ego.
If this were not the case, if the real point was the destruction of the ego as a false image, then every “successful” practitioner of meditation, would be a carbon copy of every other practitioner. All uniqueness would have vanished. Surely this is not what God intends.
So the true end of the journey is the integration of the perfect divine me still much hidden to me, with those aspects of personality that make me unique and special. Thus unified, the “new person” in Christ goes forth to act in the world with the “mind of Christ” firmly in charge and operational.
Centering Prayer, with its devotion to self-emptying, is the perfect vehicle for this transformation and reunion. All is let go, both good and bad thoughts, to allow the work of the Spirit to proceed with vigor. Each release is a new “yes” to God that we are willing to be led.
Say yes today.
Amen.
Now is the Winter of Our Discontent
30 Mar 2011 2 Comments
in Centering Prayer, God, Jesus, Lent, Spiritual Growth, St. Theresa of Avila Tags: desert time, dryness, God, Jesus, Lent, spiritual journey, St. Theresa of Avila
May nothing disturb you.
May nothing astonish you.
Everything passes.
God does not go away.
Patience
can attain anything.
He who has God within,
does not lack anything.
God is enough!“ [St. Theresa of Avila]
We have been engaged in Lent for a while now. The newness, the excitement of our dedication, the solemnity with which we approached each discipline, are waning. We are feeling dry. We find excuses–”I just don’t have time today,” or “I don’t think this is a meaningful practice after all.”
We see the long path still ahead. We are weary already.
Imagine how Jesus felt. Whether his 40-day trek in the desert, or his never-ending mission of radical openness. A friend pointed this out to me recently. Jesus was the Outsider, the one misunderstood by almost everyone, vilified by some, ignored utterly by others. How broad and endless must his desert have seemed to him.
St. Teresa informs us how to handle this difficult time. It is not very different from what we learn in Centering Prayer. Surrender, be patient, let nothing disturb you, either good or bad. It is all the same. God is within, fall into the heart. God is ever there.
I’ve received conflicting advice as to how to handle the dry times. My inclination is to become more intense and devoted to ritual. It is the doing, rather than the meaningfulness (for that is never there in times of dryness) that is key.
Others have advised that one strip away all but essential practice, clear the decks if you will.
Perhaps both are equally valid, one works one time, another, another.
What is essential I feel, is what Teresa suggests, let nothing disturb you. Lent is the time of introspection, reflection and quiet.
Her remark that “everything passes” is excellent advice. Everyone from Buddha to your neighborhood psychoanalysist would tell you that. It is the way of getting past our melancholia. We who have lived sufficient years know how very true this is. Our dryness too will pass.
Soon, we will begin to feel the stirring of the coming Easter, that which we have waited for. Until then, rest. For God is within.
Amen.
Bootcamp In Gethsemane
16 Mar 2011 4 Comments
in Centering Prayer, God, Jesus, Lent, Luke, Prayer, Spiritual Growth Tags: agony in the Garden, centering prayer, Gethsemane, God, Jesus, Lent, Luke
One of my Lenten practices this year is to give serious attention once again to meditation.
I say once again, since I’ve engaged in meditation on and off for some years. I guess you could conclude that it has been somewhat “unsuccessful.”
Although we are cautioned not to “expect” anything in meditation, I suspect we all do. After months of practice with no discernable “improvement” I get discouraged.
Yet, I know it is one of the most valuable practices in our spiritual journey. I decided, after reading Cynthia Bourgeault’s book on Mary Magdalene, reviewed here, that I would get her book on centering prayer and read it during Lent.
I’ve so far found it a rich land. She calls centering prayer, the “boot camp in Gethsemane”. I like the idea of that.
When we think of Christ’s “agony in the garden” referred to in the Gospel of Luke, we think of his intensity, so great that his sweat “fell to the ground like great drops of blood.” I take this as metaphor for the depth of his immersion in God.
We seek in Lent to traverse the agonies of Christ, to touch his deeply felt pain, his exquisite determination to do as God wanted, overcoming his natural human fear. We seek to fall into God in the same completeness that he enjoyed and achieved.
That is what makes our meditation efforts real “work.” But not work of endurance or exertion. It is more singular determination, to sit in radical openness to God. We learn that it is in this willingness to sit that God comes to us, and does his will upon us in the deepest places within us.
As Rev. Bourgeault says, we are largely unaware of this going on. It goes on in the continual turning toward God, in those brief moments before our thoughts intrude once again. As she reports, the great centering prayer teacher Thomas Keating replied to a nun whose first attempt was a failure in her eyes because “ten thousand thoughts went through my mind”:
“How lovely. Ten thousand opportunities to return to God.”
And for me, this makes centering prayer wonderfully cushioning. It delivers from me any “need” to worry about progress. For I am told that most of what is accomplished is done secretly, in the depths of my inner being. There God explains and “I” put into practice the words of Jesus,
“Nevertheless, let your will be done, not mine.”
Amen.
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Waiting in the Silence
12 Mar 2011 8 Comments
in Centering Prayer, God, Lent, Prayer, Spiritual Growth Tags: contemplative prayer, God, Lent, meditation
“The Father spoke one word from all eternity and he spoke it in silence and it is in silence that we hear it.” ~~St. John of the Cross
Or as Thomas Keating says, “silence is God’s first language.”
We all know about prayer, the petitions and thanksgiving we offer unto our Creator each day. But silence is perhaps the best prayer of all, it is the offering up of our spirit, open, vulnerable, needing.
It is our surrender to God and most of all it is listening. As those who teach this kind of prayer tell us, we may be totally unaware of anything transpiring, but during this time, when we quiet ourselves and simply sit, the communion of engaged fully, transforming, reordering our inner being.
We listen, we wait, and God’s gentle direction will come.
It seems that every faith tradition has some form of this type of prayer. We can call it Centering Prayer, or Mindfulness, or Contemplative, or Zen Meditation. It is the prayer of the Desert Fathers and Mothers, the prayer of mystics around the world. It is quieting ourselves and allowing the Creator to move within us.
Let us find time each day to wait in the silence.
Amen
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