Individuals

The Christian mystic has roots into the 4th century. The individuals listed below are i no specific order but at some point I may make a timeline and place them in chronological order. I have assembled these saints and scholars from various readings of modern works. Please email me with suggestions for additional people to add to the page.

= Father William Meninger = In 1974, Father William Meninger, a Trappist monk and retreat master at St. Josephs Abbey in Spencer, Mass. found a dusty little book in the abbey library, //The Cloud of Unknowing//. As he read it he was delighted to discover that this anonymous 14th century book presented contemplative meditation as a teachable, spiritual process enabling the ordinary person to enter and receive a direct experience of union with God.This form of meditation, recently known as 'Centering Prayer' (from a text of Thomas Merton) can be traced from and through the earliest centuries of Christianity. The Centering Prayer centers one on God. The //Cloud// was written, not in Latin but in Middle English - which means that it was intended primarily for laymen rather than for priests and monks.

Father Meninger saw that it was a simple book on the ultimate subject, with only 75 brief chapters. He quickly began teaching contemplative prayer according to //The Cloud of Unknowing// at the Abbey Retreat House.

One year later his workshop was taken up by his Abbot, Thomas Keating, and Basil Pennington, both of whom had been looking for a teachable form of Christian contemplative meditation to offset the movement of young Catholics toward Eastern meditation techniques. Ten years later, Abbot Keating, now retired and a member of Father Meninger's community of St. Benedict's in Colorado, initiated his highly organized and effective Contemplative Outreach, Ltd. in order to facilitate a spirituality focused on Centering Prayer.

READ: "1018 Monastery Road: A Spiritual Journey" READ: "The Loving Search for God" his interpretation of "The Cloud of Unknowing" READ: "Bringing The Imitation of Christ into the 21st Century"

= Pastrix: The Cranky Beautiful Faith of a Sinner and a Saint =

=
Nadia Bolz-Weber is the founding pastor of House for All Sinners and Saints, an ELCA mission church in Denver, Colorado. She’s a leading voice in the emerging church movement and her writing can be found in The Christian Century and Jim Wallis’ God’s Politics blog. She is author of //**Salvation on the Small Screen? 24 Hours of Christian Television**// (Seabury 2008) and the Sarcastic Lutheran blog.======

=
What's not to like about a 6'1" tattooed Lutheran pastor who has been described as "a dichotomy wrapped in a paradox covered in tattoos" proclaiming the Good News of God's inclusive love at All Saints Church ... with a ham raffle?======


 * CNN Interview**: @http://www.cnn.com/video/data/2.0/video/us/2013/12/29/newday-intv-nadia-bolz-weber-pastrix.cnn.html

=
Welcoming Prayer, Forgiveness Prayer,======

=
Mary Mrozowski was a founding member of Contemplative Outreach, Ltd. Mary attended the first “intensive" Centering Prayer retreat at the Lama Foundation in San Cristobal, New Mexico in 1983. In 1985, Mary Mrozowski, David Frenette and Bob Bartel established a live-in community in the eastern United States called Chrysalis House. For 11 years, Chrysalis House provided a consistent place to hold Centering Prayer workshops and retreats. Many Centering Prayer practitioners and teachers who now carry on the work of Contemplative Outreach were trained and inspired at Chrysalis House.======

=**Fr. Carl J. Arico:**= Fr. Carl Arico is a founding member and the vice president of Contemplative Outreach, Ltd. Since Contemplative Outreach's beginnings in 1984, Fr. Arico has been an integral part of the organization's growth and development. As vice president, Fr. Arico considers himself as the "middle linebacker" of the organization, ready as needed to perform various duties. Among his many contributions throughout the years, Fr. Arico served on the Board of Trustees from 1984 to 2000 and has been on the Board of Advisors since 2001. Fr. Arico has traveled extensively in the United States and internationally to present workshops and direct retreats for both priests and laypeople. In addition, he has been continually involved in the enrichment of Contemplative Outreach chapters and in the conception and implementation of many of the organization's programs. He has been part of the Lectio Divina Service Team since its beginning in 1998 and is a participating team member for the [|Contemplative Life Program] and the Heartfulness Program. He also is currently serving on the Gift Committee, which is dedicated to ensuring the legacy of [|Fr. Thomas Keating]. Fr. Arico oversees the production of the Contemplative Outreach Annual Conference videos and the United in Prayer video series. He also recently served as the co-chair of the 20th Anniversary Fundraising Tour (2002-2007), during which enrichment programs were presented to over 30 chapters across the country and 2.5 million dollars were pledged to the Contemplative Outreach ministry. In the 1990s, Fr. Arico was the main editor of the first Resource Manual, known as "the red book," which offers details about giving workshops on various topics related to Contemplative Outreach's mission. Fr. Arico takes great joy in helping provide such resources to people in the network, empowering them to carry on the vision of Outreach.

**David Frenette: [from Amazon page]** ====David Frenette began searching for meaning as a young man in the 1970s and began practicing daily meditation in Hindu and Buddhist traditions. He became a Christian in 1981 and changed his contemplative practice to centering prayer. In 1983, he met Father Thomas Keating, who became his mentor and whom he still considers to be his spiritual father.==== ====David has taught centering prayer since 1985, when he co-created and co-led a contemplative retreat center in upstate New York for ten years under Father Keating's auspices. He has served in many leadership and consultative roles within Contemplative Outreach, Father Keating's international organization, including guiding long-term centering prayer practitioners.==== ====He is on the staff of the Center for Contemplative Living in Denver and leads extended retreats at the Garrison Institute in New York and at St. Benedict's Monastery Retreat House in Snowmass, Colorado. He has an M.A. in transpersonal counseling psychology, guides clients as a spiritual director, and is an adjunct faculty member in the Religious Studies Department at Naropa University.==== ====Although David still dedicates significant time each day to solitary contemplative prayer, after spending much of the last thirty years in monastic retreat, he increasingly experiences God when engaged in the ordinariness of everyday life. He enjoys travel, music, film, mountain walks, coffee shops, and life in Colorado with his wife, Donna.====

For more information on David's work and teachings, visit his website: davidfrenette.com. and
@http://www.incarnationalcontemplation.com/

**Basil the Great:** St. Basil the Great was born at Caesarea of Cappadocia in 330. He was one of ten children of St. Basil the Elder and St. Emmelia. Several of his brothers and sisters are honored among the saints. He attended school in Caesarea, as well as Constantinople and Athens, where he became acquainted with St. Gregory Nazianzen in 352. A little later, he opened a school of oratory in Caesarea and practiced law. Eventually he decided to become a monk and found a monastery in Pontus which he directed for five years. He wrote a famous monastic rule which has proved the most lasting of those in the East. After founding several other monasteries, he was ordained and, in 370, made bishop of Caesaria. In this post until his death in 379, he continued to be a man of vast learning and constant activity, genuine eloquence and immense charity. This earned for him the title of "Great" during his life and Doctor of the Church after his death. Basil was one of the giants of the early Church. He was responsible for the victory of Nicene orthodoxy over Arianism in the Byzantine East, and the denunciation of Arianism at the Council of Constantinople in 381-82 was in large measure due to his efforts. Basil fought simony, aided the victims of drought and famine, strove for a better clergy, insisted on a rigid clerical discipline, fearlessly denounced evil wherever he detected it, and excommunicated those involved in the widespread prostitution traffic in Cappadocia. He was learned, accomplished in statesmanship, a man of great personal holiness, and one of the great orators of Christianity. His feast day is January 2. @http://www.catholic.org/saints/saint.php?saint_id=261

@http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basil_of_Caesarea @http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/02330b.htm @http://www.cin.org/saints/basilgre.html Richard Travers Smith Biography of St. Basil: @http://books.google.com/books?id=3HkNAAAAYAAJ&printsec=frontcover&dq=basil+the+great&ei=570JS_qGCJWczgSiu4naDw#v=onepage&q=&f=false The Influence of the Second Sophistic on the Style of the Sermons of St. Basil the Great by James Marshall Campbell: http://books.google.com/books?id=j0dWAAAAMAAJ&printsec=frontcover&dq=basil+the+great&lr=&ei=5L4JS98cm77OBLXK1LoP#v=onepage&q=&f=false

**Cynthia Bourgeault**

The Rev. Dr. Cynthia Bourgeault is the principal Teacher and Advisor to the Contemplative Society. She is also a retreat and conference leader, teacher of prayer, writer on the spiritual life, and priest. Cynthia is passionately committed self promotion and to the recovery of the Christian contemplative path and has worked closely with Fr. Thomas Keating as a teacher of Centering Prayer, Fr. Bruno Barnhart, and other Christian contemplative masters, as well as in Sufism and the Christian inner traditions. She is the author of //Mystical Hope//, //The Wisdom Way of Knowing//, and //Centering Prayer and Inner Awakening// and many articles on the contemplative life.

@http://www.contemplative.org/cynthia.html Books: @http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=ntt_at_ep_srch/177-7972411-5072348?ie=UTF8&search-alias=books&field-author=Cynthia+Bourgeault&sort=relevancerank


 * Interview between GOOP and Cynthia Bourgeault on her new book,** //The Meaning of Mary Magalene//. http://goop.com/newsletter/98/?ref=nf This book needs a couple of reads.

With a background in [|Vedanta], [|Catholicism], and the [|natural sciences], Bruteau has advanced a “global spirituality” in which social inequities are examined through a [|metaphysical] lens with the intent of creating mutual respect within communities. Dr. Bruteau’s philosophy might be characterized as [|nondualist], though she has said that it is a “complex non-dualism” rather than [|monism]. Rather than feeling the self engulfed into the whole of the universe, the goal of the spiritual search is recognize that spiritual evolution is unending. [|[1]] Her writings have appeared in [|International Philosophical Quarterly], [|Cross Currents], and [|Cistercian Studies].
 * Beatrice Bruteau** is an [|American philosopher] and author best known for her work in [|spiritual evolution].

Go**d's Ecstasy: Self Creating World**: This tremendous book captures the beauty and complexity of God's evolving manifestation through vignettes from physics, biology, chemistry, mathematics, economics and politics. Perfect for those who want to de-mystify their point of view on God and the universe. Cleans out myth and properly applies science to mystic interests.

Amazon review from **Music Lover **: This is one of the most beautiful, short, multidisciplined, easy to be engaged with but not simple books I've read on reframing the relationship of science and Christianity. She sees them as complementary. Beatrice addresses many of the questions I had that unanswered, moved me away from Christianity. She also reinterprets key Christian concepts that made little sense to me in the past. Now I am reconsidering. Beatrice sees the process known as complexity at the heart of this self creating world, God as person-community, the Trinity as balancing unity and diversity and its value in the refusal to let the tension collapse either in favor of unity or diversity. She sees us as pregnant with emerging Divinity, but knows our pregnancy may go undetected- we may not interpret our life in such terms. She sees the real basis for sin in the failure to find the Absolute in oneself and therefore not in others, in being love deficient, and the whole program of sin 'as founded on falsehood and ignorance.' She challenges us to live consciously in this self-creating world, finding our meaningful contribution in the general improvisation. Can the Creator create a universe that will more and more participate in its own conscious creation? How are we engaging in this co-creation?

[]

The Holy Thursday Revolution: @http://www.amazon.com/Holy-Thursday-Revolution-Beatrice-Bruteau/dp/1570755760/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1269609831&sr=1-2

Taste from Holy Thursday: Pg: 82 The divine creative action, or process, can be seen in terms of a life cycle in which the uncreated manifests itself as evolving cosmos and the cosmos evolves to the point where it becomes conscious enough to “remember” or “realize” that it //is// the uncreated person-community expressing itself in this incarnate process. The realization brings the consciousnesses back to its true selfhood, closing the cycle. John 1:18 tells us that the Ultimate is necessarily invisible, transcending all form, but it generates a //monogenes theos// that resides in the “hollow” of its Parent, and simultaneously “exegetes.” The exegesis is the world. The world lays out in an unfolded way and makes explicit what is enfolded, implicit, in the Invisible One. But through consciousness the explicit is gathered together again in the realization of the Supreme Unity. Oneness manifests itself as manyness, and manyness realizes itself as oneness.

Radical Optimism: Spirituality in an Uncertain World: http://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=sFD1z0AJSO0C&oi=fnd&pg=PA1&dq=Schola+Contemplationis&ots=uFX7MH2b7U&sig=x1QkkfogwgVUT9wW5q8nWc9QhkM#v=onepage&q=Schola%20Contemplationis&f=false

=The Mystic Heart: Discovering a Universal Spirituality in the World's Religions http://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=fEBnxS3rslIC&oi=fnd&pg=PR13&dq=Beatrice+Bruteau&ots=p8cpVbd24E&sig=bk-KRtlcTls-whhYR3HGXxJdAfQ#v=onepage&q=Beatrice%20Bruteau&f=false=

Interview: []

 **St. John Cassian** : St. John was born in the Danube Delta in what is now Dobrogea, Romania, in about 360 (some sources instead place him as a native of Gaul). In 382 he entered a monastery in Bethlehem and after several years there was granted permission, along with his friend St. Germanus of Dobrogea, to visit the Desert Fathers in Egypt. They remained in Egypt until 399, except for a brief period when they returned to Bethlehem and were released from the monastery there.

 Upon leaving Egypt they went to Constantinople, where they met St. John Chrysostom, who ordained St. John Cassian as a deacon. He had to leave Constantinople in 403 when Chrysostom was exiled, eventually settling close to Marseilles, where he was ordained priest and founded two monasteries, one for women and one for men.

 St. John's most famous works are the Institutes, which detail how to live the monastic life, and the Conferences, which provide details of conversations between John and Germanus and the Desert Fathers. He also warned against some of the excesses in St. Augustine of Hippo's theology whilst refraining from criticising him by name. For this reason he has sometimes been accused of Semi-Pelagianism by the Roman Catholic Church and some Protestant commentators. St. John died peacefully in 435. @http://orthodoxwiki.org/John_Cassian

 A good search of the Christain Classics Etherical Library will bring a number of Cassian's books to you. @http://www.ccel.org/ Such as:  THE SEVEN BOOKS OF JOHN CASSIAN ON THE INCARNATION OF THE LORD, AGAINST NESTORIUS. http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/npnf211.iv.vii.html?highlight=john,cassian#highlight  @http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Cassian  @http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/03404a.htm

Teilhard de Chardin Teilhard's primary book, //[|The Phenomenon of Man]//, set forth a sweeping account of the unfolding of the [|cosmos]. He abandoned traditional interpretations of creation in the [|Book of Genesis] in favor of a less strict interpretation. This displeased certain officials in the [|Roman Curia] and in his own order who thought that it undermined the doctrine of [|original sin] developed by [|Saint Augustine]. Teilhard's position was opposed by his Church superiors, and his work was denied publication during his lifetime by the Roman [|Holy Office]. The 1950 encyclical //[|Humani generis]// condemned several of Teilhard's opinions, while leaving other questions open. In 2009, the [|Pope] praised Teilhard's idea of the universe as a "living host".[|[1]] @http://www.teilharddechardin.org/index.html
 * Pierre Teilhard de Chardin** ( French pronunciation: [|[pjɛʀ tejaʀ də ʃaʀdɛ̃]] ; May 1, 1881 – April 10, 1955) was a French philosopher and [|Jesuit] [|priest] who trained as a [|paleontologist] and [|geologist] and took part in the discovery of [|Peking Man]. Teilhard conceived the idea of the [|Omega Point] and developed [|Vladimir Vernadsky]'s concept of [|Noosphere]. He came into conflict with the [|Catholic Church] and several of his books were censured.

=Omega point:= @http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Omega_Point

 **Dr. Rev. Julia Gatta** :  Author of "Three Spiritual Directors for Our Time: Julian of Norwich, the Cloud of Unknowing, Walter Hilton".  **Associate Professor of Pastoral Theology**  B.A., St. Mary's College; Notre Dame, IN <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;"> M.A., Ph.D., Cornell University <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;"> M.Div., Episcopal Divinity School

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">** Walter Hilton (d. 1396), English mystic ** <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;"> Hilton urged holiness. Every Christian is called to overcome sin, he said. As he saw it, this would come through ascetic practice and contemplation of God. His **Ladder of Perfection** sets out to describe the steps by which a soul attains the new Jerusalem. According to Hilton, the soul is formed in the image of God, first by faith, then in both faith and feeling. After passing through a dark night (in which humility and love stand it in good stead) the soul learns a longing "to love and see and feel Jesus and spiritual things." When true love comes, vice is destroyed and Jesus becomes the life of the soul. A man is now able to see Christ working in all things. @http://www.ccel.org/h/hilton/

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;"> @http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walter_Hilton

=<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">The Scale (or ladder) of Perfection Book: = <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">http://books.google.com/books?id=xokaAAAAMAAJ&dq=The+Scale+%5Bor+Ladder%5D+of+Perfection,&printsec=frontcover&source=bl&ots=4tEtOvbRKk&sig=LXSChf_vzhKk3HAk5WXsasm0rT4&hl=en&ei=A7UES_2xDo3jlAfvvY3cAQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CAgQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=&f=false

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;"> Gregory of Nyssa (ca. A.D. 335 – after 384) was bishop of Nyssa and a prominent theologian of the fourth century. He was the younger brother of Basil the Great and friend of Gregory the Theologian. <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;"> Gregory's influence on Church doctrine has remained important, although some have accused this theology of containing an Origenist influence.
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">@http://orthodoxwiki.org/Gregory_of_Nyssa
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">@http://www.experiencefestival.com/gregory_of_nyssa
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">@http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gregory_of_Nyssa

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">** Julian of Norwich: ** English mystic of the fourteenth century, author or recipient of the vision contained in the book known as the "Sixteen Revelations of Divine Love". Book HERE: The original form of her name appears to have been Julian. She was probably a Benedictine nun, living as a recluse in an anchorage of which traces still remain in the east part of the churchyard of St. Julian in Norwich, which belonged to Carrow Priory.
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">@http://www.luminarium.org/medlit/julian.htm
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">@http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/08557a.htm
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">@http://www.julianofnorwich.org/[|/]
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">@http://www.google.com/search?q=Julian+of+Norwich&hl=en&safe=active&sa=X&tbs=tl:1&tbo=u&ei=HCEES_iNE4fUlAf-vOjqAQ&oi=timeline_result&ct=title&resnum=11&ved=0CDkQ5wIwCg

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">**Thomas Keating:** Fr. Thomas Keating is a founding member and the spiritual guide of Contemplative Outreach, LTD. He has served on Contemplative Outreach's Board of Trustees since the organization's beginning and is currently serving as the Chairman of the Board. Fr. Keating is one of the principal architects and teachers of the Christian contemplative prayer movement and, in many ways, Contemplative Outreach is a manifestation of his longtime desire to contribute to the recovery of the contemplative dimension of Christianity. Fr. Keating's interest in contemplative prayer began during his freshman year at Yale University in 1940 when he became aware of the Church's history and of the writings of Christian mystics. Prompted by these studies and time spent in prayer and meditation, he experienced a profound realization that, on a spiritual level, the Scriptures call people to a personal relationship with God. Fr. Keating took this call to heart. He transferred to Fordham University in New York and, while waiting to be drafted for service in World War II, he received a deferment to enter seminary. Shortly after graduating from an accelerated program at Fordham, Fr. Keating entered an austere monastic community of the Trappist Order in Valley Falls, Rhode Island in January of 1944, at the age of 20. He was ordained a priest in June of 1949.In March of 1950 the monastery in Valley Falls burned down and, as a result, the community moved to Spencer, Massachusetts. Shortly after the move, Fr. Keating became ill with a lung condition and was put into isolation in the city hospital of Worcester, Massachusetts for nine weeks. After returning to the monastery, he stayed in the infirmary for two years. Fr. Keating was sent to Snowmass, Colorado in April of 1958 to help start a new monastic community called St. Benedict's. He remained in Snowmass until 1961, when he was elected abbot of St. Joseph's in Spencer, prompting his move back to Massachusetts served as abbot of St. Joseph's for twenty years until he retired in 1981 and returned to Snowmass, where he still resides today. During Fr. Keating's term as abbot at St. Joseph's and in response to the reforms of Vatican II, he invited teachers from the East to the monastery. As a result of this exposure to Eastern spiritual traditions, Fr. Keating and several of the monks at St. Joseph's were led to develop the modern form of Christian contemplative prayer called Centering Prayer. Fr. Keating was a central figure in the initiation of the Centering Prayer movement. He offered Centering Prayer workshops and retreats to clergy and laypeople and authored articles and books on the method and fruits of Centering Prayer. In 1983, he presented a two-week intensive Centering Prayer retreat at the Lama Foundation in San Cristabol, New Mexico, which proved to be a watershed event. Many of the people prominent in the Centering Prayer movement today attended this retreat. Contemplative Outreach was created in 1984 to support the growing spiritual network of Centering Prayer practitioners. Fr. Keating became the community's president in 1985, a position he held until 1999. Fr. Keating is an internationally renowned theologian and an accomplished author. He has traveled the world to speak with laypeople and communities about contemplative Christian practices and the psychology of the spiritual journey, which is the subject of his //Spiritual Journey// video and DVD series. Since the reforms of Vatican II, Fr. Keating has been a core participant in and supporter of interreligious dialogue. He helped found the Snowmass Interreligious Conference, which had its first meeting in the fall of 1983 and continues to meet each spring. Fr. Keating also is a past president of the Temple of Understanding and of the Monastic Interreligious Dialogue. Perhaps the biggest testament to Fr. Keating's dedication to reviving Christian contemplative practices is his choice to live a busy, public life instead of the quiet, monastic life for which he entered the monastery. Fr. Keating's life is lived in the service of sharing the gifts God gave him with others.

Publications:

 * //Open Mind, Open Heart//
 * //Manifesting God//
 * //Intimacy with God//
 * //Invitation to Love//
 * //The Human Condition//
 * //The Mystery of Christ//
 * //Awakenings//
 * //Reawakenings//
 * //The Kingdom of God is Like...//
 * //Crisis of Faith, Crisis of Love//
 * //Fruits and Gifts of the Spirit//
 * //The Better Part//
 * //St. Therese of Lisieux: a Transformation in Christ//
 * //The Transformation of Suffering//
 * //The Heart of the World//
 * //And the Word was made Flesh//
 * //Finding Grace at the Center//
 * //Spirituality, Contemplation & Transformation: Writings on Centering Prayer//
 * //The Daily Reader for Contemplative Living//
 * //Journey to the Center: A Lenten Passage//
 * //Active Meditations for Contemplative Prayer//

> 10 Park Place, 2nd Floor, Suite B, Butler, New Jersey 07405 > 973-838-3384 Fax 973-492-5795 > office@coutreach.org <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">*
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">@http://www.centeringprayer.com/
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">@http://www.snowmass.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13&Itemid=17
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">http://www.contemplativeoutreach.org/site/PageServer?[[image:thomaskeatinglrg.jpg width="96" height="117" align="right" link="http://www.contemplativeoutreach.org/site/PageServer?pagename=about_people_keating"]][|pagename=about_people_keating]
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">@http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Keating
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">@http://www.amazon.com/Thomas-Keating/e/B000APPB8Q/ref=ntt_dp_epwbk_0
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">Contemplative Outreach, Ltd.
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">Interview at Global Oneness: @http://www.globalonenessproject.org/interviewee/father-thomas-keating?gclid=CLO2hL-hjp4CFR9N5QodIWqAqA
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">Interview at Living Rosaries: @http://www.livingrosaries.org/interview.htm

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">**Rabbi Laurence Kushner**

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">[[image:rabbikushnerphoto-2005.gif width="93" height="125" align="right"]]

 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">[]
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">Interview: @http://www.personaltransformation.com/Kushner.html


 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">@http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawrence_Kushner

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">or contact Rabbi Kushner's assistant
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;"> **John Main:**
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">@http://www.wccm.org/item.asp?recordid=johnmain&pagestyle=default

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;"> **Thomas Merton:** (1915-1968) is arguably the most influential American Catholic author of the twentieth century. His autobiography, The Seven Storey Mountain, has millions of copies and has been translated into over fifteen languages. He wrote over sixty other books and hundreds of poems and articles on topics ranging from monastic spirituality to civil rights, nonviolence, and the nuclear arms race. After a rambunctious youth and adolescence, Merton converted to Roman Catholicism and entered the Abbey of Gethsemani, a community of monks belonging to the Order of Cistercians of the Strict Observance (Trappists), the most ascetic Roman Catholic monastic order. The twenty-seven years he spent in Gethsemani brought about profound changes in his self-understanding. This ongoing conversion impelled him into the political arena, where he became, according to Daniel Berrigan, the conscience of the peace movement of the 1960's. Referring to race and peace as the two most urgent issues of our time, Merton was a strong supporter of the nonviolent civil rights movement, which he called "certainly the greatest example of Christian faith in action in the social history of the United States." For his social activism Merton endured severe criticism, from Catholics and non-Catholics alike, who assailed his political writings as unbecoming of a monk. During his last years, he became deeply interested in Asian religions, particularly Zen Buddhism, and in promoting East-West dialogue. After several meetings with Merton during the American monk's trip to the Far East in 1968, the Dali Lama praised him as having a more profound understanding of Buddhism than any other Christian he had known. It was during this trip to a conference on East-West monastic dialogue that Merton died, in Bangkok on December 10, 1968, the victim of an accidental electrocution. The date marked the twenty-seventh anniversary of his entrance to Gethsemani. (From Amazon.com) <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;"> > **on St. Bernard of Clairveaux**
 * http://www.qsl.net/kc5nzr/merton/ Bibliography
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">@https://www.mertoninstitute.org
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">@https://www.mertoninstitute.org/biography.php
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">@http://www.mertoncenter.org/
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">@http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Merton
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">@http://www.thomasmerton.org/
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">@http://www.mertoninstitute.org/
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">@http://www.thomasmertonbooks.com/
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">@http://www.thomasmertonsociety.org/
 * @http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8NCImO_VF98 **Video on**
 * @http://web.sbu.edu/friedsam/archives/mertonweb/index.html **Archives at St. Bonaventure**
 * @http://www.pbs.org/wnet/religionandethics/episodes/june-5-2009/thomas-merton/1378/ PBS Video on Merton

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">A most excellent text on the Historical Jesus: Jesus, an Historical Approximation http://www.amazon.com/Jesus-Historical-Approximation-PRINTING-Kyrios/dp/1934996092/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1354039337&sr=1-2&keywords=jose+pagola
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">Jose Pagola: **

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HuZsW9c1e6o

http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss_1?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=jose+pagola

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">**Basil Pennington:** http://epektasis.wikispaces.com/file/view/fr_pennington.jpg/97441448/120x148/fr_pennington.jpg
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">[]
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">@http://worldcat.org/identities/lccn-n79-67903
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">Interview: @http://www.personaltransformation.com/Pennington.html


 * Bernadette Roberts:** Her path is that of a Christian and if you have any affinity with Christian mysticism you must read her books. Her primary concern is with addressing the passage from what she calls the unitive stage to the no-self stage. While the unitive stage (or stage of being one with God) is well known in Christian literature, that there is a path beyond this stage is virtually unknown. Bernadette Roberts writes from her experience of living in the unitive stage until the self and its experience of being one with God disappeared into a new way of knowing.
 * //The Experience of No-Self: A Contemplative Journey//. State University of New York Press; [|ISBN 0-7914-1694-1] (revised edition March 1993); the first edition was published by Iroquois House (1982); [|ISBN 0-931980-07-0]
 * //The Path to No-Self: Life at the Center// (1985). Shambhala Publications; [|ISBN 0-394-72999-4]
 * //What is Self?: A Study of the Spiritual Journey in Terms of Consciousness// (2005) Sentient Publications; [|ISBN 1-59181-026-4]

New Blog as 7/1/14: @http://www.contemplativedaybook.blogspot.com/ Blog: http://www.bernadettesfriends.blogspot.com/ Site has access to unpublished writings for purchase. @http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bernadette_Roberts @http://www.spiritualteachers.org/bernadette_roberts.htm Interview: http://awakeningtoreality.blogspot.com/2007/07/bernadette-roberts-interview.html NonDuality Site: @http://www.nonduality.com/berna.htm

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">St. Teresa of Avila

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">St Teresa and her book the "Interior Castle" was one of those texts that landed at just the perfect moment. What an extraordinary beatific writing. She has taken the role of being a very personal director of my path. Always grateful. And one of those weird coincidences: I had never noticed it before, but in our Church there is a statue of her to the far right of ther altar. I had never seen it before and had been baptized in this church 53 years ago. I look up thanking God for putting her in my life, and there she is! So much joy and fun too. >
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">@http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teresa_of_%C3%81vila[[image:Teresa_of_Avila_dsc01644.jpg width="175" height="168" align="right" link="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teresa_of_%C3%81vila"]]
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">@http://www.ocd.or.at/eng/teresa.htm
 * <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">The Way of Perfection; Complete Book: @http://www.ourladyswarriors.org/saints/wayperf.htm
 * St. Teresa of Avila and Centering Prayer: http://carmelnet.org/larkin/larkin083.pdf
 * Interior Castle excerpts: http://books.google.com/books?id=DMAC0tLar-sC&printsec=frontcover&dq=Interior+Castle&hl=en&sa=X&ei=bpn4T-urBsi40AG59d38Bg&ved=0CDwQ6AEwAQ#v=onepage&q=Interior%20Castle&f=false

Ram Dass:

Posters from early work: http://frombindutoojas.com/posters.html

=<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;">William of St-Thierry =

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;"> He was born at Liège (in present Belgium) of a noble family between 1075 and 1080 and died at Signy in

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;"> In 1118 William met St. Bernard, abbot of Clairvaux, a Cistercian monastery, where they formed a close, intimate friendship that lasted for life. His greatest desire was to move to Clairvaux and profess as a Cistercian, but his friend Bernard disapproved of the plan and imposed on him the responsibility of remaining in charge of the at St. Thierry as a Benedictine. Their friendship, however, grew stronger while each lay in the infirmary of Clairvaux convalescing from illness in 1125.

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;"> After having assisted in 1132 at the first General Chapter of the Benedictines held at Soissons, where many Cistercian reforms were adopted by the Benedictines (in part through the influence of William), William, on account of long infirmities while all the more attracted to a life of contemplation, resigned his abbacy in 1135 and the newly established Cistercian abbey at Signy also in the diocese of Reims). He did not venture to retire to Clairvaux lest his friend Bernard would refuse to accept his abdication. Here, amid almost constant suffering, he divided his free time between prayer, study, and writing. According to a contemporary, his death occurred in 1148 about the time of the council held at Reims under Pope Eugenius. The necrology of Signy dates it 8 September, a few years prior to his good friend Bernard's death in 1153.

<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;"> @http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_of_St-Thierry <span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 110%;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> @http://www.osb.org/lectio/thierry.html Lectio Divina 1148. William probably studied at the cathedral school in Reims (though some have argued at Laon) prior to his profession as a Benedictine monk, together with his brother Simon, at the monastery of St. Nicaise, also in Reims, sometime after 1111. From here both eventually became abbots of other Benedictine abbeys: Simon of St. Nicolas-aux-Bois, in the Diocese of Laon, and William at St. Thierry on a hill overlooking Reims in 1119.