January e-bulletin

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“The divine action in daily life and prayer is working with incredible wisdom. It provides us with the same situations over and over again, until we are completely detached all the way down to the soles of our feet. We can postpone this process by disregarding it, but the vocation we have and which we are trying to transmit to others is a desire for a state of mind that does not get discouraged by difficulties. It allows the Spirit to join us in our difficulties.”

Thomas Keating
Illuminations of Love: Words of Thomas Keating, O.C.S.O
illustrations by Meridith Schifsky

Q: I facilitate a contemplation group and there is a challenging man who clearly has anger issues and likes to argue about whatever has been read. How should I deal with this? I find it quite upsetting and disturbing.

A: Read Josie’s response here.

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You can read the complete bulletin at     https://mailchi.mp/coutreach/2025-jan-e-bulletin?e=9aa0837e74

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Kreg Yingst @psalmprayers

Incarnatio continua 
The Incarnation continues in you, as you.
We wish you a blessed Christmas season living the Light into this world.

“God is manifesting in each moment as the human consciousness in each of us. As the Canadian Jesuit Bernard Lonergan (1904–1984) said, ‘We are the icons of God.’ God experiences Godself in us and awakens God’s dispositions in us, especially humility, forgiveness, and compassion. God receives God’s own love from us in the Spirit and delights in sharing with us the Trinitarian life of total self-giving.”

Thomas Keating
Reflections on the Unknowable

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“The Advent mystery is the beginning of the end of all in us that is not yet Christ.”

Thomas  Merton
Seasons of Celebration

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Q: I have ADHD and I love to use the ideas from the book Praying in Color. Am I praying contemplatively if I use paint or drawing to center myself so I can listen for God? No matter what group I have belonged to, the idea of contemplative prayer is to be still and let go of inner distraction through breathing or a mantra. I know inner distractions are part of being human but sitting still is not easy for me.  

A: Read David’s response here

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You can read the complete e-bulletin at      https://mailchi.mp/coutreach/2024-dec-e-bulletin?e=9aa0837e74

 

November e-bulletin

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“We often project onto others what we most dislike in ourselves. This is why to bring our prayer life into confrontation with the reality of daily life, with its unexpected happenings and ups and downs, is a very important part of the purification and transformative process, and has been called ‘the discipline of the Holy Spirit’.”

Thomas Keating
Heartfulness: Transformation in Christ
($6 USD; available as hardcopy and digital PDF)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Q: … During the last few months I get very sleepy during the prayer (especially the second session) and I very often fall asleep, sometimes even for a few hours. I understand it is fine to fall asleep during the prayer. However, falling asleep after the prayer is inconvenient and it makes me feel the prayer is “stealing” my free time this way. … 

A: Read the full question and Joy’s response here.

 

 

 
 

Chronic Pain and Chronic Illness: Wisdom for the Journey
by Kimberly Yaeger, Grand Island, New York, USA

” … I’m not sure how to describe it, but there’s a way in which the point of pain becomes this direct connection to God, this thing that, when you open yourself up to it, stop resisting it, and consent, obliterates all other thoughts and leaves just this deep, strong, almost electric connection. Often I find it arcing through from my seat of intuition to the place(s) of pain. In Open Mind, Open Heart, Fr. Thomas distinguishes non-disturbing versus disturbing thoughts and how each can be let go, which sums up my experience …”

Read more here >>>

 

You can read the complete e-bulletin here        https://mailchi.mp/coutreach/2024-nov-e-bulletin?e=9aa0837e74

October e-bulletin

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Nicholas Roerich, Defender Cloud Archer, 1937

 

“The psychological experience of a separate self sense is the root of all sin [meaning ‘to miss the mark’]. … It is the anxiety, the sense of separation, loneliness, or alienation — and all the negative feelings that flow from them — that are really the inspiration of seeking what we imagine as happiness, wherever it can be found, without being concerned about the consequences. …

“What would be the proper response to missing the [mark, the bullseye] if you were an apprentice? Obviously, try again. … In other words, to allow the divine energy to work through us through the preparation that has been done through many, many failures.”

Thomas Keating
Heartfulness: Transformation in Christ

 

 

 

Q: I am 76 years old and belong to a recovery program. … I practice twice per day for 20 minutes and have done so for over two years. My problem is I don’t seem to be getting any deep “messages” from my subconscious. I’m sure I have a lot of garbage in my subconscious. I wonder if you can help me.

A: Read the full question and Mary’s response here.

 

You can read the complete bulletin here    https://mailchi.mp/coutreach/2024-oct-e-bulletin?e=9aa0837e74

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image courtesy of Ron Barnett

“If we refuse to think of anything except what we are doing or the person that we are with, we develop the habit of being present to the present moment. …

“Attention, then, is a way of doing what we are doing. It cracks the crust of the false self (our psychological awareness of daily life) in which we are the center of the universe while everything else is circling around our particular needs or desires. This is an illusion, but unfortunately it is the heritage we all bring with us from early life.”

Thomas Keating
The Thomas Keating Reader

 

Save the dates

  • Enrichment for Centering Prayer Group Facilitators – Saturday 12 October via Zoom. Please register here.
  • Welcoming Prayer online course, November 4 – 29, 2024, in partnership with Spirituality & Practice. Registration opens soon.
  • “Thomas Keating: The Making of a Modern Mystic — A Dialogue with Cynthia Bourgeault and David Frenette.” Tuesday December 10 at 1pm Eastern Time via Zoom. More details to come.
  • Date change: United in Prayer Day 2025 will be March 14-15, 2025 via Zoom.

You can read the complete E-bulletin at    https://mailchi.mp/coutreach/2024-sept-e-bulletin?e=9aa0837e74

August e-bulletin

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Georgiana Houghton, The Risen Lord, 1864

God is more like a verb …. “is-ing” all the time and inviting us to “is,” too. What that involves may take us a lifetime to understand. It is an incomprehensively beautiful vision – only the Ultimate Goodness could have thought it up.

Thomas Keating
God is All in All: The Evolution of the Contemplative Christian Spiritual Journey

 

In honor of Fr. Carl J. Arico’s 90th birthday at the end of this month, please see the many free audio and video teachings he has given over the years — which you can find collected here on this page. Fr. Carl is a founding member of Contemplative Outreach, teacher and retreat leader, and long-time friend and companion with Fr. Keating.

Happy Birthday, Fr. Carl, servant of God!

 

You can read the full bulletin at          https://mailchi.mp/coutreach/2024-august-e-bulletin?e=9aa0837e74

July e-bulletin

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Georgiana Houghton, The Sheltering Wing of the Most High, 1861

“Faith suggests that we are in fact complete and never separated from God, but we just have not found it out yet. We have not awakened to the loving presence of God within us that is forever waiting to be discovered. In this perspective, the primary gift we can give to one another is to practice Centering Prayer faithfully and allow circumstances to refine the experience of peace that occurs. The abiding state of peace that God calls us to in the Beatitudes maintains it in daily life. Life happens. God works with our willingness and consent to bring about the transformation of our inmost being into the eternal happiness for which we have been created.”

Thomas Keating
Consenting to God As God Is

 

                                                                                                 Q&A
 
Q: I find it difficult to endure an hour of Sunday Mass, unless the priest happens to be an involving speaker. … I find it close to impossible (with my ADHD) … I know that not all priests have the oratory skills of Fr. Keating and I feel shame and defeat that I could not endure today’s Mass despite my years of Centering Prayer practice. I would much appreciate some guidance at this point.

A: Read the full question and Leslee’s response here.+++

You can read the complete newsletter at    https://mailchi.mp/coutreach/2024-july-e-bulletin?e=9aa0837e74

 

January e-bulletin

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“Live that prayer, let it live you … so that your deepest purpose in life is more accessible to you in every breath, in every movement, and in every ordinary failure and forgetting. I constantly forget my heart intention practice, but the grace and the beauty and the gift of it is that I can always come back. I can always let the prayer come back to me. ‘Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on us. Son of God, amen.’ I can always let a new discovery arise in me of the oneness and the love that unites all of created life beneath it, all the turmoil and the politicization and the conflict. Life is radiating love in being. That can come back to me out of the gift of oneness in an encounter with another person. And I can always let the mantra, the resonant energy of life resound in my heart, in my mind, ‘Yeshua Maranatha Hesed Amen‘.”

– David Frenette
excerpted from a self-guided e-course about the Heart Intention practice
 

Q: Our group has been doing a contemplative walk before meetings.

Do you have any information about this practice?

A: Read Leslee’s response here.

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You can read the complete e-bulletin at   https://mailchi.mp/coutreach/2024-january-e-bulletin?e=9aa0837e74

December e-bulletin

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“As incarnations of the Son of God,
we allow God to experience what it is like to be human
in each one of us.”

Thomas Keating, Reflections on the Unknowable

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Hail, all of you.
All of you filled with grace
in every cell and particle of your being.
May you incarnate and radiate Presence
in your homes, workplaces, the dear streets of your life,
simply by being you
on purpose.
Amen.

The above passages were excerpted from the Word of the Week for 17 December, which you can read in full here.

Join a community of over 4000 global practitioners in this free and weekly practice-based enrichment aimed at going deeper into the heart of God. You can read more about it here and sign-up for the weekly email and links to the live prayer groups.

 

You can read the full bulletin at    https://mailchi.mp/coutreach/2023-december-e-bulletin?e=9aa0837e74

16th Dec. Contemplative Outreach Dublin Advent Reflection Day

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Contemplative Outreach Dublin Advent Reflection Day

Date: Saturday 16th December

Time :9.30 am – 3.00pm

Venue : Avila Carmelite Centre, Bloomfield Avenue, Morehampton Road, Donnybrook, Dublin 4 Avila have parking facilities. The centre is served by the following bus routes 39A (Blanchardstown to UCD), 46A (Phoenix Park to Dun Laoghaire) and 145 (Heuston Station to Kilmacanogue) buses

Structure of the Day

9.30-10.00 – Tea, Coffee, and time for greeting one another

10.00 am – Centering Prayer

10.30 am – Presentation 1

Denis Gleeson cfc – Theme of Peace

12.00 – Participants are welcome to join in with the Carmelite Community for the celebration of the Eucharist.

12.30: Lunch – Tea and Coffee are provided at lunch time but participants will need to bring their own lunch

13.30: Presentation 2

Ann O’Reilly “Exploring our Yes to life in the spirit of Arnaud Desjardins”.

Arnaud Desjardins (1925-2011) was a French film director and author who travelled to India and Afghanistan in the 1950s and 1960s, making television documentaries about spiritual traditions not well known to many Europeans at the time, including Hinduism, Tibetan Buddhism, Zen, and Sufism.  He was a deep seeker who brought the wisdom of India back to France and began a lifetime of teaching that helped to open and heal many, many people. He opened his first Ashram in France in 1985.

2.30: Centering Prayer

 

There is a fee of €20.00 per participant to cover costs. This can be paid by cash or by cheque made out to Fionnuala Quinn. We will not have any facility to accept card payments. If you prefer to pay by bank transfer in advance please let me know.

All are welcome. If you would like to attend this event, please send an email to anaoreilly13@gmail.com to reserve your place.