Contemplative Outreach News
Volume
23, Number 1 · December 2007
Quick Links
Breathed by the Spirit By Fr. Thomas
Keating ~ From the President ~ New
Resources ~ Outreach
Reader's Reflections ~ Resource
Faculty ~ The Spanish Corner ~ Regional
Updates
From
the President
Vedanta Presentation
Love, The Free Flow of Grace
by Gail Fitzpatrick-Hopler, President
Editor’s Note:
Vedanta is one of the world’s most ancient religious philosophies, affirming
the oneness of existence, the divinity of the soul, and the harmony of
religions.
This article was excerpted from my keynote presentation at the
annual Vedanta Society Memorial Day Inter- Faith Retreat held in Olema,
California. For almost thirty years this retreat has featured an inter-faith
dialogue. Spiritual seekers from all faiths are invited. Over the past thirty
years, the group has increased to over 1,000 persons in attendance.
Fr. Thomas was the keynote speaker in the late 80’s and this
year it was my pleasure to present Centering Prayer and the Christian
contemplative dimension of the Gospel under a large tent that was erected in a
beautiful, park-like environment for this special occasion.
Swami
Yuktatmananda of St. Petersburg, Florida spoke on a similar topic from the
standpoint of Vedanta.
Christian message is Love—to love one another as Christ has
loved us and to love our neighbor as ourselves.”
Love is the energy that relates us one to another as human
beings. It unites each of us to the center of ourselves and, beyond that center,
to the Indwelling Spirit. The love that we share is fueled by God’s love for
us. It is an endless supply of love flowing through us. As Christians, we call
it Grace.
We can’t isolate ourselves from interacting with others; our
families, friends, neighbors, anyone we meet in our daily encounters. Unless we
behave in a loving way—starting with loving ourselves—we are not allowing
the love of God to flow. We can’t say, “I love God, but I don’t love my
neighbor.”
Contemplative living cultivates the freedom to say and do what
the Spirit prompts us to say or do, without exceptions or conditions. Keeping an
open heart, mind and intention, refreshed daily by our Centering Prayer
practice, is vitally important. We begin to grasp that, as we sit in silence
each day, we are holding and supporting one another in the energy of love.
It is an approach from “the ground up” to being human, to
being lovers of God and lovers of one another.
In the silence the only thing we have to do is to be present
and open. The Spirit does the work. The Spirit binds us to each other and we let
go of our thoughts that separate us. That is to say, we let go of judgments,
assumptions and opinions of who we are and who others are, and remain open to
find out the truth of who we really are in God.
Whether
we are Christian, Jewish, Buddhist, or Hindu is not important. These words label
our belief systems. What we share and what human condition. If we let go and let
God live our lives for us and act from a place of love, transformation is
possible. We find that differences can be resolved and peace can be part of our
lived experience. Grace, then, is the recognition that there is no separation
between us and all that is good and true.
Contrary to popular opinion about the nature of contemplation—that
it is simply a withdrawal into oneself—contemplation is both silence and
action. Contemplation places us in the immediacy of open presence, which is
living life as it is one moment at a time.
The humble giving of ourselves, one to the other, in order to
understand the movements of love and the free flow of Grace with open
heartfulness is the joy that is lying in wait for us through the contemplative
life.
Quick Links
Breathed by the Spirit By Fr. Thomas
Keating ~ From the President ~ New
Resources ~ Outreach
Reader's Reflections ~ Resource
Faculty ~ The Spanish Corner ~ Regional
Updates
