The Catholic theologian
Karl Rahner famously said .
“the Christian of tomorrow
will be a mystic, or not a Christian at all.“
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I’ve gotten into a few series of topics here. For instance, before this post, I’ve demonstrate how spirituality is an essential ingredient for adult humans. in scientific research and by various spiritual authors. Some posts are religions but many are not.
This post begins a study of contemplative practices. While this area of blogging isn’t untried, even with some success, I want to order the study in a way that presents Christian meditation and contemplative practices in perspective of a global consciousness.
Many of my regular readers know that I am Christian and I’m a monotheistic believer. However, what I didn’t much present before this is that I believe that every person is an essential mind; an idea that is an aspect of all that is.
My posts in this contemplative practices series will focus on how we may each be contributing to global consciousness, even in spite of any resistance. Global conscious, I think is the pulse of our times as it occurs in space-time.
Now, I happen to think that benefits globally do occur because this is God’s will. I write about it and as more people choose a serenity path for themselves to transcend our world chaotic consequence of separate self-sense, more people are centering themselves in moments of inner peace, and the outcome is seemingly of itself folding out from a shift of global consciousness.
However, really, I am sure that this is because more are coming to understand the messages of the Holy Spirit. The messages, surrender to God’s will; participate in being love; ask God in prayer to be doing His will; be peaceful and compassionate; are all the same message. This is how (I think) that divine knowledge reveals itself in global consciousness. Any divine knowledge is all divine knowledge.
In our human form, here in bodies, we typically may look at some point along the way, usually as adults, to transform from ego-centrist creatures to a higher way of relating and being.
I began an Integral Life… here are some highlight of the Integral Life… from Father Thomas Keating and Ken Wilber.
So, let’s begin looking at the responsibility to self to transcend the ego and discover, each of us, a genuine personal and transcendental purpose (these videos are high quality despite the image that may display before you begin one). Each to their own path:
Spiritual, But Not Religious?
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If you can’t watch the entire program FF to 12:30 to see the important end to this program. .
Program Description Father Thomas Keating, considered one of the great contemplatives of our time, has spent a lifetime in the practice of Christianity, seeking and sharing its depths. The goal of the tradition, suggests Fr. Thomas in this week’s video, is transformation — but transformation into what? In this video, Keating presents us with that an answer depends on what stage of development we are at.
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Tomorrow’s Spirituality
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If you can’t watch the entire program FF to 6:00 to learn about the “stages” concept in this program. .
Program Description A Cistercian monk from St. Benedict’s Monastery in Snowmass, Colorado, Father Thomas Keaton has spent a lifetime in deep Christian practice, and in sharing the fruits of this contemplation with countless others. We were enormously blessed to host a dialogue with Fr. Thomas Keaton and Ken Wilber in April of 2006. In this video, Ken discusses some of the foundational concepts of Integral spirituality.
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Ken Wilber is the founder of Integral Institute and the co-founder of Integral Life. Father Thomas Keaton is a founding member and the spiritual guide of Contemplative Outreach, LTD and founding member of the Spirituality branch of Integral Institute.
Integral Life… “No one is 100% wrong.” – Ken Wilber
If ordinary people don’t perceive that our grand ideas are working in their lives then they can’t develop the higher level of consciousness, to use a term that American philosopher Ken Wilber wrote a whole book about. He said, you know, the problem is the world needs to be more integrated, but it requires a consciousness that’s way up here, and an ability to see beyond the differences among us.
-President Bill Clinton
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People who live integrally are animated by pursuit of a deep purpose, knowledge and sophistication in their personal and professional lives. They demonstrate a capacity for self-awareness, perspective-taking, a diversity of interests, and a commitment to lifelong development. Integral awareness allows people to expand and deepen the experience of every moment, to make sense of the world, to include everything they are while leaving nothing out, and to wake up to the unifying truths that lie at the core of all human experience. Integral Life commits to helping its members live totally free in their immense diversity while embracing the full richness of the human experience in themselves and others. In short, Integral Life community members are leaders committed to extraordinary living.