I was listening to Catholic Answers with guest Sharon Lee Giganti and her monthly slot for discussing the New Age. She was an actress with an active professional career who got involved in the New Age and left acting to promote the New Age.
In this episode she was discussing the group “Contemplative Outreach” which is the main organization promoting centering prayer and the works of Fr. Thomas Keating and others. Fr. Keating was the first president of Contemplative Outreach.
One of the book they recommend throughout the site is “Psalms for Praying: An Invitation for Wholeness” by Nan C. Merrill who died last year. This book is a translation of the Psalms meant to be less Patriarchal (authors statement) that flattens them and removes references to sin, judgment, laws, precepts, commandments, etc. As a result the translated Psalms read like more like a reference to an inner-light than they do of any Christian understanding of God. Half of the profits for the book go to her site “Friends of Silence” a website that publishes a New Age Newsletter full or references to the Divine Light within filled with quotes referencing this “light” which falls into line with the pantheism of New Agers.
The author was involved with the infamous “A Course in Miracles” by Helen Schucman that denies suffering and quotes from a channeled spirit. Fr. Benedict Groeshel who went to school with Helen Schucman and gave her eulogy had said that this channeled spirit was possibly a true diabolic manifestation. Nan C. Merrill also had Luciferian views. This group venerates an unfallen Lucifer as a light bringer. She also quotes other Luciferians and Theosophists on this site.
The passages of the book Sharon Lee Giganti read from show a translation of the Psalms that anybody with a working BS detector informed by the faith would cause to sound alarm bells. Often when you bring up the topic of Centering Prayer you set off a tempest from people who support it and considering how prevalent this is in retreat centers that is no surprise. A lot of good people certainly want to get closer to God and so are attracted to this form of prayer which promises to help them achieve that. Yet when you read what the leaders of this movement teach and the fact that they recommend a book dripping with New Age tendencies, you get an idea how close Centering Prayer is bringing them to God.
When you read some of the quotes of Fr. Keating you find something beyond Theosis or Deification such as St. Athanasius’ statement “The Son of God became man, that we might become god” into something more pantheistic where union with God means that we are God and there is no separation between us and God. Becoming “partakers of God’s nature” as St. Peter wrote is not the same as being part of God’s nature. Sharon provides references to many of Fr. Keating’s quotes that are hard to square with orthodox teaching. Add to that he is involved with an institute that promotes religious plurality and syncretism.
It rather sad how infected so many parishes are with Centering Prayer. Instead of forms of contemplative prayer advocated by the saints or proven practices like Lecto Divina people are taught a technique more akin to Transcendental Mediation than looking at God and contemplating and adoring his attributes. A form of prayer not advocated by any Blessed or Saint and which is promoted by people with less than an orthodox view of the faith is hardly a prayer at all. Centering Prayer can easily become self-centered prayer that confuses yourself with God. I remember another episode on Catholic Answers where they were discussing Centering Prayer and a large group of people called in explaining how after they got involved with Centering Prayer had quite negative effects. This article on This Rock Magazine “The Danger of Centering Prayer” explains why this is so.
You can find Sharon Lee Giganti’s site here.
14 comments
“Often when you bring up the topic of Centering Prayer you set off a tempest from people who support it…”
Thank you so much for this post! So true. Since I heard Johnnette Benkovic speak on the sources on the New Age movement, and read a concrete catechesis on centering prayer and its origins, I wouldn’t have been able to explain this. To this day, though, I have ostensibly orthodox friends who *love* centering prayer and are very attached to it.The info on the leaders of the movement is very helpful.
The whole attraction with centering prayer is that people think that they can achieve union with God easily every time they try it whereas in orthodox Catholic prayer the mystical union with God is a gift from God and rarely obtainable and only when one passes through a number of lower stages.
Some good references:
The Fulfilment of all Desire by Ralph Martin and
The Better Part by Fr John Bartunek
http://rcspiritualdirection.com/blog/2011/01
I had similar problems when we had to study various Catholic spiritualities in a capstone seminar at a Catholic university! The ultra-feminist prof. refused to accept that anyone would not find Centering prayer suitable for their prayer needs. It became more buddhist than anything, but then again according to her there’s nothing wrong with buddhism anyway… I took to praying the Rosary when we took 15 minutes each day to ‘center’ ourselves.
A question: what is the difference between centering prayer and, say, praying the Jesus Prayer quietly and slowly in the hopes of calming your mind and simply being with Christ?
In my humble opinion one of the greatest problems that plagues modern man is an understanding of who God is. God has been greatly diminished to a point where we become on par with Him.
Why is that Christians, Catholics and the like are constantly seeking ways to draw nearer to God which are flawed with respect to our relationship to Him? Last time I checked contemplating the Psalms “centers” us with God. We need Him desperately, we are sinners, He is our Rock. At least that what I get.
Sensus Fidelium quickly and easily warns us from this sort of demonic hogwash. Pablum!
Pray upwards and out of oneself to the Holy Trinity! Why would man, except deluded by pride, pray into his “core”? Our core is dimmed, subjective, blighted, etc. One may was well peer into the heart of an artichoke.
The Creator exists objectively outside of his creature. It is cuddly to think He is “within you” per se, but, please, that is the ancient heresy of pantheism come back as new age drivel.
Faithful, read Revelation! The heavenly court is shown to us, and it ain’t inside Joe Schmoe’s core of consciousness (that is new age for soul)! God’s throne-room objectively exists without, not within. The Lamb is seated there, nearby, as is the Blessed Mother. The angels and saints encircle. Obviously, outside of space and time. Only man in our ugly pride would have the vainglorious guts to think this is all within himself.
You are totally misrepresenting Centering Prayer on this site. Its sole aim is to bring us to an awareness of the immanence of God. We are not separate from God, we are held in existence by him. It is not pantheism, but panentheism, which describes more accurately than theism or pantheism the God who is both immanent and transcendent, both “right here and out there,” although I prefer “other” to “out there”
The Bible makes many attempts to describe this God who is both right here and out there.
“But who is able to build him a house, since heaven, even highest heaven, cannot contain him? Who am I to build a house for him, except as a place to make offerings before him?” 2Chron 2:6
“Where can I go from your spirit? Or where can I flee from your presence? If I ascend to heaven, you are there; if I make my bed in Sheol, you are there. If I take the wings of the morning and settle at the farthest limits of the sea, even there your hand shall lead me, and your right hand shall hold me fas”t.
(Psa 139:7-10)
Do I not fill heaven and earth? says the LORD.
(Jer 23:24)
For ‘In God we live and move and have our being’; (Act 17:28)
In Christ all things hold together.
(Col 1:17)
Christ is all and in all. (Col 3:11)
…the fullness of him who fills all in all. (Eph 1.23)
…one God and Father of all, who is above all and through all and in all.
(Eph 4:6)
God is love, and those who abide in love abide in God, and God abides in them.
(1Jn 4:16)
And of course, the passages from John’s gospel, where Jesus speaks of union with God for us:
“As you, Father, are in me and I am in you, may they also be in us … so that they may be one, as we are one, I in them and you in me, that they may become completely one”
(Joh 17:21-23)
This is all saying that God is within us, ‘immanent,’ as well as transcendent. You cannot ignore these scriptures.
RobP,
You are astute in recognising the dangers posed even in the Jesus prayer. Often you find folks who advocate certain breathing techniques in it’s recital which of course risks self-hypnosis. The idea of incorporating the Holy Name of Jesus into our every breath is a noble one, but it is not something that should be taken to overnight… again for reasons of self-hypnosis. Rather it is better that we shoot it out like an arrow of humility at the devils that plague us throughout the day and night.
God Bless you.
Saint Margaret Mary, you gave your heart to Jesus in exchange for His Sacred Heart, and by placing yourself in His Side you received innumerable graces for yourself and for others, especially sinners. Pray for us wayward pilgrims, especially at the hour of our deaths.
I am enrolled in a Catechist program at my Archdiocese. I was appalled at the nun who taught the first session. She taught centering prayer and other New Age craziness. She did not teach from the Catechism or the Bible. Of course she was one of those older “nuns without a habit” – a refugee still living in 1969. I complained to the RE director, but I don’t think what I said really mattered to her.
I would think that if you pray the Jesus prayer (or any prayer to God) directed towards God then it should be fine. If it is said in a spirit of devotion, adoration, etc of God then it should be fine. The problem with centering prayer is that it really is not directed at God but “the purpose of centering prayer is to clear the mind of rational thought in order to focus on the indwelling presence of God.” In other words the mind is cleared (including thoughts and devotion toward God). Instead it is directed towards identifying something inside one’s self as the presence of God- in the incorrect sense. Since God is not us we shouldn’t be looking for Him inside us as a way of prayer. Centering prayer is also primarily directed towards one’s self which also led to Satan’s fall (focusing on his own beauty- not God’s) . Centering prayer can be very dangerous despite all its claims otherwise.
Brad says “God’s throne exists objectively without, not within. Brad, you are contradicting Jesus. in Luke l7: 2l. ” The kingdom of God is within you.”The word for within.entos, is in some translations rendered as “among”. This is not correct. In fact, the correct translation for entos is “inside of” you.
Thanks for this post. This kind of heretical behavior in parishes is still so prominent. A resource I recommend to people is a book from Saint Benedict Press: “The Judas Syndrome: Seven Ancient Heresies Return to Betray Christ Anew.” Not only does it present authentic Church teaching but explains how in the modern world, even in the Church, where heresies are reappearing. The problems preesented by new age spirituality are presented very clearly.
a lot of folks mix up deep hypnosis/deep concentration with holiness.
The technique of the centering prayer is identical to self hypnosis, and has it’s own psychological dangers, which is why I shudder when non trained nuns teach it to lay people they hardly know.
The ability to enter into deep hypnosis depends on one’s inborn neurological personality.
You can measure the depth by measuring the amount of white that appears below the iris when you look up and slowly close your eyes.
If you see a lot (as we see in a lot of actors in movies), you can easily be hypnotized, you are probably artistic, you can be easily persuaded into anything.
That is why the centering prayer or anyone trying to do deep prayer techniques needs someone to discern if they are seeing God or just the “demons of the id” or imagination.
Luckily most folks are in the “in between stage” and for them the danger is much less.
Deep concentration can occur watching movies, doing art work, or (in my case) by playing music. In Christian contemplation, if I understand Father Dubay correctly, you get it from God, as you gradually learn to immerse yourself into other forms of prayer or bible reading. That is why learning to silence distractions (as one learns in the centering prayer technique) is a valuable lesson, because it puts you in touch with your inner self, including the voice of God that we often stay busy so we don’t have to hear.
But like words (oral prayer) the technique is morally neutral. Bit there is a world of difference between slipping into the prayer of quiet while seeking God, and learning “TM” or other variations of self hypnosis on order to “find oneself”.
FYI: Yes, I have used it for pain control in my patients, but that’s another story.