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Richard Rohr's Daily Meditation

From the Center for Action and Contemplation

Week Forty-two

Thomas Keating: The Secret Embrace
Part One

What the Mystics Know
Friday, October 23, 2020

Today I pause Cynthia Bourgeault’s reflections and offer a few words about the essential role of contemplation in the lives of honest spiritual seekers like Thomas Keating and Cynthia herself.

To many people, contemplation is an old-fashioned word, but it simply means the deliberate seeking of God by an inner dialogue. The soul grows closer to God through our willingness to detach from the passing self, the tyranny of feelings, the addiction to self-image, and the false promises of culture. It is a journey into the nothingness of true faith, where the ordinary rules of thinking, managing, explaining, and fixing up the smaller self do not apply. Contemplation shouldn’t be used to spiritually bypass what is real, harmful, or unjust in our lives or the world around us. However, with steady practice it will eventually give us the ability to stay present to what is, and meet it with wisdom, compassion, and courage. All the major world religions at their more mature stages recognize the necessity of contemplative practice in some form and under different names.

I’m not sure that most people in the Western world have ever really met the person who they themselves really are. Most of us have lived our lives with a steady stream of ideas, images, and feelings that we cling to—thinking they are our very essence. But in reality, at that level, I don’t have the idea; the idea has me. I don’t have the feeling; the feeling has me. We have to discover who this “I” really is. Who are we at the deepest level—behind our thoughts and feelings or others’ thoughts and feelings about us?

At every moment, all our life long, we identify ourselves either with our thoughts, our self-image, or our feelings. We have to find a way to get beyond those things to discover our “original face,” the one we already had before we were born. Even with great practice, most of us will only glimpse or abide in our True Self for moments at a time while we are alive. Mystics seem to finally and fully abide there, which I hope encourages us to keep going.

We yearn for “breach menders” who can “restore our ruined houses,” as Isaiah says (58:12). We long for great-souled people who can hold the chaos together within themselves—and give us the courage to do the same. I pray all of us know such people in our lives and that we be granted such people on the world stage. And I am confident such people have gone before and paved the way for us—the mystics and saints of all genders, cultures, and faith traditions, those both known and unknown.

Gateway to Action & Contemplation:
What word or phrase resonates with or challenges me? What sensations do I notice in my body? What is mine to do?

Prayer for Our Community:
O Great Love, thank you for living and loving in us and through us. May all that we do flow from our deep connection with you and all beings. Help us become a community that vulnerably shares each other’s burdens and the weight of glory. Listen to our hearts’ longings for the healing of our world. [Please add your own intentions.] . . . Knowing you are hearing us better than we are speaking, we offer these prayers in all the holy names of God, amen.

Listen to Fr. Richard read the prayer.

Story from Our Community:
As I read today's message [on Celtic Spirituality], I was transported back in time and distance to the cliffs of Tintagel [England], where I stood many years ago, looking westward. . . Reading today's offering, I wept—it was so familiar and I haven't heard it in so long! Reclaiming my role as a mystic, at 82, after a lifetime of "being in the world" with what that involves, I've always been drawn to the spiritual dimension of life. Now thanks to the most recent CAC meditations, I am closer to Home than I've ever been before in this lifetime. —Sarah K.

Share your own story with us.

Adapted from Richard Rohr, What the Mystics Know: Seven Pathways to Your Deeper Self (The Crossroad Publishing Company: 2015), 20, 79, 83.

Image credit: “Outside in” (detail), James Turrell at House of Lights, Tohka-machi, Niigata, Japan.

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Action & Contemplation

2020 Daily Meditations Theme

What does God ask of us? To act justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with God. —Micah 6:8

Franciscan Richard Rohr founded the Center for Action and Contemplation in 1987 because he saw a deep need for the integration of both action and contemplation. If we pray but don’t act justly, our faith won’t bear fruit. And without contemplation, activists burn out and even well-intended actions can cause more harm than good. In today’s religious, environmental, and political climate our compassionate engagement is urgent and vital.

In this year’s Daily Meditations, Father Richard helps us learn the dance of action and contemplation. Each week builds on previous topics, but you can join at any time! Click the video to learn more about the theme and to find reflections you may have missed.

Click here to learn about contemplative prayer and other forms of meditation. For frequently asked questions—such as what versions of the Bible Father Richard recommends or how to ensure you receive every meditation—please see our email FAQ. Visit cac.org to explore other ways to connect with the Center for Action and Contemplation.

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Inspiration for this week's banner image: His silence is a kiss, / His presence an embrace. —Thomas Keating, “Loneliness in the Night.”