Voices of the Community
Voices of Community
What is the relevance of a contemplative practice today? What fruits have you noticed in your life and what do you understand by the purification process? With the rapid evolution [...]
Voices of Community
Dear Fr. Thomas and Contemplative Outreach associates, I’m grateful to God for Fr. Thomas’ inspired vision in founding Contemplative Outreach 30 years ago, and for the many following years of [...]
A New Tree
Voices of Community
To see with new eyes the Christmas treeIs but an outward showOf a deeper realityThat we have come to know. For isn’t the Christmas tree,Hung with ornaments aplentyA deep reminder [...]
Voices of Community
Kneeling in a vast hemispherical hall, I am surrounded by what seem to me must be the souls of all who have ever lived and of all those who ever [...]
Words of Power
Voices of Community
God brought the beasts before Adamand he gave to each a name:bull, pig, goat, sheep, dog.His children called them by their names,and lo! they came when called.So shamans and savants [...]
Presence in the Silence
Voices of Community
I had been working as a hospital chaplain for just a few months, when one morning I visited a patient (let’s call her Joan) who was due to have complicated [...]
Centering Prayer is …
Voices of Community
Centering prayer is cuddling with Christ.Centering prayer is taking out the trash of the subconscious.Centering prayer is releasing a handful of helium balloons; a heart-full of joy.Centering prayer is laying [...]
Voices of Community
About five years ago, I was searching for a spiritual practice. One day, a notice appeared in our local paper about an event called “A Taste of Silence.” The rest, [...]
Voices of Community
Sometimes, I am goodness, truth & beautyand sometimes I act upon another nature,superimposed on mea life mask over my innocent self,the mask is made of projections, assumptions, and judgements [...]
Voices of Community
Anything less than a contemplative perspective on lifeis an almost certain program for unhappiness. – Father Thomas Keating Recently a group from Las Vegas enjoyed [...]
A Centering Prayer
Voices of Community
O Holy Spirit please,please seal my soulinto your service. Let silence soarwithin our boundless beingthat I may wakento our wonder of oneness. Let me sit in stillnessand know that You [...]
A Heartfulness Practice
Voices of Community
I suspect that whatever has occurred in my life in this regard has, to a significant extent, been a gift that I have received through my practice and involvement related [...]
Why Do I Sit in Silence?
Voices of Community
Why do I sit in silence?I sit in silence to be with God.I sit in silence so God can act in me.I sit in silence to forget me.I sit in [...]
Yahuwah’s Love
Voices of Community
Yahuwah, as a child in your Garden offering You your flowers,You smile tenderly and hold me in your arms for hours.|Yahuwah, I live in your Heart, offering You your Love… [...]
A Quiet Communion
Voices of Community
All things must have a start, even times of quiet contemplation. After several days of hard cold rain on the Northern California coast ones thinking can become gray as the [...]
Walking Into the Dawn
Voices of Community
Before setting out for morning services, John and I stood outside of our hermitage, which overlooked the valley and the monastery below, and gazed into the pre-dawn sky; the same [...]
The Silent Call
Voices of Community
Step inside and bolt the door.The inner room is now secure.Distractions quelled from busy mind,The Lord of Hosts is here to dine. This daily banquet with our LordIs fullness of [...]
But
Voices of Community
What would you doIf you were givenBut just one more day to live? “I’d spend it with a loved one”“I’d conquer every fear”“I’d grab life by the horns,And do all [...]
Voices of Community
I was overwhelmed by constant, intense, thoughts and feelings of fear. At the time, I believed that if I was just ‘right with God’, or, became a ‘better Christian’, these [...]
Given to Me
Voices of Community
In May of 2008, I attended a Centering Prayer Presenter-Formation Retreat at St. Mary’s Retreat Center, Sewanee, Tennessee. On the night of May 18, we all participated in group lectio [...]
One Step
Voices of Community
We gather at the noon hourMorning choices made, now past;Silence at table, sit wonderingIf the insights will last. I’ve been here many times beforeWell, in this kind of holy place;Impatient [...]
Lessons
Voices of Community
The Real only comes to some-to those listening. To those whocan endure the fathomless silence,starting first in your core, then spreadingthroughout the room,through shut windows. It takes time to hear, sometimes [...]
Voices of Community
1. The Rock – a living relationship with Christ Jesus urges his followers to build on rock and not on sand (Mt. 7.24 – 27). In South Africa we have [...]
Voices of Community
The slippery slope of questioning the fundamentals of belief …. I slid off AND.. found GOD; GOD bigger than our beliefs, than our understanding, than our constructs to understand God. [...]
Voices of Community
It is the wailing and the weepingThat wakes the will to repentInfinite happiness is the soul’s birthrightAnd all unhappiness comesFrom selling it for a pot of porridgeWhich leaves the soul [...]