Pray to be able to greet death like a companion or a trusted friend waiting on the bank of the other shore who reaches out to you and helps you manage the last slippery stones of a rushing stream as you step safely across from life to new life.
The Wisdom traditions agree: “death is a door disguised as a wall.” (Philip Zaleski and Paul Kaufman)
Have you ever noticed that a common, and favorite definition of death is “What happens to others”?
Death is the great giveaway.
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A contemplative practice is one integral component of an authentic spirituality, one that is mature, holistic, enlivening, responsible, liberating, and in service to love.
There are two primary reasons people don’t stay with a contemplative practice: (1) and most likely unknowingly, they are still looking for results, or (2) they are subconsciously afraid to be still for long because they sense the stillness will surface “dark emotions” and awaken the need to feel and move through them (or is it they fear they won’t feel anything at all?).
Isaac the Syrian said, “If we arrive at stillness, we shall be constant in weeping.” I suspect he meant from more than compunction or dread; from awe and gratefulness and sheer delight as well.
Contemplative prayer is agenda-less prayer. This is why it confuses the novice and frustrates the narcissist.
The paradox of contemplative prayer is that nothing is supposed to happen. This is why it is counter-cultural. And here I especially mean counter both to the pragmatic, utilitarian, reward-based culture of the West and to the Church culture and how and why most Christians were taught to pray.
Nothing is supposed to happen and yet everything (the main thing or the grace or God thing or the life thing) is always happening, which, I suspect, is why the psalmist records the Divine as saying, “Be still and know that I am God.”
ABOUT STILLNESS
Our U.C.C. friends have an evocative slogan: “God is still speaking.” This is why I say, “if God is still speaking, we need to learn the art of still listening.”
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One of my favorite images for the Divine comes from the title of Samuel Terrien’s book The Elusive Presence. Terrien maintains that the notion of presence has priority in Hebrew religion even over the notion of covenant. He asserts that the reality of the presence of God stands at the center of biblical faith and that humans are able and meant to experience the actual presence of God even though this presence is elusive.
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Much as I can tell there is no university in the world that offers a degree in Letting Go, no graduate school where you can get a Ph.D. in Relinquishment.
Merton reminds us that prayer means forgetting ourselves on purpose. When we are the least self-conscious or self-concerned we are most genuinely ourselves. We can say, together with St. Paul, “It is no longer I who live but Christ who lives in/through me.” This is the paradoxical path of the Christ-life – kenosis.