Attentive Living and Centering Prayer

This morning at First United Methodist Church, we continued our discussion of Leighton Ford's The Attentive Life and talked a good bit about distractions (“those ‘many things’ of a busy life [that] pull me away from the ‘main thing’ that I should be paying attention to (Luke 10:41-42)?” (100). Ford discusses distractions at length in Chapter 5, stressing how difficult it is to pay attention to what matters in a world of hyped-up information, “events communicated at warp speed,” and multitasking. We expressed some curiosity about the Ford’s comment that distractus (the Latin origins of the word) literally means “to draw or pull apart” (101). My old Latin dictionary agreed with Ford, saying that distractus is a participle derived from distraho which means to pull asunder, tear into pieces, divide, separate, and remove. Its root traho means to drag.

If distractions prevent us from paying attention, Ford suggests that they are negative influences in our lives. In retelling the story of Jesus' visit to the home of Martha and Mary wherein Jesus tells Mary that "only one things is essential," (Luke 10), Ford interprets the story so as to suggest that "we all have 'Martha' and 'Mary' parts in us, and we all are called to pay attention both of action and contemplation" (107). We are, as Mother Teresa explains, "contemplatives in the midst of life" (qtd. 107).

The topic of contemplative living, essentially one of "paying attention," brought us to a discussion of contemplative practice. Sharing some of my previous effrots at Buddhist-based meditation at a Zen monastery, I described at some length the mentally difficult effort expected of me in Renzai koan study, extended efforts designed to break down my overly intellectural apprehension of reality. During such meditation, I was encouraged to do zazan and focus on koan work and avoid mental distractions at all costs. Even lwith help of an experienced Zen master, it was difficult work. As I look back upon that set of experiences, I am grateful that God helped me, with the aid of my Buddhist friends, to learn a good bit about quieting the inner life.

After the death of my son in 1993, however, I was (by the grace of God) given an introduction to contemplative practices within the Christian tradition (notably Centering Prayer encouraged by Thomas Keating and Basil Pennington, among others). With the help of Christian friends, God showed me how not only to “settle” myself interiorly but also to settle into Himself. With the continual help of the Holy Spirit who cries "Abba, Abba, Abba!" even as we pray ever so weakly (Romans 8), it was given to me to realize that mental, emotional, and memory-based distractions within Silent Prayer are not disasters. With God nothing is a disaster, not even distractions, not even those times when we seem to be coming apart. When one realizes that he or she has been distracted within foundamentally "wordless" prayer, one simply returns—ever so gently--to the “sacred word” that signals an intention to be in God’s presence. Distractions are thus presented to God for his blessing, care, and healing.

While this description of what happens in centering contemplative prayer may sound simplistic, the overall dynamics of Centering Prayer are profound, best left for a fuller exposition by Thomas Keating in Open Mind, Open Heart, Basil Pennington in Centering Prayer: Renewing an Ancient Christian Prayer Form, and Murchadh O Madagain in Centering Prayer and the Healing of the Unconscioius.

For more on Centering Prayer, visit

• Centering Prayer


• Centering on the Presence


• Contemplative Outreach Ltd


• Kyrie: Centering Prayer Index


• Centering Prayer: Uniquely, powerfully Christian meditation


• Introduction to Contemplative (Centering) Prayer

For an eight-minute introduction to Centering Prayer, listen to Fr. Thomas Keating:



Near the end of our discussion Mason asked us to look at Psalm 131; it surely sums up most of what we were trying to say this morning:

1 My heart is not proud, O LORD, my eyes are not haughty;
I do not concern myself with great matters or things too wonderful for me.

2 But I have stilled and quieted my soul;
like a weaned child with its mother, like a weaned child is my soul within me.

3 O Israel, put your hope in the LORD both now and forevermore.

Centering Prayer

In the previous post, I mentioned Centering Prayer as one way of entering the wonderful and healing Quiet of God. This morning I received news about blog coverage of the 2008 Annual Conference and Enrichment Weekend: Unity: Oneness in Contemplation, sponsored by Contemplative Outreach. By visiting the blog, you will find out more about Centering Prayer and meet some of the people who include its practice in their prayer lives.

Chapter 5: Active Life, A Slower Pace in a Faster World

While going about his day's work, when Jesus realized that the time was about "terce" (Latin for three), he knew that it was mid-morning, the third hour, that is, about 9:00 a.m. as we calculate the hours. Already at work, Jesus--and his disciples and the millions of disciples ever since--knew and know that about 9:00 we need to "take a break from busy work," as Leighton Ford puts it. And inasmuch as Ford likes to compare the passing of a single day to the passing of a whole life, he suggests that mid-morning thoughts might well be compared to some more-or-less early or mid-life (and mid-work) considerations. Ford especially would like for us to think about the many ways we "put off" getting down to the business of real living with distractions, those things that literally "draw or pull [us] apart" (101).

Living in a world of "overload" (102), we multi-taskers now take it for granted that modern life must be lived in speed, highly organized so as to be efficient, and relentless in its demand that time be filled up with unpunctuated activity. We rush from this to that, from pillar to post, from minute to minute. Ford would like for us to think and live otherwise.

In "A Little Story about Attentiveness," Ford invites us into the story of Jesus's visit to the home of Martha and Mary. Rich with interpretive possibilities, the story has been retold to suit many audiences. Monastic communities in particular like to identify themselves with Mary, supposing that they have chosen "the better part." Maybe. Personally, I like the way Ford breaks open the story's significance when he says that "we all have 'Martha' and 'Mary' parts in us, and we all are called to pay attention both to action and contemplation." His use of Mother Teresa explanation "about the work of her Sisters of Mercy in caring for the dying poor" really gives all of us something to chew on mentally and spiritually. Mother Teresa said, "Do not think of us as social workers. We are contemplatives in the midst of life. We pray the work" (107).

Praying the work: that's what we do in mid-morning, in mid-life (and even near the end of life, like a few of us in this class). Although Ford does not give us any point-by-point guidelines for living contemplatively, it seems to me that we readers might naturally want to know more about it; that is, how might we answer the question: How as a contemplative do I "pray the work"? If this is something of your question, I'd like to suggest that you take a look at the possibility of what is now known as Centering Prayer. For introductions, sitting with Mary, here are two good places to visit:

• Centering Prayer
  Centering Prayer (Wikipedia)

On the off-chance (or on the chance!) that you're interested, I'll bring some printed information about Centering Prayer with me to class on Sunday.

Image credit: The Turtle Island Project

Surrendering to Sheer Grace

During last Sunday's discussion on Chapter 4, Harry asked that Luther's comments on the difficulty Luther experienced in "surrendering to sheer grace" be posted so that everyone might read it. Here's what Luther said "On the Sum of the Christian Life" (Luther's Works, American edition, vol. 51):

Even though [faith] is taught in the best possible way, it is difficult enough to learn it well . . . . We cannot . . . think anything except that, if I have lived a holy life and done many great works, God will be gracious to me . . . . The heart is always ready to boast of itself before God and say: "After all, I have preached so long and lived so well land done so much, surely God will take this into account . . . ." When you come before God, leave all that boasting at home and remember to appeal from justice to grace. But let any body try this and he will see and experience how exceedingly hard and bitter a thing it is for someone who all his life has been mired in his work righteousness, to pull himself out of it and with all his heart rise up through faith . . . . I myself have now been preaching and cultivating it through read and writing for almost twenty years and lstill I feel lthe old clinging dirt of wanting to deal so with
God that I may contribute something, so that he will have to give me his grace in exchange for my holiness. Still I cannot get it into my head that I should surrender myself completely to sheer grace; yet this is what I should do and must do.

Some More Thoughts about Roots

In Chapter 4, Ford asked each of us to ponder this question: “What is the root system of my life?” (82). In my last post, I said that I'd say something more about our being rooted and grounded in God's baptismal waters. Inasmuch as my wife (God bless her!) comes from the Southern Baptist tradition, you can well imagine that she and I have had not a few conversations about our understanding of and appreciation for baptism. Among Christians, it is popularly thought that there are basically two views: one held by those who baptize infants (Orthodox Christians, Roman Catholics, Anglicans and Episcopalians, Lutherans, Presbyterians, Methodists, among others); another held by those in the anabaptist tradition (Baptists, Mennonites, Assembly of God Christians, and so on). Actually there are more than two views as Tom Nettles et al. make apparent in Understanding Four Views of Baptism. But as good as that book is (it is at times superficial), I would argue that its four views are too strictly derived from the so-called Protestant tradition; the book says nothing about the views of our Roman Catholic and Orthodox sisters and brothers. Yet although there are more than four views, the book nonetheless moves us to understand that within the Church our understandings of baptism are diverse and nuanced.

Because I best understand and appreciate the Lutheran understanding to Holy Baptism (reflecting the "catholic" view), I agree with Four Views when it describes the Lutheran approach as one which emphasizes the saving activity of God in baptism. As always with our relationship with God, the Holy Trinity initiates and brings to completion our salvation. Baptism is like being born. When my mother delivered me, she did all grunting and pushing, heavy breathing, and muscle contracting; all I did was gasp for a breath of air and start living. So with baptism, "being born again"; God, like a mother, does all the saving work, delivering me; all I do is feel the mighty Word and the water coming down over me, and I catch the Breath.

Interestingly, in a Bible class I attended a year ago we discovered (not unsurprisingly in a Methodist church) that about 50% were baptized as infants and the other 50% were baptized as adults. We talked about our baptisms at some length and then asked each other, "Does the kind of baptism by which you entered the Church now give you deep satisfaction? That is: if you had to do things over again, would you want to be baptized as before or differently?" Not a few of those baptized (and re-baptized) as adults said that they now wished that they had been baptized as infants. Those who articulated this view said that they envied those who from infancy on, from their first memories forward, knew themselves to be baptized Christians even as toddlers and very young children. They wished that they too could have had that sense of identity from birth, from the time of their infancy in baptism. As I now think back on their responses to the question, it really doesn't surprise much at all that so many in the class, baptized as adults, said they would have like to have been baptized as infants.

Knowing that I was a Christian from my earliest memories has been for me a great source of comfort. Thinking about my baptism, I have often been reminded what the Lord Jesus said to my "patron" Saint--Saint Andrew and to me, "Andy, you did not choose me; I chose you." Because God is my Sovereign Savior, I have never felt the need to be "re-baptized." When God acts, he acts decisively! God's placing me by baptism into the death and resurrection of Jesus (Romans 6) happened before I was able to remember the watery event, "before the foundations of the world." Like a child who has been adopted shortly after birth, I grew up knowing only God as my True Parent. In baptism the Most Holy Trinity gave me his Name. As I grew older and went to three years of Saturday-morning confirmation instructional classes, learning what it meant to be immersed in the death and resurrection of Jesus, and was then confirmed in my faith at the age of fourteen, I steadily grew in understanding and appreciation of God's decisive love. That's not to say that I always lived out my baptismal identity. I didn't. Even when I forgot who I was and left the Church later in life, going into spiritual exile for something over a decade, I was however so "vaccinated" with that identity that upon returning to the Family of God, my return was, properly understood, "easy." All I had to do was walk home, reclaim my God-given identity, and live in my baptismal life. There was no need to get "re-baptized," for God, once and for all times, had brought me into his family, given me his Name, thrust me into the life of the his Son and the embrace of the Holy Spirit. I may have left God, but God never left me. Just as I have children who will always be my children (no matter what!), so God called me his child in baptism, and he has always said, "You are mine."

So when I think of the roots of my life, there you have it. I am rooted, grounded, and watered in the love of God and always have been since my baptism on November 30, 1937. Now each day, during my Morning and Evening Prayers, and at the beginning and conclusion of each Eucharistic Liturgy when my Pastor says to the Family, "In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit," I remember when God put me, like the Israelites at the Red Sea, into and out of the water and saved me. When remembering, I mark my body with sign of the cross and live out my identity as God's child. I look around and see many in my Family also marking themselves with the sign of the cross, and I thank God that by God's grace I am a member of the Body of Christ. God has really gotten my attention.

Some Thoughts about Roots

In Chapter 4, Ford asked me to ponder this question: “What is the root system of my life?” (82).

For the past three or four days I’ve been asking myself that question, letting the image of roots, especially tree roots, lead me to my thoughts for this posting. Before beginning, however, let me confess that I’m fascinated with tree roots. Whenever I have an opportunity (and a camera), I go looking for tree roots, especially when they’re exposed by severe erosion or when they twist themselves around rocks and plunge themselves into crevices of granite and limestone. As I drive along the highway, I’m constantly amazed at where tree manage to grow and how far down their roots go to seek nourishment. So when Ford asks me to consider my roots, I imagine myself something of a tree among the rocks, the roots of my life going down deep where the nourishment is, where there’s water.

Trees are are “grounded” in water. And so is the root system of my life, because I’m grounded in the waters of my baptism. Born on October 21, I was baptized by my father, a Lutheran pastor, on November 30, on St. Andrew’s Day. On that day I God baptized me into the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, God adopted me into his family, and He marked me with His name--Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. My baptism into the divine life of the Most Holy Trinity is the most important gift I have ever received. With Martin Luther (as he says in the Large Catechism), I realize that "to be baptized in God's name is to be baptized not by men but by God himself. Although it is performed by men's hands, it is nevertheless truly God's own act.”

I am rooted in God’s loving action. "God himself stakes his honor, his power, and his might on it. It is not simply a natural water, but a divine... water ...it contains and conveys all the fullness of God" (LC). Rooted from infancy in God’s love, a t the beginning of each day I draw nourishment from my roots, my baptism. I make the sign of the cross over myself (the sign my father first placed on my body on November 30 when god watered me in Holy Baptism). When I worship and hear the Eucharistic Liturgy’s opening words, “In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,” I once again mark myself with the Holy Cross and remember and thank God for my baptism. When I’m tempted to despair of my sinful self, I have learned to say, “But I am baptized!” If I am baptized, I have the promise that I shall be saved and have eternal life, both in soul and body. I belong to Christ.

The implications are enormous, and in a day or so I’ll say something about them.

Chapter 4: Prime Time: Our Root System (81-98)

Tomorrow morning June and I leave on A bus trip, along with some forty-six other “senior citizens.” Our destination is New York City, but along the way we’ll be stopping in Henderson, NC, Cherry Hill, NJ; on the way back we stop off at Atlantic City, Philadelphia, and Washington, DC, and again in Henderson. Although I’m packing lightly, I’ll be sure to take along Ford’s Attentive Life. But because I’m not sure how often I can get myself to a wireless connection, I’ve decided this afternoon to begin reading and writing about Chapter 4, which our group will be discussing on September 14.

Although Ford doesn’t give us the etymology for the word prime, it might be helpful to remember that prime comes from the Latin primus and refers to the first hour of daylight (i.e., dawn). Counting six a.m. as prime (first) , terce (three) signifies 9:00 a.m.; sext (six), noon; and none (nine), 3:00 p.m. Thus when Scripture says that Jesus hung on the cross from the sixth to the ninth hour (Matt. xxvii, 45; Mark xv, 33; Luke xxiii, 44), we sometimes translate that ancient time-reckoning to mean that he was dying from noon to 3:00 p.m.

Although, as Ford helps us see the Mepkin Abbey monks going off to work after observing Prime, it's helpful to know that today Prime as one of hours for prayer is observed, with few exceptions, only in monasteries. Prayer at Prime tells the monks that it's time to begin their day’s labor.

Prime has an interesting history as to its origins: “around the year 382, in one of the monasteries near Bethlehem, a problem arose, because after the night offices (which corresponded to the more modern Matins and Lauds), the monks could retire to rest. The lazier ones then stayed in bed until nine in the morning (the hour of Terce) instead of getting up to do their manual work or spiritual reading. The short office of Prime, inserted a couple of hours before Terce, solved the problem, by calling them together to pray and sending them out to their tasks” (The Structure of the Liturgy).

Prime (or a close cousin to it) can still be found in some prayerbooks today. The Book of Common Prayer provides a short “Order of Service for Noonday” (103-107), and my Lutheran prayerbook gives me a few pages of “Responsive Prayer” if we want to pause to speak to God at noon or in the afternoon, or before travelling. By and large, however, most “prayerbook” Christians no longer observe Prime; instead, with psalms and scripture readings they make an effort to pray and stay with God twice a day: in the morning and in the evening.

But with that said, Ford provides a quite wonderful meditation on Prime in Chapter 4. He finds “a metaphor for this hour of beginning” —remember: prime has to do with “first things!”—in the way the root systems of trees grow near the Glen Burney Falls and “snake down and around rocks, finding their way into the ground through a cleft to gain firm support” (82). As Christians, Ford suggests, we like those trees. We have such beginnings, and at the beginning of the day, we do well to ask: “What is the root system of our lives? Is it deep and wide and long and strong enough to withstand the pressures of each day? That is the paramount question at the hour of prime?” (82-83).

Ford asks us to contemplate such questions, that is, to “look at life in the presence of God,” and then adds this insightful clarification: “with the eyes of God, or through the eyes of Christ—at any time, not just at special times; anywhere, not just in certain places; toward anyone, not just ‘special’ people” (83). In this way, Ford breaks open the ancient understanding of Prime so that it becomes atany time, any place, and with any person prime time, primary, premiere.

In the next few pages Ford continues his reflections on Prime with this question: “What does it mean to be contemplative? (83-85). Tomorrow in my bus seat as I watch the countryside go by, I’ll be musing over and pondering what are the "first things" in my life. With some good luck, I’ll try to post a few more words on Sunday or Monday evening. In the meantime, think about what's prime in your life and perhaps share your thoughts with a comment.

Image Source: http://www.matthewfelton.com/Photos/Yosemite/TreeRoots.jpg

Chapter 3: Daybreak: The Hour of Beginnings (64-80)

Chapter 3: Daybreak (The Hour of Beginnings) is a meditation on “lauds,” that monastic time of day which, at Mepkin Abbey, begins at 5:30 in the morning.

While I use a number of books that contains “lauds” as one of the “hours” of the day, my Lutheran tradition does not ordinarily use the term lauds as a time for that fixed-hour hour of prayer. What Ford and the Mepkin Abbey monks call Lauds, Lutherans call “Matins” or “Morning Prayer.” And, trust me, it doesn’t come at 5:30 a.m. (except at St. Augustine's House, a Lutheran Benedictine community in Oxford, Michigan); it’s more like 7:30 or 8:00 when most of us Lutherans do Morning Prayer. Whether we come to prayer at 5:30 or 8:00, Ford is quite right to say that at some point (he calls it the pointe vierge, the virginal point of the day), we Christians may well want to greet “the dawn of the day” and “of new life” (64).

With Lauds in mind, Ford introduces us to considerations of our own “awakening to God” (65). He tells us how Billy Graham and his wife Ruth came to know God. For Billy, it was within a discernable moment; for Ruth, a gradual lightening, like “the almost imperceptible coming of surise” (66). Having discussed his own beginning with his spiritual director, David (I wonder if this is David Steindl-Rast, about whom Ford speaks in Chapter 1), Ford tells about his early life with/out God, about his learning to preoccupied so as to be inattentive, about his life as an adopted boy whose parents were on and off again with their love. Eventually at fourteen years of age, he hesitatingly came to pray, paraphrasing verses from the psalms. Awakenings, Ford tells us, come in a variety of ways. For one friend, it happened in a chapel in Taos; for Francis Collins it was C. S. Lewis who opened the door. Ford himself used to tape psalm-like prayers to his bathroom mirror to help him comes into mornings with attention to God. Today, he says,

Often in the morning I will sit in a favorite chair in my study with a cup of coffee, with classical music playing, not trying to form a prayer with words but waiting, listening, until perhaps I sense the Spirit bringing to the surface a word from God. Then I offer a simple “Thank you.” I have found this time of silence, even it is is very short, to be a key to staring the day with attention.

Waiting is important for Ford, and he wishes it to be good for you too.

“Prayer is Like Watching for the Kingfisher” (a prayer by Ann Lewin that Ford suggests might “speak to you”) turned out to be especially appropriate for me and my understanding as to what Ford is driving at in this chapter. I have seen a kingfisher only once in my life; it happened last summer when I was out on my pontoon boat, well into evening, with Kurt, June’s nephew, who had every expectation that we might see one. I was doubtful. But sure enough, after we had slowly entered a cove whose banks were lined with overhanging trees, there we saw it: a streak of flashing colors, iridescent greens and blues. For maybe a minute I watched it fly back and forth across the shallow water. I had wanted to see one for decades. That evening I got my glimpse.

Since that glimpse I had gone out a number of times to resee the kingfisher. But without luck. I get to see great blue herons, turkey vultures, and warblers whose exact names I don’t know, but I still have to wait to see that kingfisher for a second time.

Ford tells us that prayer is like that: it’s a lot of waiting, birdbook (prayerbook) in hand, binoculars hanging on the shoulder, eyes more or less riveted on the trees, the psalms, the Scriptures. One needs to be fairly quiet. One needs to wait. Morning, Ford is convinced, is a really good time for waiting; it’s time for Lauds, for Morning Prayer, the opening of the day.