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introduction

questions that persist

birth of the foundation

centering prayer

the beginning of the story

st. paul

centering prayer as a way of transformation

thoughts matter

contemplative service

blocks along the way

losing our way

guide/angel

vision for the future

internal monastery

CONTEMPLATIVE SERVICE   

When we open our eyes after the stillness and silence of a Centering Prayer session, we re-enter the external world and we resume the tasks of everyday life. How do we keep alive the spirit of contemplation as we engage these everyday tasks?

 We bring the very practice of presence with us.  During the time of prayer, we “let go to” the Divine Presence and Action. In deep stillness and silence, we are completely present to the moment. After the prayer we continue to be present; now we are present to what we are doing. If we are cooking, we cook; if eating, we eat; if listening, we listen; if engaged in a complex mathematical or legal matter, this is what we do. However sophisticated, however simple the task, we are attentive to it. It is the quality of our presence that transforms our actions. We bring the Presence of God to whom we are with and to what we do. We engage in contemplative action.   

And with the What of Attention and the How of Presence, there is also the Why. Why do we do what we do? Intention is everything, as Keating tells us. But our intentions can be very mixed. At a conscious level we can choose a given intention only to be driven by other unconscious motives.  Where we are coming from is critical to intention. Are we driven by our instinctual needs so that, while our action might appear to be a response to God’s Will or service in His name, we are instead attempting to meet our own need for survival and security, our desire for pleasure and esteem, our drive for power and control? Or any combination of these and other biological or psychological needs?  

To what extent can we “let go” of the consuming force of all of this and rest at a deeper level within ourselves, rest in the Divine Presence, and act from there? Action that springs from the love of God is qualitatively different from action that has its source anywhere else.

 In this, as in all else, attentiveness is crucial. Unless we are aware, we will be driven by our unconscious motivations. We need “to catch” ourselves in the moment so that we purify our intention and allow it to come increasingly from the love of God within us.  Keating reminds us that, “When attention to the present moment and a pure intention are established as habits, then we have, in the fullest sense of the word, contemplative service.”[1]