Voices of the Community
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Voices of Community
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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 [...]
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Voices of Community
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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 [...]
Title:
A New Tree
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Voices of Community
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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 [...]
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Voices of Community
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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 [...]
Title:
Words of Power
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Voices of Community
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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 [...]
Title:
Presence in the Silence
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Voices of Community
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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 [...]
Title:
Centering Prayer is …
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Voices of Community
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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 [...]
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Voices of Community
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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, [...]
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Voices of Community
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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 [...]
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Voices of Community
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Anything less than a contemplative perspective on lifeis an almost certain program for unhappiness. – Father Thomas Keating Recently a group from Las Vegas enjoyed [...]
Title:
A Centering Prayer
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Voices of Community
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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 [...]
Title:
A Heartfulness Practice
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Voices of Community
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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 [...]
Title:
Why Do I Sit in Silence?
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Voices of Community
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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 [...]
Title:
Yahuwah’s Love
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Voices of Community
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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… [...]
Title:
A Quiet Communion
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Voices of Community
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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 [...]
Title:
Walking Into the Dawn
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Voices of Community
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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 [...]
Title:
The Silent Call
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Voices of Community
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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 [...]
Title:
But
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Voices of Community
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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 [...]
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Voices of Community
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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 [...]
Title:
Given to Me
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Voices of Community
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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 [...]
Title:
One Step
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Voices of Community
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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 [...]
Title:
Lessons
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Voices of Community
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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 [...]
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Voices of Community
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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 [...]
Series:
Voices of Community
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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. [...]
Series:
Voices of Community
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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 [...]
