“Come Rest Awhile with The Lord.”
Lent & Valentine’s Day is a treasured graced-filled time of the year and an opportunity to light our awareness to the sacredness of this season. Contemplative Outreach St. Louis invites you to a morning of prayer including Lectio Divina, and two Centering Prayer sessions, as we prepare for Lent & Valentine’s Day’s invitation.
The Silent Saturday morning offers supportive silence and prayer time. An opportunity to retreat into the enriching pool of quiet that invites us “to be still and know that I am God.” For over 25 years Silent Saturdays have offered a refuge for many striving contemplatives. Whether you are just beginning on the journey or are nourished by your practice of centering prayer, it offers a mini retreat for all. This is for anyone who wants to be refreshed with solitude and prayer as we get ready for another sacred season.
Flow of the Morning:
- Welcome!
- A reading of the Centering Prayer guidelines
- 1st Centering Prayer period
- 15 minute break
- Guided Lectio Divina session
- Optional sharing
- 2nd Centering Prayer period.
Saturday, February 10, 2024
Gather at 8:30 am, 9 -11 am: Centering Prayer with a Lectio Divina Session
Light refreshments are available
Silent Saturday is at a NEW LOCATION:
Community of Christ Church, 830 N Kirkwood, MO, 63122
Please register so we can prepare for you. After registrations are received a follow up email will be sent with directions and other necessary information. We look forward to seeing you.
There is no fee for this event but if you like, a donation of any amount to help cover our rent and other expenses will be gratefully accepted. This is purely a suggestion and not meant to be a barrier to attendance. All are welcome.
To support our ministry by making a contribution of any amount via PayPal or credit card, use the Donate button at right or contribute at the event. Thank you!
Save the dates: Silent Saturdays are held on the second Saturdays of even-numbered months!
The Mystery of Christ
The ideal disposition for the divine encounter is the gathering together of one’s whole being in silent and alert attentiveness. The practice of interior silence produces gradually what the voice in the vision produced instantly: the capacity to listen. It withdraws the false self from its self-centeredness and allows the true self to emerge into our awareness. Revelation, in the fullest sense of the term, is our personal awakening to Christ.
The external word of God and the liturgy dispose us for the experience of Christ’s risen life within us. It is to this that the spiritual exercises of Lent are ordered. The awakening to the divine Presence emerges from what Meister Eckhardt called “the ground of being” — that level of being which in Christ is divine by nature and which in us is divine by participation. (Mystery of Christ, page 45, Thomas Keating)
Romancing Lent
May we be companions of the heart
as together in prayer
we engage the great Lenten pilgrimage
as a way of romancing our Beloved God.
May you have a richly blessed
and grace-full Lenten season so
you can rejoice in the great Easter feast
of the Resurrection of Christ Jesus.
Fr. Ed Hays
Spiritual Sense of Touch “The spiritual sense of touch is more intimate than the sense of smell and the attraction to the delightful perfume of God’s presence. The divine touch, like the divine perfume, is not a bodily sensation. Rather it is as if our spirit were touched by God or embraced. The divine touch might feel as if God were descending from above and enveloping us in an embrace, or embracing us from within, and placing a great big kiss in the middle of our spirit. Our own self-identity lets go, and for a moment God is all in all. The delight may overflow from this deep spiritual source into the external senses, and then the body also rejoices. The Spirit of God can transform the entire organism into an immense celebration of love, peace, and joy…” (Crises of Faith, Crises of Love, pages 68-69, by Thomas Keating)
“Any practice moving towards contemplation is ecclesial in its effects. It bonds the people who are doing it with everybody else who is doing a similar practice, and indeed with everyone else in the human family. It creates community. As we sit in silence, we realize our oneness with others, not only with those with whom we pray, but with everyone on earth — past, present, and to come. What is deepest in them, their oneness with the divine presence, resonates with what is deepest in us. Hence, their joys, their trials, and their openness to God are part of us.” (The Better Part, page 70, Thomas Keating)
May they all be one, just as, Father, you are in me and I am in you, so that they also may be in us…. I have given them the glory you gave me, that they may be one as we are one.
— John 17:21-22 NJB
Mystic Mountain
May this Lenten Season not be a time
of purple penances and harsh denials,
but rather may it become a celebration
of the ageless pilgrimage of ascending
God’s Mystic Mountain of Holiness.
Take up your cross, so unique to you,
as you follow the Lenten Leader,
our Beloved Christ, who walks ahead,
leading us into silence and solitude,
into prayer and selfless acts of generosity.
May your true Lenten penances be
the unforeseen occurrences and trials
of these days of ascent to Godhood.
A Fruitful and Graceful Lent. Art & Poem Fr. Ed Hays
We are blessed to have videos presented by Father Thomas Keating on Lectio Divina, calling us into a deeper relationship with God. Lectio Divina draws from scriptural and/or other sacred reading, meditation, and prayer to promote communion with God and increase the knowledge of God’s Word.
Centering Prayer and Lectio Divina with Thomas Keating, Part 1: In this talk, Fr. Thomas explains that Lectio Divina is meant to be an experience of scripture in which one listens for God rather than reads for content. The words penetrate one in a dynamic process under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, gradually moving one into deeper union with God. Fr. Thomas describes the traditional four ‘moments’ of Lectio Divina in a circular format; the experience is not linear as all the ‘moments’ are interrelated. This conference was given at the Lectio Divina Institute held on January 17-21, 1997, at the Benedictine Center in Beech Grove, Indiana.
Centering Prayer and Lectio Divina with Thomas Keating, Part 2: In this talk entitled “Principles for the Practice of Lectio,” Fr. Thomas explains that Lectio is the process of assimilating the Gospel and being assimilated by it. He describes five moments in this process: 1) Beginning prayer to the Holy Spirit as your Guide, 2) Noticing how scripture is mirroring your life, 3) Experiencing the Word of God as directed to different levels of consciousness, 4) Reading your experience of grace into the scriptures, and 5) becoming the Word of God in a particular human situation. This conference was given at the Lectio Divina Institute held on January 17-21, 1997, at the Benedictine Center in Beech Grove, Indiana.
Four Steps of Lectio Divina
There is no standard way of doing lectio divina, but the following method has proven helpful to beginners.
- Read (Lectio): Read a passage from Scripture. “Listen” to God’s word. Gather the facts. Does a particular word or phrase speak to you?
- Reflect (Meditatio): Read the passage again. Reflect on the passage as a whole or on a particular phrase. What is God saying to you?
- Respond (Oratio): Read the Scripture once again. Respond to God with your heart. What do you want to say to God?
- Rest (Contemplatio*): Read the selection a final time. Rest in God’s presence for a few minutes.
* Strictly speaking, contemplation is a gift of grace that depends on the movement of the Holy Spirit. It is a real awareness of God, desiring and loving Him, beyond concepts, feelings, and particular acts.
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