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Speakers will include LaurenceFreeman, Balfour Mount, SarahBachelard, Peter Ng and YvonThéroux. They will lead a wide-ranging and in-depth exploration ofthe expansion of John Main’s gift tothe world over the past 25 years. Thetalks and workshops will lead to newways of seeing the spiritual and socialchallenges of our time. For moreinformation visit the WCCMwebpage at www.wccm.org orcontact jms2007@bellnet.ca

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A retreat - “Recovery and Spirituality”- was held recently in Geneva,Switzerland for people in 12-stepprogrammes recovering from variousforms of addiction.

As meditation and prayer areintegral parts of the recovery processinitiated by Alcoholics Anonymous (the“12-step Programme”) and embodiedin AA’s 11th step, our purpose wassimply to bring contemplative prayerinto the daily practice of recoveringmen and women.

Opening the retreat, a meditatingmember of the program began byrecalling the correspondence betweenBill W., the co-founder of AA and CarlJung. A member of AA had previouslybeen in therapy with Jung and thedoctor had told him that medically hewas incurable. Jung went on to sayhowever, that occasionally over the yearssome alcoholics had recovered whenthey had had ‘vital spiritualexperiences’. These two concepts (i.e.hopelessness and the need to recoveron a spiritual basis), have becomefoundational to the AA 12-step process.Jung enlarged on what he had told hisformer patient by saying thatalcoholism and addiction in generalrepresented a low-level spiritual quest.Alcoholics used “spirits” as an ersatz for

“the Spirit”. To Bill, this, coming fromsomeone of Jung’s stature, validatedwhat he had always felt about the“divine dissatisfaction” at the root ofthe disease. In fact, wrote Bill, the stepsof AA were designed to providespiritual experiences “almost on awholesale basis” through their practice.Fr. Laurence then spoke of meditationas a universal spiritual practice, a healerof wounds and as a reconciler ofopposites. There was a short exposéconcerning Christian meditationfollowed by a 20-minute meditation(repeated in the afternoon) duringwhich a remarkable level of stillnessand silence, considering that most ofthe participants were beginners.

The next day we went to walk, talk,meditate and celebrate Mass in asecluded hamlet in the French Alps ona glorious sunny Sunday. Theatmosphere of grace was palpable andundoubtedly the weekend left theGeneva 12-step community with anenhanced taste for the spiritual life andin particular for meditation and for Fr.Laurence’s teaching.

A WCCM website for practitionersof the 11th Step is being planned. If youwould like to help or contribute pleasecontact the International Centre:susan@wccm.org

JOHN MAIN SEMINAR 2007“Still Present:

The Life and Legacy of John Main”“Le Rayonnement de

l’Enseignement de John Main”18-21 October 2007, Mt Orford,

Quebec, Canada16-18, Pre-Seminar retreat

led by Laurence Freeman12-14, Pre-Seminar French retreat

led by Laurence Freeman

The Eleventh Step in AA

To find out how you can supportus and help to share the gift ofChristian meditation, individuallyor as a meditation group, pleasecontact the International FriendsCoordinator, Leonard Ong:f r i e n d s w c c m @ y a h o o . c o m . s gVisit our web site:www.friendsinmeditation.com

The outreach activities of the WCCM are financiallysupported by donations from meditators, weeklymeditation groups, and well-wishers around theworld.

We need more

Be aOr we will connect you to theFriends Coordinator for yourregion if you write to:International CentreSt Mark’s . Myddelton SquareLondon EC1R 1XX - UKFax: + 44 (0) 20 7713 6346

!"#$%&$'()*+,$&'&$-().+/%0+&&+#1)2-03)451).-3)67)8+9+:;+#)<55=2

Next year marks the 25th anniversary of John Main’s death,the last step of his earthly journey, and the beginning of his newlife in the Body of Christ. His legacy has spread simply in thelives of people around the world, through silence and stillness,over this past quarter of a century. It is a growth that bearswitness to the truth of Resurrection. The John Main Seminar inOctober 2007 will be hosted by the Canadian ChristianMeditation community and will be held near Montreal wherehe died on December 30th 1982. It will celebrate this expansiveinfluence of his teaching within and beyond the WorldCommunity. It will also explore the meaning of his teaching inthe many areas of modern life into which the Community hasmoved and where he continues to inspire so many – to begin, topersevere and, in their turn, to expand.

In my travels, as in the work of the Guiding Board, theInternational Office and in the work of national coordinatorsand group leaders around the world, we become aware each dayof how much the life of this Community is developing – ineducation, health care and recovery, peace and social justiceand in our sense of what the church means in our time. Buthowever wide has been the influence of John Main’s catholic,integral vision and of his radically simple teaching, what inspiresand delights me most is to see the personal depth to which itleads so many people. That, not numbers, is really the measureof spiritual growth. In individual terms we usually see it happenover years, in terms of community over decades.

One of the signs of this deepening of experience and wisdomhas been the School of the World Community. This is a programof workshops and retreats that gives meditators the opportunityto ground their personal experience in the wider sense of thetradition and to grow in the confidence to share the gift ofmeditation with others. It has also taken under its wing theprogram of teaching meditation to children. One of EileenO’Hea’s legacies to the Community is her work of visioning theSchool and in particular of developing the “School Retreat”.This is an experience which I would love every meditator tohave at least once. It is a weeklong, very silent retreat for arestricted number in a quiet setting. Daily, there are frequentmeditation sessions in common, one short talk, a contemplativemass and a short personal meeting with one of the retreat

directors. There are also meditative or mindfulwalks between the sitting meditations

which are more than opportunitiesto stretch one’s legs. In their

slow, conscious motion, theygive the opportunity to see

how the stillness ofmeditation and the

activity of daily lifeflow into each other.

2*340-'(0-(5"033-,55Earlier today I joined the walking group a few minutes late: ahappy fault, as I was able to see it in a moment of vision andlove. I knew that I knew and loved each person in the movingcircle as it seemed slowly to coil around the central fountain andstatue of Mary. Each one had their own peculiar way of walkingthat expressed their personality or special condition. It is theparticularity of a human being that makes them loveable. Therewas the stooped sister of 85 with her oversized trainers anddark glasses. Behind her an upright young athlete andphysiotherapist. Near him was Laurent, a stroke victim fromhis home meditation group whom he was helping, walking witha cane, dragging his left foot but as intent and mindful as therest. More so perhaps, as he told me later, because every step hetakes every time he walks needs mindful attention if he is not tofall over. Behind him was his wife, Nicole, who has cared forhim constantly since his stroke a year ago. Then there was a lineof others walking more or less ordinarily. And then Chuck, ameditator and long-term member of the community who hasbeen in a wheelchair for thirty years since a skiing accident twoyears after his marriage to Pat. Their courage and fidelity hasalways been a wonder to all who know them. He turned thewheels of his chair in silent rhythm with the walking group.

My feelings as I watched them were not abstract and I didn’tthink then I would use this scene to open the next newsletter. Itwas a moment simply and totally unique and present but at thesame time quite overwhelming in its transparency. Through itsomething quite ineffable became visible. Should we call it thelife of Christ, the fragility and grandeur of the human? Or themeaning of community, solitude and communion? Even withoutthese words you can probably recall the experience from yourown memories because, although it is unique, it is universal.On the feast of Mary that we celebrate today it seemed all themore present because the courage of Mary was to be open tosomething so much greater than herself and yet that claimed themost intimate knowledge of her. The greatest revelations, suchas the one that took flesh in her or that we see in the miracle ofeach other’s ordinariness, manifest a disturbing paradox ofstrength and vulnerability. She was disturbed by the angel’sgreeting. We glimpse this paradox in every form of love and inthe attempt to give our self to others. How can we give selfwithout conditions or the expectation of a reward?

Yet how can we be fully human unless we do? This is thedilemma of human meaning that finds resolution in the momentof Christ. We can be fully human because we receive theunconditional gift of self that is God incarnate. Christ is a gift,‘full of grace and truth’, that is humanly as totally unique as wereeach one of us in the slow circle of walking meditators. In Jesuswe experience the absolute self-giving that is God. So it helps totransform our understanding of our humanity as well as expressingthe real nature of God. Any gift of self, rare as it is, maybe

*(3,"",$(6$%/(3*&$,-7,(6$,,/*-(%58.0$,7"%$( %6( "#,(2%$3.( 7%//&-0"+( 6%$( 7#$05"0*-( /,.0"*"0%-

December 8, 2006; Feast of the Immaculate Conception

!"#$%&$'()*+,$&'&$-().+/%0+&&+#1!2-03)451).-3)67)8+9+:;+#)<55= 3unsustained or incomplete, is never a commodity. It is not apossession or a form of control. It gives the gift of self-giving.Love empowers us, in turn, to give our selves to the best of ourcapacity. What else is the meaning of giving presents, like theMagi, to each other at Christmas or on birthdays? They can betrue gifts only when they are unsolicited and unconditional.Would they have the same meaning if we were to say I give youthis on condition that you are grateful, acknowledge me or giveme something equal in return? Learning to say the mantra isapplying this essentially human truth. We say the mantra ‘withoutdemand or expectation’, as John Main often remarked. It is awork of love. As a simple self-giving it also becomes – somethingrare in human gift-giving – a complete letting-go.

"0/,("%(8,()$,5,-"I noticed on the first day of the retreat that our mindful walkwas quite fast and individualistic. To some degree each personwas still in the world they had come from and their way ofwalking showed it. It was not synchronised with others and itwas trying to catch up with something invisible or elusive – theuniversal rush of most modern living. It takes time to becomepresent – that’s the work of patience and the need for discipline.But even by the second day the walk had begun to slow, to becomemore mindful. Even though everyone walked personally, in thesame direction but not usually in single file, we were in a lessisolated space and less individualistic. I remembered Rumi’sline, ‘everything revolves around what it loves’. Soon people werealso moving more harmoniously in the dining room and otherareas, entering more carefully into the chapel for meditation.Doors were being closed more quietly. There were fewer anxious,distracted looks scanning the space around them. These changescame as everyone present became present to themselves and tothe others without words or gestures. On the opening night wehad shared where we came from, why we thought we were thereand what we were looking for. But in the ethos of the retreat weagreed to trust silence as a form of intimacy and friendship andthe result was that day-by-day we felt we were growing closer toothers but also to ourselves and to God.

For a number of reasons it takes time to come to this level oftrust and stillness. First, it is just because it is an unfamiliarstate to be in. We may feel intuitively drawn to it but also a littlescared of it, as we do when we find ourselves in a new countrywithout the local language and without bearings. The Cloud warnsus that beginners in meditation easily mistake the spatialmetaphors of ‘in’ or ‘up’ or ‘deep’. It insists that the spiritualwork is not done in any particular place. “But to this you say,‘Where then shall I be? By your reckoning I am to be nowhere!’Exactly. In fact you have expressed it rather well, for I would indeedhave you to be nowhere. Why? Because nowhere physically iseverywhere spiritually.” (Chapter 68). The wisdom of the Christiancontemplative tradition advises us at this early stage just topersevere in the ‘work of love’ especially when the mind rebelsagainst this sense of meaninglessness. Meditation takes usnowhere. It enriches us through poverty. Its emptiness is fullness.One thing the retreat confirmed for me was that we must onceagain become confident and familiar with the mystical languageof paradox in our tradition before we as Church can find ourtrue place in and for the world. Only when the meaning of thisexperience has re-awakened among us can Christians learn todeal with the differences – so often cultural rather than truly

theological anyway – which cause such catastrophic divisionsand undermine the witness the Church is meant to make for theKingdom.

0/)*"0,-7,(*-.(033&50%-But meditation is a journey. It may be the subtle journey ofconsciousness from the mind to the heart but before it iscompleted the process will take us through every aspect of ourselves, psychologically and socially. Modern consumerconditioning that we bring to meditation as to everything wantsto know it all now and to be in control. It assumes that once ithas read the product description on the package and paid theprice that the purchase is complete. In the spiritual transaction,however, there are no consumer rights, only grace, only self-giving. Our extreme impatience has already condemned usculturally to organised distraction and addictive fantasy.

Impatience and illusion meet their match in meditation.Whatever is false within us is exposed, not ruthlessly but withthe artlessness of a child telling the truth. Wherever we havesettled unconsciously into prejudices or false compromise, alarmsignals will sound. Conscience or our hidden integrity will showus how they have been offended and how we have ignored orrepressed their complaints.

In meditation we are led to a definitive threshold. It is not asectarian line dividing one group (the ‘enlightened’) from another(those who are ‘in the wrong’). The contemplative does not enjoythe luxury of knowing they are right and others wrong. If itdivides anything (sheep and goats, for example), meditationseparates those who divide from those who do not divide. Itmakes this distinction, not with an indiscriminate tolerance foreverything, but in favour of those who do everything possible toinclude rather than exclude. Meditation – the work of developingthe contemplative consciousness – therefore requires and createsa truly catholic mind. This is a mind that is ready to wait and tohold apparent opposites in creative, loving patient tension. Thereis suffering in this patience as the very word ‘patient’ implies.The catholic mind knows that to reject the opposite of anythingthat we hold to be true, without the deep wisdom that comeswith the contemplative vision, the eye of the heart, we also oftendiscard what is most true in what we believe. We are then ledinto self-contradiction. This follows as soon as we take sideswith any kind of lack of charity or with any degree of violence.In a world of violent contradictions with fewer and fewer civilisedways of even controlling it, let alone practising the sanity of anon-violent resolution of conflict, we urgently need to developcatholicity. Perhaps we have to start doing this much earlier inlife than we do now and why children, who can and like tomeditate, benefit themselves and our future by learning tomeditate. People still often ask ‘is meditation Christian?’ I findmyself often replying ‘yes, it is catholic.’

During the School retreat we have one short teaching eachday. During this week I reflected on the petitionsof the Our Father, the great and earliestChristian mantra. What I have beensaying about the kind of mindthat meditation develops isalso the fruit of anycontinuous lectio of theLord’s Prayer as partof the Christian life.

!"#$%&$'()*+,$&'&$-().+/%0+&&+#1)2-03)451).-3)67)8+9+:;+#)<55=4Experience illuminates the scriptures and the scriptures nourishexperience. Let’s look briefly at these petitions as they arerecorded in the Gospel of Matthew.

%&$(6*"#,$Firstly, we begin by saying ‘our’ not ‘my’ Father. Jesus spoke ofascending to ‘my father and your Father’, insisting that his deepestknowledge of the Father includes us. And although ‘we’ tendquickly to begin limiting those who are included in this collectivepronoun, Jesus does not. As I remarked on the change of walkingstyle and body-language during the first few days of the retreat,the natural direction into which the development of consciousnesstakes us is away from narrow individualism into relationalpersonhood. We see that our deepest identity is inseparable fromothers and when we see that clearly we see ourselves in othersand others in ourselves. Our way of behaving towards othersnaturally changes as a result of this new clarity. The sense of theChurch changes also. It is no longer an embattled sect seekingways of dominating others but a place – a nowhere, universalplace – where all see themselves and others as equal children ofGod even though we or others are not equally aware of that fact.

Our Father is therefore our common ground of being. Notan impersonal but a creative and overwhelmingly loving sourcethat continually challenges our notion of love and pushes ittowards an ever more complete integration. Perhaps we couldsay that in Jesus we feel the powerful attraction that the Fatherfeels for us, the erotic aspect of divine love as Pope Benedictspoke of it in his first encyclical. This we can readily relate tobecause it is what we feel most often and most instinctively. ButJesus emphasises in his turn the agapic – selfless, boundless andself-giving – nature of the Father’s love. The Father is like ‘thesun who shines on good and bad alike and is kind to the ungratefuland the wicked’. There is no punishing will in this God andtherefore no violence in the Father that we can use to mask orjustify our own violence. In fact, to be true to ourselves we haveto be ‘like our heavenly father’. We do not pray to get benefits fromGod, said Origen, but to become like God.

The biblical revelation shows – and it is its great contributionto the human understanding of the nature of reality – that Godis being and that being is love. The Father then, which has to bea linguistic term, transcends sexual duality. In Christ too thereis neither male nor female as competing contradictions but therealisation of one new, wholly integrated form of humanity. Onlywonder can comprehend God’s incomprehensible power, as theearly Church teachers kept saying. The surface levels of our

mind are quite comfortable with dualities but becomeuneasy with the resolution of paradox. To understand

this we have to approach that threshold ofsilence that the narrow path of meditation

leads to. Its narrowness is not like thenarrowness of a mind that can only

see from its own point of view. It israther the focused attention thatcan rest steadily on a particularmanifestation of reality – thewonderful diversity of thepeople in our meditation walkfor example – and be patientuntil the expansion ofconsciousness into the

universal takes place from within that small band of attention.Mystery is the resolution of paradox. It can be known but

not fully described. The best way to approach and communicatethe mystery of the Father which is the ultimate union of oppositesis celebration – as the feast of the kingdom imagery of Jesussuggests. When what is lost is found – another theme of Jesus’teaching – the response is joy and conviviality. The sadness ofthe sin-centeredness that has so often characterized the Church’steaching and spirituality is deeply at odds with the spirit of theGospel. Once we have glimpsed this reality in our own experience– meditation ‘verifies the truths of our faith in our ownexperience’ according to John Main – we see the whole worlddifferently. St Gregory of Nyssa expresses this sense of a newcreation in Christ in which all is sacred when he says that‘everything that exists prays to thee’.

0-(#,*9,-During the retreat one of the participants who is a bird-watchertold me she had seen a rare bird, a peliated woodpecker, in thewoods of the retreat centre. I mentioned it during my reflectionon the second petition because it seemed to be a good metaphorfor the Kingdom – something always present but not alwaysvisible. I may have caused a distraction because several retreatantswent out in search of it during their free time and there weremany claimed sightings.

The Kingdom is the Father’s, that is it shares his nature.It is our conscious experience of God. We cannot enter theKingdom unconsciously though we can intuit or dream of it.But to enter it we must be awake, alert and vigilant – thequalities that meditation develops. Yet as Jesus teaches wecannot observe the coming of the kingdom with the dualisticlevel of mind. We know it by sharing in it. This is perhapswhy its epiphanies seem to come and go. It is why theIncarnation both reveals and conceals the Father, as groundand source of being, in Jesus.

The threshold of consciousness that meditation takes us tomarks our capacity to know and live in the Kingdom. Ourjourney there will take us through moments of intense consciouspresence and also, on many occasions, through a sense ofintense absence. We keep on meditating, after a certain pointof spiritual growth, for the same reasons that we stop meditatingin the early stages of the journey: because of this alternatingrhythm of presence and absence. In time we see that it is thecycle of growth – the growth that Jesus often uses to describethe Kingdom – and through the strengthening of the faculty offaith we become able to grow as well through the absences asthrough the times of presence. As long as we are evaluatingthis experience with the dualistic mind (success and failure, orpleasant and difficult) we interrupt the rhythm. The DesertFathers and Mothers taught this quite strongly – that we aremost fully praying when we don’t know that we are praying.The way of unknowing is the only way of knowing God by loverather than thought. Grace explodes most powerfully and silentlyas mental activity ceases to block the deepening of consciousnessand as we learn to lay aside all thoughts.

Doing this work, the laying aside of thoughts, is the essentialascesis of the Christian life because with the thoughts go ourego. If this ascesis has found its central place in our life we seethat not so many other attempts of ‘self-denial’ – except that ofmoderation in all things – is really needed.

!"#$%&$'()*+,$&'&$-().+/%0+&&+#1!2-03)451).-3)67)8+9+:;+#)<55= 5#*33%2,.(8,("#+(-*/,In the early church ‘blessing the name’ was an expression formartyrdom, bearing witness to the Father in Jesus by the powerof the Spirit. It means more than singing God’s praises verbally.In this sense everyone is invited to be martyrs. And we mostfully accept the invitation when, at moments of greatest weaknessor darkness, we give our selves over into the mystery of Christ.

This is another way of learning to know God by unknowingbecause at these moments we can’t be sure of anything. Faith isalways more than certainty. The Name of God is unspeakableand it is spoken in everything that has being. It has an uncountablenumber of meanings. The mantra leads us into the Name andour saying of the mantra glorifies the Name. As it becomesrooted in our heart and accompanies all we say and think anddo during the day we grow in the capacity to ‘praise the name ofthe Lord in all things’.

"#+(40-'.%/(7%/,The Kingdom transcends dualities. It is in us and among us.The fruits of the spirit, which are the fruits of meditation, appearboth through transformation in ourselves and in our ways ofrelating to others. To see others as a miracle of God’s creation isa sign of the Kingdom.

We experience the Kingdom in glimpses because although itis continuously present, we are not. As we come closer to thethreshold of stillness in meditation these moments of presence– always reciprocal presence – can deepen and increase infrequency. They are known by their pure joyfulness – a joy thatis not dependent on the mind’s usual pre-conditions forhappiness. Moments of grace mean moments where there is nobargaining and no regret. In one sense they are moments ofpure receptivity because ‘the love we speak of is not our love forGod but God’s love for us. God loved us first.’ And yet receptivityis not passivity. To be receptive at this level of consciousnessrequires a deep and sustained gift of self, proceeding from theongoing contemplative work of renunciation and integration.

"#+(2033(8,(.%-,:The ‘will’ of God is not a secret command we have to decipher. Itis inseparable from the divine act of creation and salvation. Andthis act is not an act in the human sense but a continuous self-giving in love. It is even simpler than that suggests: God is love.

As long as we think of the will of God as something we aremeant to obey, as if it were a command from on high, ourknowledge of God stays trapped in the image of God formedfrom our experience of human authority and power. We will failto understand the heart of the Gospel revelation and the meaningof Christ – that, as love, God is, in a real sense, powerless. Canlove impose itself or force us to respond? It can persevere andinfluence but it cannot over-ride the uniqueness of the personwho is loved. Meditation gradually accustoms us to this way ofseeing God because it detaches us from those images of Godthat the ego has constructed and clings to.

%&$(.*03+(8$,*.The Eucharistic food reminds us that we know and love God inthe flesh as well as in the spirit. But the daily bread we areusually preoccupied with, the material needs and solutions tolife’s problems, is not the only kind of bread. The other andmore nourishing bread is prayer itself. Not what we pray for but

that we pray – ‘praying itself is good’, Origen says. Just as weneed physical food at regular times and on a daily basis so weneed to pray regularly, daily and at depth. We pray for the gift ofprayer and our morning and evening times of meditation are inthemselves both the appetite and the satisfying, the request andthe response.

6%$'09,(&5(*5:We love because we know ourselves to be loved, and to thesame degree. And the same is true of our capacity to forgive.Forgiveness frees us from the self-fixation of resentment andbreaks the cycle of violence precisely as it snaps the addiction tothe past. It happens by grace but also by our own efforts, firstlyas an interior healing and then as the process of restoring thebalance of relationships. Meditation opens us to this gracebecause if we are truly silent and still we will be exposed to thosewounds that find healing by becoming conscious of the divineother.

",/)"*"0%-(*-.(.,309,$*-7,The great temptation, that we are never free from, is to give up.At quite unexpected moments, even after special moments ofthe Kingdom, it can seem alluringly attractive to float back tothe surface of consciousness. Even in the period of meditationitself this tendency – temptations are tendencies – makes itselfknown in the lethal sleep or the pernicious peace, the holy floatingwhere we say ‘I am so near to the threshold of silence that Idon’t need to do this work of the mantra, which is so faint nowanyway, any longer’. Evil is the ultimate and terrible result ofsuperficiality.

*As the silence of the retreat deepened I found myself

remembering a story that a young meditator had told me a fewdays before we began. He is a young father and a committedmeditator. One day on his way home his car was struck by atruck and he went into a tail spin, at one point seeing the truckheading straight for him. Time slowed down and almost stopped.He felt great calm in the stillness even as he was aware that hewas on the knife edge between life and death. He was filled withthe consciousness of his family and his love for them. And atthe same time the mantra arose in his heart. He waited in faithfor whatever would happen while trying all he could do to savehis life.

It seemed a more dramatic example of what we were doingon the retreat and what we do every ordinary day as we meditateeach morning and evening. The meditator takes on the mind ofChrist. We do so even as we approach the threshold in our ownsouls that we know we must cross to become fully alive and fullyawake. Day by day – and very clearly at this time of the Christianyear – we also see that God has already crossed that threshold inour direction and so the continuing incarnation that we call ourlife is changed by what is accomplished in his.

With much love and every blessing in our community for theChristmas Season and the coming year,

Laurence Freeman, OSB

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-,25(6$%/("#,(2%$3.(7%//&-0"+The following is a small representation of the life of the Community. For weekly news and more information visit the Community web page: www.wccm.org

277/()03'$0/*',("%(0-.0*;<;=(/*$7#(>??=This visit buildson the dialoguebegun by the1998 Way of PeacePilgrimage, anddeveloped in the2005 WCCM visitto India and SriLanka. We willvisit importantBuddhist sites near Bodhgayaand the holy Hindu city of Varanasi, on the banks of theGanga. We will go South, via Chennai, the city of St.Thomas, to some important ashrams where WCCM hasenjoyed fruitful dialogue: the Ramana Ashram at the footof the holy hill of Arunachala, and the ashram ofShantivanam made famous by Abhishiktananda (Fr. Henrile Saux) and Fr. Bede Griffiths. The pilgrimage is beingorganised by Soul of India Tours. Full details, includingprices and booking form, can be found at www.wccm.organd also www.soulofindia.com

/%-",(%309,"%21-28 July 2007 The theme for this year’s retreat will be‘Losing and Finding’. Led again by Laurence Freeman,Giovanni Felicioni and Robert Kiely.For more information contact Jan at mail@wccm.org

/,@07%($,"$,*"Fr Laurence will be in Mexico from 9 to 13 February 2007. You are invited to join him either in Ixtapa at the retreat orto attend one of his conferences in Mexico City. You canfind all the information in the website:www.meditacioncristiana.com/events or you can e-mail LucíaGayón, national coordinator at pax@meditacioncristiana.comor call her at + 52 (755) 55-3-01-20. You are welcome!

7*-*.*The Canadian Christian Meditation CommunityNational Conference, June 29-July 1st 2007Keynote Speaker: Laurence Freeman OSBLocation: University of British Columbia, Vancouver B.C.Conference Coordinator: Joyce Rogers (joycerogers@shaw.ca)

&5*The US Christian Meditation CommunityNational Conference, February 23-25 Phoenix, Arizona“Christian Meditation: An Infinite Expansion of Love” withPaul Harris. Dr. Keith Egan and Sister Constance Fitzgerald,OCD will be guest speakers.Conference Coordinator: Joanne Rapp (joannemr@att.net)

*&5"$*30*The Australian Christian Meditation CommunityNational Forum, April 27-29 with Laurence Freeman“Meditation and the Future of Christianity”More information athttp://www.christianmeditationaustralia.org/

0"*3+The Italian Christian Meditation CommunitySilent Retreat led by Laurence Freeman, June 15-17Camaldoli monastry, ArezzoMore information at http://www.meditazionecristiana.org/

0-",$A$,30'0%&5(.0*3%'&,0-(63%$,-7,For some years an inter-religious group has been meetingcomprising the Christian Meditation Centre in Florenceand other important religious groups of the city, ZenBuddhists, Tibetan Buddhists, Jews, Muslims, Anglicans,Bahà’í (Iranian), Ananda Magra (Indians), SukyoMahikari (Japanese), Hare Krishna (Indians) andProtestant Christians.

Our work together is to create times of meditation withthe purpose of reinforcing the collective commitment towardsdialogue and peace. We have two monthly meetings: onetakes place in a room in the Palazzo Vecchio lent to us bythe city of Florence; the other meets in the centres of thereligious groups that are part of this project. Each gatheringstarts with a reading from all the different traditions presentat the meeting and then we have 25 minutes of silencefollowed by a time of sharing. The participants numberbetween 30 and 60 according to circumstances. Everythingis very simple and the atmosphere is always very welcomingand receptive.

The President of the City Council of Florence, ErosCruccolini supports the program: “This effort shows that atroot, experiences of unity and commitment towards peacecan be born and develop. Meditation meetings like theseare useful for peace because they give ordinary citizens thepossibility to be part of the effort to understand the meaningof the world and to resist resigning ourselves to the fatalismof war and hate. These spiritual citizens have chosen torediscover the value of one’s true and deep identity as partof a commitment to a world of peace. This unites more thanany declaration of principles.”

Marco Lazzeri, Director of the Christian MeditationCentre, Florence: m.lazzeri@infogroup.it

%@6%$.A new weekly Christian Meditation group has started incentral Oxford: St Theosevia Centre for Christian Spirituality,2 Canterbury Road, OxfordEvery Wednesday starting at 7:30 pm.

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I joined the Brazilian Christian Meditation Communityin 1996 and began to coordinate the annual visits of FrLaurence throughout Brazil in 2001. I became the NationalCoordinator in 2002 and joined the Guiding Board of theWorld Community in 2003. For the past two years I havebeen helping to develop the Christian Meditation Communityin other countries of South America where groups are nowforming, including Argentina, Chile, Paraguay and Venezuela.After ten years of meditating and five of coordinating FrLaurence’s visits to Brazil I have begun to learn from experiencethe meaning of these words of John Main –‘meditation createscommunity’. I never cease to wonder how so many differentkinds of people – with big cultural, national, social and agedifferences – can feel part of the same community simply bypraying (and working) together without most of the linksformed by strong structures, rules or organisation. Afterfollowing the growth of the Brazilian community – which hasnow more than fifty weekly groups – and then seeing the firstgroups form in Argentina, Chile and Paraguay, I have come tobelieve in the truth of Fr John’s words. I have come to feel thepower of the spirit acting in the silence of prayer and unitingpeople in a community of love.

0$,3*-.Kim Nataraja is giving a silent retreat in Dromantine RetreatCentre in the Co Down hills near Newry, Northern Ireland. The theme is “Roots in the Desert”, 1-3 June 2007.

*$',-"0-*The first Christian meditation retreat here, held with thesupport of Bonum, the publisher of Christian meditationtitles, attracted nearly a hundred and has stimulated newweekly groups. We are also working together with themeditators in Chile and Paraguay. Magdalena Puebla,National Coordinator, Argentina(malen_puebla@hotmail.com)Website: www.meditacioncristiana.cl

)%$"&'*3An extended six-week introduction to Christian meditationhas started in Lisbon. For more details contact the nationalCoordinator: Maria Cristina Guedes de Sousamcristinags@netcabo.pt

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I have just come back fromArgentina, Paraguay and Chilewhere I have seen the familiar signsof a new life of this community.From experience I know there will be crises ahead in thegrowth process. But I also am sure that through the powerof silence we can transcend them because meditation opensthe heart directly to love and to the presence of Christ. Theneed to share this experience within – and beyond – thecommunity is inescapable. It is love that generatescommunity while the ‘devil’ is the force that divides. Afterthese years of experience I feel that I am part of a spiritualcommunity in all these countries. There is always anotherstep in community: I was talking with Antonio Sosa fromVenezuela who came to the retreat in Argentina and willnow begin a group there. As we spoke of the experience ofcommunity he remarked that his mother had alwaysreminded him that he was named after St Antony of theDesert. The community we belong to extends far backhistorically as well as geographically.

Ana.Fonseca@umusic.comNational Coordinator, Brazil

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/,.0"*"0%-()%.7*5"5Web visitors may subscribe to RSSfeeds or iTunes podcasts ofNewsletters and “Meditatio Talks”by pointing their podcatchers towww.wccm.org/images/audio/meditatio/MeditatioTalks06.rss.Direct link at iTunes: http://phobo s . app l e . c om/WebObj e c t s /MZSto re .woa /wa /viewPodcast?id=203765825. More podcasts will be postedthroughout the coming year.

New John Main Titles and Editionsfrom Canterbury Press and Medio Media:

/BCDEFGHI(2JFKBLF(2DMME(!"#$%&'()'*+,'&--.A new complete edition of John Main’s spiritual letters editedby Laurence Freeman

2BHN(JCFB(5JMGCOGJohn Main’s first and enduring classic on meditation – howto and how it is situated in the Christian tradition

.BBH(FB(5JMGCOGA collection of hitherto unpublished teachings by John Mainpresented in a new format for more reflective reading

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General Editor: Gregory Ryan (gjryan@wccm.org)

Graphic Design: Carlos Siqueira (info@wccm.com.br)

International Coordinator: Susan Spence (susan@wccm.org)

The World Community Web page: www.wccm.org

Medio Media Web page: www.mediomedia.org

The Christian Meditation Newsletter is published four times a year by theInternational Centre of The World Community for Christian Meditation,St Mark’s, Myddelton Square, London EC1R 1XX, UK(tel +44 20 7278 2070 / fax +44 20 7713 6346)Email: mail@wccm.org(Copyright The World Community for Christian Meditation)It is distributed by national communities with national updates.

THE WORLD COMMUNITY DEPENDS ON DONATIONS. PLEASE REMEMBER THE COMMUNITY WHENYOU MAKE YOUR WILL. FOR INFORMATION OR ADVICE CONTACT THE INTERNATIONAL CENTREIN LONDON OR YOUR NATIONAL CO-ORDINATOR.

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We can know no peace if we do not exercise gentleness. Peacemakers must be at peace with themselves.Only peace makes for peace. The only power that can create peace in our world is the power of peace found,

known, and experienced in human hearts.Once found in us this peace is invincible. It is stronger than violence and wiser than fear because peace is

creative. It is patient. It knows how to suffer, whereas violence is impatient and destructive.These truths we must verify not in words but from personal experience. We cannot find peace within ourselves by using violence

against ourselves. Door to Silence (2006)

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