By contrast, the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against such things… if we live by the Spirit, let us also be guided by the Spirit. (Galatians 5:22-23, 25) The fruit of the Spirit, listed by the Apostle Paul in the fifth chapter of Galatians, is one of my favorite of New Testament passages. I see it as equal to the Beatitudes in terms of establishing a concise statement of what a transformed spiritual life can look like. I especially like the metaphor of “fruit” — this is what the abund ..read more

Friends, just want to make sure everyone is aware of a few upcoming events I have on the calendar. Join me for a retreat and a book signing in New York, or for a day of reflection in Maryland; and if you can’t meet me in those locations, join me online. Here’s what’s coming up… — April 25 (Online event): Teaming up with my friends Alice Camille and Paul Boudreau for a conversation / mini-online-retreat on the Psalms in the light of contemporary music and poetry. Sponsored by the Rock Hill Oratory, this 90-minute program will combine reflection, presentation, and conversation as we explore how ..read more

A long-term reader and patron of this blog recently wrote to me this message: Just what is a contemplative person or for that matter tradition? Is a Christian mystic by definition a contemplative or is a contemplative a possible subset? Or turn that around……is a Christian contemplative by definition a mystic or is a mystic a subset? I think that for years I may have thought that because I engaged with a 20 min. sit each day ( 2 or 3 sits on a good day) that I was engaged with a contemplative life style. I am sure that my toe has been in that water but I know that I am far from being submerged ..read more

A little while back I wrote a blog post called “Five Approaches to Interspirituality.” In this post, I compare interspiritual practice to having a relationship with more than one country (such as the USA and England). People can have different ways of relating to more than one country, and I pose five such “ways,” comparing spirituality to being a tourist, an immigrant, an ambassador, and so forth. At the end of that post, I pose this question: Certainly there are other ways to engage with a faith tradition different from your own. Do you have any ideas as to what that would look like? This ..read more

A reader of this blog recently wrote this question to me: I’ve read and listened to Fr. Thomas Keating quite a bit but am still a little confused regarding where my mind is supposed to be during my Centering Prayer practice. I understand that we are to use the sacred word as a symbol of intention to accept the presence and action of God, however, I get tripped up over where my awareness is supposed to rest. Am I supposed to sit with open awareness AND with the sense that God is present or am I supposed to sit with open awareness and just allow God to interject his presence if/when he so choos ..read more

Hi friends, just wanted to make sure that if you haven’t had a chance to sign up for the Modern Mystics School sponsored by Spiritual Wanderlust, it’s not too late to do so! The program began March 2, but it runs all year long (until next February), so you’ll have plenty of time to watch the recording(s) of the class(es) that have already happened and you’ll still get to enjoy the once-a-month programs that are still to come! Click here to learn more about this program and to register! This monthly program invites you to deepen your spiritual life by taking a deep dive into the wisdo ..read more

Everyone is so busy these days. I get it. So many books, so little time. Which is why audiobooks are God’s gift to commuters and other busy folks. If you have been interested in checking out some of my books, but would rather listen to them than read them, here are your choices, including two of my newer “contemplative” titles and two of my older “pagan” titles. First up are your options if you are an Audible subscriber. Each of the following books can be streamed/downloaded through Audible (or Amazon, the links take you to Amazon): The New Big Book of Christian Mysticism (Audible) Eternal He ..read more

The silence became an emptiness, a steadiness, a solitude, a sacred pause, and a container of nothingness I could bathe in. — Cassidy Hall My friend and colleague Cassidy Hall (who co-hosts the podcast “Encountering Silence” with me and Kevin Johnson) has a new book coming out. I’ve read it, endorsed it, and am sufficiently excited about it that I wanted to spread the word a bit in advance. It’s called Queering Contemplation: Finding Queerness in the Roots and Future of Contemplative Spirituality. As the title implies, it’s a journey into queerness and contemplative spirituality in the light ..read more

A Facebook friend recently posted a request for suggestions on books by or about Meister Eckhart. There are so many, that I couldn’t figure out a succinct way to respond to the request, so I figured I’d just post a list of books here instead. So what follows is a list of books featuring English translations of the writings of the medieval German theologian/mystic Meister Eckart, along with some books of commentary, and even a few collections of poetry inspired by (and drawing from) Eckhart’s own words. Once I started drawing up the list, I kept thinking of more books to add, and before I knew ..read more

Today is the one year anniversary of the passing of my dear friend, mentor, and partner in crime, Brother Elias Marechal, OCSO. Last year I wrote about him at the time of his death, you can read that post by clicking here. If you aren’t familiar with Elias, I encourage you to pick up his books. Tears of An Innocent God: Conversations on Silence, Kindness and Prayer came out in 2015 and is still in print in both paper and ebook formats. A bit harder to find (but worth the search) is Dancing Madly Backwards: A Journey Into God, published in 1982 under Elias’s secular name, Paul Marecha ..read more