Dangers Of Centering Prayer

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Last week there was a thread about Centering Prayer (C.P.) that had both positive and negative responses. May I give you an address of a paper written by a Catholic Priest. The title is “The Dangers of Centering Prayer”. A careful reading will reveal the fact that C.P. is not a Christian method of praying.

spcdc.saint-mike.org/library/CenteringPrayer.html
 
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Exporter:
Last week there was a thread about Centering Prayer (C.P.) that had both positive and negative responses. May I give you an address of a paper written by a Catholic Priest. The title is “The Dangers of Centering Prayer”. A careful reading will reveal the fact that C.P. is not a Christian method of praying.

spcdc.saint-mike.org/library/CenteringPrayer.html
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Exporter,
This reference was cited in the thread you speak of.
 
. This is one thing. But to seek knowledge of the future or intimate knowledge about another person, apart from God, and through the help of clairvoyance or spirits is what is meant by forbidden knowledge.

Forbidden power is a kind of magical power that produces effects apart from God and in a way that is beyond ordinary human means.

**The Kingdom Of Darkness And Forbidden Knowledge

******“Do not go to mediums or consult fortune tellers, for you will be defiled by them. I, the Lord, am your God” (Lev. 19:31). “Should anyone turn to mediums and fortune tellers and follow their wanton ways, I will turn against such a one and cut him off from his people” (Lev. 20:6).

**Astrology, Horoscopes Are Pagan Customs

******Fortune tellers try to predict the future through the use of occult, magic, or superstition. It is forbidden to seek knowledge of the future by using playing cards, tarot cards, the crystal ball, the study of the hand, the stars, examining the liver of dead animals, shooting arrows, the Ouija board, or any other superstitious means.

A medium is a person who has immediate or secret knowledge either by some questionable power of his own or through the power of an evil spirit that works through him. In l Samuel chapter 3, read how King Saul consulted a medium and died the next day. 1 Chronicles 10:13 says that Saul died because of this.

This is found at ewtn.com/library/bishops/occult.htm Written by a Bishop.
 
:yawn:

Same old, same old. We’ve debated this guy’s article at length. Dreher makes numerous misstatements about centering prayer. Repeating it does not make it any more right than it was before.

Alan
 
Alan, " Repeating it does not make it any more right than it was before."
I say, repeating it DOES NOT make any more Wrong than before.

Correct me if I am wrong, Alan, but from what you write I think you are a proponent of Centering Prayer, no matter who gives the warnings; be it Bishop or Priest. Read BLB_Oregon’s references from the Vatican.

I read the paper from Cardinal Ratzinger. It states very plainly that any type of meditative prayer is only for mature adults. That means it is not to be used with children as it has been. People who have a mental ilness, no matter how well they hide it should never go into a quasi-hypnotic-meditative state. Why? Because of deliterious effects.

Alan, if you had cussed and discussed that paper before, then ignore it. I have never seen it before. I have a very good reason to be concerned that people know about the dangers. Perhaps you have been lucky, Alan. Protect yourself.:yup:
 
Centering prayer is not for everyone, but for those who benefit from this form of prayer, it is a wonderful plus to their prayerlife.

Perhaps someone who dabbles in new age stuff, or had a problem with something like that should stay away, but for those with good spiritual direction, it really can deepen their prayer life.

Anything can lead to difficulty, if there is no solid foundatin and regulay Catholic worship. As long as we use different prayer methods in addition to, and NOT instead of our Catholic prayer life, these different methods can add new life to our prayer.
 
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Mysty101:
Centering prayer is not for everyone, but for those who benefit from this form of prayer, it is a wonderful plus to their prayerlife.
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I think this is an excellent point. For instance, there is a danger in oral prayer: it can become mechanical and can be done without any participation from the heart, or even the mind. A person at contemplative prayer is prone to laziness and the desire to “make something happen” during times of aridity. There are “dangers” in every sort of prayer, if you want to look at it that way. The pitfalls in any spiritual activity are well worth knowing, as there are no paths to God which the devil will not attempt to thwart.

Nevertheless, when asked about how to pray, the Holy Father has been quoted as saying, ""How to pray? This is a simple matter. I would say: Pray any way you like, so long as you do pray." You can pray the way your mother taught you; you can use a prayer book. Sometimes it takes courage to pray; but it is possible to pray, and necessary to pray. Whether from memory or a book or just in thought, it is all the same. See, John Paul II, The Way of Prayer, Crossroad Publishing Co. (1995).
Taken from landru.i-link-2.net/shnyves/prayer.html#time%20and%20place
 
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Exporter:
Correct me if I am wrong, Alan, but from what you write I think you are a proponent of Centering Prayer, no matter who gives the warnings; be it Bishop or Priest. Read BLB_Oregon’s references from the Vatican.
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I have used CP at the recommended levels (20 min, twice/day) in the past, but currently I am not keeping up with anything near that.


I am not claiming that CP is something anybody should do. Also I don’t get any point with anybody if I “recruit” anyone new or not. I’m concerned that people at least get to hear a pro-cp voice among dissenters. On whether any given person wishes to investigate centering prayer, I am completely neutral.
People who have a mental ilness, no matter how well they hide it should never go into a quasi-hypnotic-meditative state. Why? Because of deliterious effects.
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OK, so we can make the restriction that a person should be under the guidance of proper spiritual direction which could recommend individual prayer guidance and see if there are any problems.

For many, including myself, centering prayer has helped them get through mental illness. In addition to doctors here on earth, we have the Divine Therapist, the Holy Spirit, who will give us healing if we are open to hear Him.
Alan, if you had cussed and discussed that paper before, then ignore it. I have never seen it before. I have a very good reason to be concerned that people know about the dangers. Perhaps you have been lucky, Alan. Protect yourself.:yup:
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Thanks.

Alan
 
I am just now reading Ronald Knox’s book “Enthusiasm,” which deals with 16th and 17th Century phenomena in prayer similar to Centering Prayer. Some of this is very close to what Sts. John of the Cross and Teresa of Avila cover in their writing on prayer. Then, as now, approaches to prayer, like Centering Prayer, which emphasize complete passivity to God caused uproar in the Church. The accusations and defenses are remarkably similar to what is going on here.
 
Meister Eckhart said this:

"I have read many works of both heathen masters and prophets, and books of the Old and New Testaments, and have sought earnestly and with the utmost diligence to find out what is the best and highest virtue, with the aid of which man could be most closely united with God, by which man could become by grace what God is by nature, and by which man would be most like the image of what he was when he was in God, when there was no difference between him and God, before God had created the world.

"And when I search the Scriptures thoroughly, as far as my reason can fathom and know, I just find that pure detachment stands above all things, for all virtues pay some regard to the creatures, yet detachment is free from all creatures. Hence it was that our Lord said to Martha: ‘One thing is needful,’ that is to say, he who wished to be untroubled and pure must have one thing, namely detachment.

“The teachers praise love most highly, as St.Paul does when he says: ‘In whatever tribulation I may find myself, if I have not love, then I am nothing.’ But I praise detachment more than all love. First, because the best thing about love is that it forces me to love God. On the other hand, detachment forces God to love me. Now it is much nobler that I should force God to myself than that I should force myself to God. And the reason is that God can join Himself to me more closely and unite Himself with me better than I could unite myself with God. That detachment forces God to me I can prove by the fact that everything likes to be in its own natural place. Now God’s own and natural place is unity and purity and they come from detachment. Hence God must of necessity give Himself to a detached heart.” (Selected Treatises and Sermons, p. 156*)*

And Pope John Paul II, in a 1985 speech, said this:

“Did not Eckhart teach his disciples: ‘All that God asks you most pressingly is to go out of yourself - and let God be God in you’? One could think that, in separating himself from creatures, the mystic leaves his brothers, humanity, behind. The same Eckhart affirms that, on the contrary, the mystic is marvelously present to them on the only level where he can truly reach them, that is in God.”
 
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