Welcoming Prayer: This week we’ll discuss “Listen and Unlearn” from Anthony de Mello’s book, Awareness. “Mixing Christian spirituality, Buddhist parables, Hindu breathing exercises, and psychological insight, de Mello’s words of hope come together in Awareness in a grand synthesis.”
This practice begins at 12:15pm PT.
Centering Prayer: Our Lectio Divina reading: From “The Black Maria”, by Aracelis Girmay. We always close with the alternative Lord’s Prayer from A New Zealand Prayer Book, pg. 181.
This practice begins at 12:45pm PT.
I look forward to seeing you on Thursday.
Contact Sylvia to receive the meeting link.
Mark your calendars for two special Welcoming Prayer Refresher/Enrichment sessions to be presented by Cherry Haisten on Thursdays, February 22 and 29 at our usual meeting time.
Listen to the Wisdom of Your Body: Practicing the Welcoming Prayer
Saying yes to life involves saying yes to inhabiting fully these bodies we have been given for our time on earth. Our bodies are the repositories of everything we know. Often mistreated, overindulged, or ignored, they have much to teach us if we only stop to listen. Their wisdom can guide us to dismantle the building blocks of the false self and contribute to our transformation.
In our first session together, we will explore the Welcoming Prayer as it opens pathways for listening to the wisdom of our bodies. In the second session, we will explore how to recognize the “squirm point” that signals a need for the Welcoming Prayer day by day, hour by hour, even every present moment.
Cherry Haisten is a longtime presenter of workshops on Centering Prayer and Welcoming Prayer, which she has regularly practiced for three decades. She has led workshops and retreats in many places around the U.S. and in British Columbia. With her colleagues on the Welcoming Prayer Service Team, she worked to revise the 2016 Welcoming Prayer Contemplative Life Program booklet and to write materials for the Spirituality and Practice online Welcoming Prayer courses. A leader in Contemplative Outreach Northwest since 1996, she remains involved with the local chapter though now from a backseat. A former writing instructor with a B.A. from Emory University and an M.A. from the University of Georgia, both in English, she received a Master of Arts in Transforming Spirituality in 2005 from Seattle University School of Theology and Ministry, where she was inducted into Alpha Sigma Nu, the Jesuit honor society. For fifteen years, she was program director of The Center at St. Andrew’s, a healing and lifelong learning ministry of St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church, Seattle, where she also served as a Eucharistic minister, healing minister, licensed lay preacher, and for two years, as lay pastor, had the privilege of coordinating and presiding at the Sunday evening Taizé service. Her retirement from these duties coincided with the beginning of the Covid pandemic and launched her into the unknown of a big lifetime transition and more adventures traveling on life’s journey, both geographically and spiritually.