Volume 21,  Number 2 · January / June 2006

The Contemplative Life Program 

We invited subscribers to the Contemplative Life Program 
to share their experiences thus far. Here are some of the stories we received.

Deepened Relationship & Sustaining Connection

I practiced Centering Prayer more than twenty years ago for a period of several years during a particularly difficult time of my life. Amidst the chaos of caring for a cancer-stricken wife who was slowly dying, Christian meditation offered me great consolation. Unfortunately, because of several watershed experiences, I was beginning to develop spiritual hubris. The Holy Spirit, in Her great wisdom, removed this from me by taking me into a deep, dry valley of spiritual desert and desolation. 

Since that time, I have always been peripherally interested in Contemplative Outreach and have continued to read, study and pray, as best as I knew how. When the Contemplative Life Program was offered to me, I felt I was being called to Centering Prayer once again. 

Though the experiences of my earlier years have remained fresh within me, I began the program considering myself a novice. The modules have produced in me a spiraling effect. As the Welcoming Prayer has begun to enhance Centering Prayer and Lectio is likewise becoming augmented by Discernment Practice, I am beginning to view the components as themselves modules of rest and activity. Welcoming is itself an Active acceptance coming as it does after the Passive receptivity required in Centering Prayer, whereas Lectio as Listening seems more receptive to the Active questioning required in Discernment Practice. 

I am again within a very difficult time of my life. Learning to pray in the will of God and yet continuing to ask and knock as a disciple of Jesus, I have been gratefully answered as I have received the divine solution to a severe health problem. Listening and waiting in the silence is bearing much fruit, and although I am not quite sure how to pray the Discernment Prayer, I have turned over a problem concerning my daughter to the Lord since I don't have the answer. 

I thank God and all the authors of the Contemplative Life Program that I have been given this vehicle to sustain me in my efforts to continue to learn to pray more deeply. The blessings of the Risen Lord on us all! 

John DeSantis, Bronx, NY

A Lot of Chaff is Falling Away

“Thank you for the opportunity to share with you one of my experiences over the last five months. There have been more. I feel I am being winnowed like the wheat from the chaff and a lot of chaff is falling away.”

Today I need to tell my cleaning lady that I will be cleaning my own bathrooms (all three of them) not because she wasn't doing a good job but because something has changed between us. I vowed a long time ago to keep our relationship professional. I would not make the same mistakes my mother did. While we would sit at one end of the table for lunch, speaking in English, our domestic help would sit at the other end, conversing in Spanish. It was a forced togetherness, to say the least. My solution was to simply not invite my help to lunch. Besides, I reasoned she would probably rather go home for her break.

When my cleaning lady had her second baby, she would move the infant carrier from room to room as she cleaned, including going up and down the stairs. I was impressed how strong she was within a month after delivery. When the baby would cry, I would rock the carrier a few times, but never pick her up to comfort her. That would be over stepping the boundaries and I wanted to maintain a respectful distance. 

I needed a cleaning lady because I was doing important things like volunteering at the school and church and responding to the needs of a large extended family. My time, as well as my children's, was too valuable to be spent cleaning bathrooms. For my cleaning lady however, I presumed this was a step up from working the fields from dawn to dusk. She must have been grateful to have a warm, dry house to work in and steady year round employment. 

Lately though, I began to notice how she wrapped up a piece of toast that I would have thrown away or rinse out a pair of disposable gloves and hang them to dry. Somehow she kept her dignity intact when accepting the bags and bags of cast off clothes that my family grew tired of, even as I was growing a little embarrassed by the closets that were always full. Someone was cleaning the lens of my eyes. 

A transforming process, seeded long ago, was beginning to bear fruit. I first heard a sermon about contemplative prayer from a diocesan priest. Two years later, I sought the spiritual direction of a Carmelite priest who introduced me to St. John of the Cross. I read the entire Collected Works of St. John of the Cross one summer, not in the quiet cell of a monastery but in my car waiting at soccer practices. 

"We go by a way we know not…" melded into my psyche. My spiritual director left for Uganda and on my own, I began to allow distractions to pull me away. Three years went by. 

When the Contemplative Life Program was offered by Contemplative Outreach, I thought maybe this would help me get back on track. It was just too hard to practice alone. When the fourth book was late, I actually became anxious, afraid I would slip back into my old ways. 

Providently, the fourth book arrived on the day I finished an intensive 80 hour Spanish course. I understood how to conjugate verbs but I couldn't speak a sentence in conversation. Determined to master this new skill, I set out to practice with my cleaning lady and something profound occurred "You say it in English and I'll say it in Spanish" she offered softly and gently. And so began the humbling experience of being led by my new maestra into, not just the language of Spanish, but her separate world. A key was beginning to turn in the lock and I was being admitted into the private place of her culture that could only be accessed by leaving all pretensions behind. 

Nothing could pass through the eye of this needle except the essence of one's self. I am being led "by a way I know not…" I now stand before my cleaning lady stripped bare of social, educational, economic superiority and see her as my sister in Christ, my maestra and friend. We will clean this house together; just leave the bathrooms for me and my children to do. 

Mary J. Mcgoffin, Sedro Woolley, WA

A Map and Compass 

A few years ago I found out about Centering Prayer and decided to jump in that boat with the enthusiasm of someone who really has no idea where she was going. 

Unfortunately I was alone in that boat, with no map and no compass and eventually dropped out. But I was hooked and came back for more: the CLP allowed me to get more. 

Not only did it bring some direction and teaching to my spiritual life but it made it very real in living my daily, ordinary life. Events and circumstances don't seem to hit me as hard as they used to; there is a "built in zone of peace" around me which somehow protects me from going into a spiral like I used to. 

Watching the news used to touch me, but in that superficial manner of someone who feels that she is supposed to feel bad, but then move on. I used to think that there was no other way; that violence, wars, hatred were just part of life, were "normal". 

Today even though I am not drafting laws, or marching down in the streets to protest, I feel much more involved in other people's sufferings. I feel that there is another way. Centering is a way for me to share in their lives and somehow to make a difference. Centering can change people's hearts not only the practitioner's. 

As much as I love the welcoming prayer, I do find it too long when things are happening too fast. I found that coming back to my sacred word instead was very helpful to remain centered. The discerning process: that was a tough one. The first thing to discern was what to discern about! And I had a long list at my finger tips. Eventually it did help me to focus on what I really was supposed to do instead of what I thought I had to do. 

As processes kept on being taught I found myself overwhelmed by the amount of material presented, and how or when to use it. This time I was not alone in my boat and got some very helpful answers from Pamela [Pamela Gursoy is the CLP program coordinator] who took the time to share her own personal experiences with me.

Every day when I practice my centering I put a "Don't disturb" sign on my door: almost like my sacred word this is the sign of my consent, and for my children the understanding that being alone with God is a good place to be. I thank CLP for teaching me that too. 

Isabelle Robinson, Reston, Virginia

Consent 

Since consenting to participate and deepen our practice through the CLP, I'm aware of being more mindful of God's presence and my motivation for doing whatever I'm doing in prayer, work and in relationship with others. Is my intention one of love for God or am I acting out of self-interest? 

We often say how blessed we are in having this connection with Contemplative Outreach to support us on the Journey. We've increased our centering prayer time to an hour most mornings and every late afternoon. 

Anne and Jim Byrne, Cape May Court House, NJ

I am not alone 

Enrolling in the Contemplative Life Program has renewed my Centering Prayer Practice. The emphasis on the guidance of the Holy Spirit who transcends all bounds has enormous appeal. It reminds me to focus on the similarities among all people. 

As I do the practice, I become increasingly aware of my creaturehood and great dependence on God as I simultaneously also become aware of my own divinity and my growth towards Divine Union. The practice tends to bring to awareness the feeling of the presence of God and his promised abiding sense of interior peace. 

Oftentimes, the awareness that I am not alone and never have been will surface. This sense often remains throughout stressful situations. It takes the bite out of harsh feelings of anger, hatred, and negativity and leaves them as shells of their former selves which soon collapse and vanish only to rise once again with the false self when challenges must be faced. 

This cycle of awareness and unawareness along with the accompanying learning and relearning takes place time and again on the journey until, finally, I learn to trust at profoundly deeper levels in God's Will for me. 

Centering Prayer increases my openness to and awareness of other, more complex and evolved states of consciousness which we are able to attain through grace and the overwhelming generosity of God. I like to think about the Goodness, Love, and Mercy of God rather than my own ignorance. I may be, in part, an ignorant creature living in illusions but I am also a divine daughter becoming aware of my union with Christ. 

The Kingdom is now. Divine Union begins now. It's our inability to see this that causes so much needless distress. The Contemplative Life Program gives us the tools to enhance our seeing. Along with the enjoyable experiences of life; betrayal, rejection, scandal, sorrow, and pain are also seen as teachers. Reframing with the x-ray eyes of faith, learning to hear more clearly, becoming aware of the simultaneous existence of various levels of consciousness in myself and others are some of the tools of transformation found as I practice. 

The Contemplative Life Program joins me with others as I participate in this meaningful and purposeful practice. 

Diana Blaschak, Windber, PA

The Fruits 

“Put off your old nature (false self)... and be renewed in the spirit of your minds, and put on the new nature (true self), created after the likeness of God.... (Ephesians 4:22,23). 

That to me is the heart of the Contemplative Life Program. I rejoice in how the Holy Spirit has worked through this transforming program to free me to love and to live in God. 

Centering Prayer is not new to me; I have been meditating daily for 33 years, but through the CLP I have recommitted to doing it twice a day for at least 30 minutes each time. 

CP has been the doorway through which I have awakened to the Presence of God at the heart of all being. I¹m the type that tends to go mountain climbing over molehills; CP has helped me to move from being “anxious and troubled about many things” to staying my mind on the “one thing needful”. 

Through the dark valleys and desert places, it has been a sustaining and strengthening practice that has helped me to grow. The effects of CP overflow into daily life with a sense of resting in God even in the midst of activity. 

In my work as a counselor and spiritual director, CP has helped me to become more aware of the needs and the beauty of each unique self, which is sometimes buried beneath layers of fear, guilt, or resentment, and of the Presence and action of God, loving us into wholeness and divine union. 

The Welcoming Prayer is a new practice for me, although God has been teaching me for years to “give thanks in everything”. I have found WP to be a wonderful tool for countering the resistance of the false self and accepting life as it is, knowing that God is working through all for our healing and growth. What a relief it is to let go of the strain of trying to manipulate life to meet our needs, and instead to relax into the goodness of God underlying all creation. 

Another benefit of this program has been connecting with others on the spiritual journey. I have found a “Partner in Grace” that confronts me when I am wandering off into the past or the future and helps me to live in the eternal Now. It is a joy and a wonderful support to be in contact with someone who understands the struggles of the soul on the spiritual path. 

I am a third-order Franciscan Oblate in The Little Sisters of St. Clare, and part of our mission is “to bring the contemplative spirituality of St. Clare out of the cloister and into our churches, being grounded in the roots of the past, while finding wings for the future.” The CLP is an excellent tool for doing exactly that. Recently, we began offering a Lectio Divina group in our Episcopal Church, and it’s amazing how the Holy Spirit speaks to us and through us, bringing new light to familiar Scriptures. 

As I start the fourth module of the program, which is on discernment, I am so grateful for this transforming way of life. Thank you so much for providing it for those of us that hunger for the fullness of God. 

Sr. Jeanne-Marie (Karen) Williamson, O/LSSC, Sequim, WA

Bloodroot, a forest floor plant native to the north woods of Minnesota, grows in the natural woods close to my back door. In early spring before the leaves of the canopy emerge, the bloodroot stems poke out of the nearly frozen ground. Leaves are vertical with two sides pressed together shielding the emerging tender buds. As the season progresses. the flowers turn to fruit, and the leaves grow larger and move to horizontal positions ready to capture the sun’s rays filtered through a canopy of elderberry, dogwood, Juneberry, and maple leaves. 

Through participation in the Contemplative Life Program with the Centering Prayer, Welcoming Prayer, and Lectio Divina modules , I have felt like a bud surrounded by protective leaves. Beginning to let go more fully through the silence of prayer, through the welcoming of feelings and situations, through the Word’s formation and shaping—these have been and are the sun, rain, and soil of God’s love and mercy. Now, as I enter the discernment module which addresses major life questions, God will need to grow my leaves more broadly to catch the rays of His love falling on me through the canopy of the world’s unceasing tears. I am thankful that I have experienced the shielded season and know it is there with me continually. “Bli kvar i min kärlek (Abide in My love).” 

Helen Carlson, Duluth, Minnesota Bloodroot