Dearest dancing monks, artists, and pilgrims,
This Friday, June 12th, we are delighted to welcome Brother Richard Hendrick, OFM Cap. for a retreat on moving From Intention to Attention: Becoming Really Present in Prayer. We will encounter this flow through the lens of the Christian contemplative tradition, looking at the Desert Fathers and Mothers, the Franciscan masters, the teachers of the practice of the presence of God, and the sacrament of the present moment up to our own day to garner tools that will help us in our own personal meditative life and practice today.
This poem is from Brother Richard’s Facebook post on March 22nd:
Desert Stillness:
Be still
and know
that I Am...
Would you enter the desert
at the heart of yourself?
Would you allow the sandals of your senses
to fall away?
Would you, finally, recognise
the holy ground your heart
truly is?
Would you behold the burning bush
afire with presence at the centre of
your soul?
Then you must
enter the desert of stillness.
Be still
and know...
Would you know the call to exodus
from the slavery of self?
Would you pass through the waters
of overwhelming worry?
Would you ascend the holy mountain of prayer?
Would you behold the glory so bright that it is darkness?
Would you enter the cloud of the presence?
Would you keep the covenant of grace?
Would you reach the promised land of peace?
Then you must enter the desert of stillness.
Be still
and know...
For
This is how the Ultimate is revealed:
as presence through stillness,
as Being beyond being,
as emptiness without absence,
as right relationship,
in which
we come to know
the self truly
only in the light
of Pure Being as
independent
(where all else depends on love),
as non-contingent:
(where all else arises from previous causes),
as creative:
(where all else sub-creates),
as transcending all,
imminent in all,
beyond all,
but
holding all
in being
by
Love.
Would you enter the desert
at the heart of yourself
and see it bloom?
If you would,
then only
be still
and you will
know.
Please join us Friday to explore the place of Intention and Attention as energetic directions of the soul in your meditative and prayer practice.
With great and growing love,
Christine
Christine Valters Paintner, OblSB, PhD, REACE
Image: Paid License with Canva
