Meditatio Newsletter May 2020
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Registered Charity No. 1182213 - I N T E R N AT I O N A L E D I T I O N , Vol 44 No 1; May 2020
The Path through the Crisis Laurence Freeman reflects on the post-Covid-19 world: How can we make a contemplative response to an unknown future?
A CONTEMPLATIVE PATH THROUGH THE CRISIS
This issue
After the Night Vigil, the Bonnevaux Community watched the Easter Sun rise. Although the Holy Week Retreat had to be limited to the residents, thousands online from around the world could join in the ceremonies, the contemplative mass and the teachings by Fr Laurence
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Special
Inter-Contemplative Dialogues: Alan Wallace, Eva Natanya and Laurence Freeman
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In Focus
Angelene Chan, Singapore architect: meditation as pure gift
Our new website combines online events, short videos, talks, interviews, written resources - many ways to strengthen and inspire us to understand the spiritual dimension and its opportunities during these tough times. Join ‘The Path’ to receive updates on the new resources as they appear: http://acontemplativepath-wccm.org
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Resources & Events
Because of the crisis the John Main Seminar 2020, hosted in Mexico, will be online
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Meditatio Newsletter May 2020
A letter from Laurence Freeman, OSB
During the First World War the British government was recruiting volunteers for its killing fields in France. They used guilt to coerce them, like the poster of a man with his son on his knee and the boy asking ‘what did you do during the war, daddy?’ One day, maybe, but without the loaded tone, people will ask us what we did during the first big Shutdown (or maybe it will be ‘Shutdowns’), ‘what was it really like?... And afterwards, was it hard?’ And if a child asks why it was called by CoVid-19 we can say that Co=Corona V=Virus D=disease and 2019 was when it began. But 2020 was when it knocked everyone into the beginning of a new vision of reality. It helped to have a name for it, even if we didn’t know much about it or how to cure it. Maybe it will take us decades to see its meaning. ‘Well,’ we will say wisely, ‘it took us all by surprise and it was something of a mystery’. As to the question, I would answer, ‘I was in Bonnevaux, locked up in a beautiful prison with a group of very nice people. We were faithful to our existing daily rhythm of life, of prayer, work and study (including meals and the occasional movie) which our ancestor Benedict designed wisely to take us through both good times and bad times. I stopped travelling except through the internet, which was easier than flying but earned no airmiles. Because of the technology of online meetings, I have been busier than usual working with our amazingly dedicated international team as we try to respond to the spiritual needs of our global community and of those who have met us for the first time through the crisis. In ten days, we made a new website to help people face new chal-
lenges (A Spiritual Path through the Crisis) which is run by some of our younger teachers. We have had many meditation sessions online, dialogues with other faiths, intellectually stimulating teachings by a variety of speakers. And we began streaming contemplative mass on
know what impact it will have in the world. Will it change how we live, work and respect the environment? It is too soon for answers, but from what Bonnevaux has taught me during these months, let me share some early reflections. I start with a thought of Simone Weil that struck
The beauty of spring at Bonnevaux
Sundays with a large congregation from across the planet, an online yoga class and live meditations in our daily schedule. Through all this interaction with individuals and national communities, we understood better how Bonnevaux is called to be a physical centre of a community that has no walls or borders, no need for visas, and in which even the barriers of language can melt in the experience of deep silence. So, we were contemplative but busy. Benedict said, ‘idleness is the enemy of the soul’. We have not been idle but we found ourselves more clearly becoming what we kind of already knew we were: a centre of peace that is here to serve as a centre for peace. The other question our descendants might ask is about meaning. Many are already impatient to
me recently. Every event in life is part of the language with which God speaks to us. All events are signs of God’s love. If you drink a glass of water the water is God’s ‘I love you’ to you. If you are two days in a desert and can find nothing to drink, your thirst is God’s ‘I love you’. As we learn this language at first, we think only some events mean ‘I love you’, the nice, desirable things that happen. But as we learn the language better, we see that the entire language, every event, means ‘I love you’. God has only this one thing to say. God has no way of saying ‘I hate you’. This isn’t an easy language to learn. But it could not be simpler. Keeping this in mind, struggling with the strange idea that Covid-19 could be a love message, let’s try to reflect on what the message
Meditatio Newsletter May 2020
‘I love you’ might mean.
The Noosphere
Do you remember movies of World War Two that show people huddled round a radio listening intensely to the news? That was the early days of instant global communication. Before that, when major events happened, like wars or epidemics, people only really knew what was going on from what they saw in their towns or villages, the soldiers marching past or people dying. How this connected with news from other places was largely up to rumour, magic and imagination. Life was local, which had advantages but could also be intensely limiting and oppressive. Now, rich and poor alike, we are all global citizens. Yesterday the BBC World Service had a sound clip of one of the million Rohingya refugees incarcerated in camps in Bangladesh. The first cases of the virus had just been discovered; the prospect of infection spreading through the over-crowded camps is horrific. The man spoke in his Burmese Rohingya dialect but the words ‘Covid-19’ were clearly audible. Evidently, he and we all face the same crisis and we know it and have invented a universal name for it. Early in the 20th century the Jesuit scientist Teillard de Chardin and the Russian scientist Vladimir Vernansky, coming with different perspectives, developed the idea of the ‘noosphere’. We are so familiar with it in practice today – with 24/7 news, Zoom, Instagram and the worldwide web, that it hardly astonishes us. We live in this cocoon-sphere of consciousness unconsciously. In physical isolation we saw what a lifesaver communication technology was. The ‘noosphere’ has now become more conscious and
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we must reflect on the meaning of a new kind of global communication. The Greek word nous means mind, so the noosphere is a ‘sphere of the mind’. The technology behind it may dazzle us or we may get addicted to it, taking our cell phones to bed with us. But this crisis has made us wonder how this new immediacy of communication across space and time-zones affects our way of living together as one huge, multicultural family. The noosphere has emerged from the biosphere – the physical world we share in which viruses spread. But
... The ‘noosphere’ has now become more conscious and we must reflect on the meaning of a new kind global communication this new sphere is at a higher level of consciousness. As I am writing this at Bonnevaux I am looking out on the lake watching the ducks and herons. If I were closer, I would see the plump, swift fish. If I moved closer, they would feel the threat instantaneously. They would turn on a sixpence, change direction, take flight, rapidly, obedient to each other and all without anyone bumping into another. How could they do this without possessing a common mind? So why not us too? We are conscious; we have more in common than divides us. We can form a football crowd or a meditation community, pack malls as consumers, get addicted to the same soap operas. We do, however, bump into each other a lot but we can work together on ways to improve this. Is our common mind, our noosphere, evolving?
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Is the sphere of reason, of conscious mind composed of intricate networks of interpersonal relationships, developing? Is it forming both through the glass of water we drink and the thirst we feel when deprived of it? The materialist would say all this is simply a product of technology and that mind emerges from complex matter. There is no proof of this, of course, but it is a dogma of modern science. Whatever the cause may be, we are increasingly curious about this new consciousness and its implications. For example, it demands a higher moral responsibility because the risks it poses are as great as the benefits it promises. Fake news can be seeded in it like a virus. Confronted with his wilful stupidity or falsehood, a brazen politician has only to make endless soundbite denials to eventually plant them as a possible truth in the mass mind. This is not the fault of technology. We cannot blame technology - or a virus for causing distress. They are only causes. It is we who misuse good things for bad ends. The globalising of human consciousness calls for global institutions. Perhaps a logical consequence of the evolving noosphere will be a globally respected moral authority. If so, we will find conflict ahead. Not surprisingly dictators and dishonest leaders with totalitarian tendencies will oppose and undermine such global bodies by reviving outdated but still toxic nationalisms. In a spiritual analogy, it is the ego resisting the Self. But this is why it is easier now to speak about spiritual consciousness. Survival depends on it. In contrast to the modern dogma of reductionist materialism, a universal wisdom is reemerging. Rooted in a perennial philosophy it calmly says that mind does
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not arise from matter, but that matter is manifested by mind. This is not a philosophical abstraction of no practical value. Fundamental ideas shape the world. It seems, for example, that some leaders, responsible for abolishing environmental controls and restarting the exploitation of nonrenewable resources, feel justified by their fundamentalist religious beliefs. They hold extreme biblical views about the seven days of creation and the imminent Armageddon that will precede the Rapture. If an elect group are going to be beamed up soon, what difference does environmental damage make? Or, belief that all human beings do not possess equal, essential value. Some, the more successful, are worth more than others. Rational arguments can then be made for creating collateral damage, sacrificing whoever you feel are less important. It helps to have God on your side in such decisions. Believe in a God who punishes whoever breaks the rules made by His representatives and rewards those who keep them, and religion becomes a tyranny of the self-righteous. The glass of water shows that God loves you and your thirst proves that God hates you. Covid-19 has shocked us into a new sense of human unity as we watched how a simple, miniscule virus has no favourites and no enemies. Good and bad belong to humans not to events. We have seen how human tragedy can be played for shameful political advantage. Yet we also see a daily outpouring of altruism and tenderness. Both extremes are visible at the click of a mouse. How we interpret it depends on the mind behind the hand controlling the technology. The crisis has shown us we need to fund our healthcare but it also exposes the weakness of our education.
Critical thinking developed by good public education opposes a tyranny that tries to prove that oppression is liberty and black is white. Technology can assist the development of a global mind and of a more just society. It can also be twisted to block both. But what if the common mind, the unity of human
Meditatio Newsletter May 2020
all pursuit. Without the Self, never could life exist (Isha Upanishad) To feel that we share in this universal mind, at the deepest level of reality described in these words, it is not necessary to try to know everything, to browse the internet all day, read every article, argue about every
Contemplative Mass live from Bonnevaux every Sunday. More info here: http://tiny.cc/liveevents
consciousness, is on the march and cannot be stopped? What if it manifests at certain stages of evolution, helped but not dependent on technology? An absurd idea to the materialistic mind, but it helps to illustrate the Mind of Christ: Let this mind be in you as was also in Christ Jesus (Phil 2:5) Now I beseech you by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you all speak the same thing, and that there be no divisions among you; be perfectly joined together in the same mind and in the same judgment. (1 Cor 1:10) The Self is One. Ever still, the Self is. Swifter than thought, swifter than the senses. Though motionless he outruns
opinion, become a news junkie. It is necessary only to pay attention to one thing totally. Training our potentially infinite capacity for attention forms the contemplative mind in individuals who then come to see how they are equal sharers in the whole of humanity. The contemplative mind is the birth right of all. Meditation is for everyone. The political benefit of this is that contemplatives are not so easily manipulated or misled; knowing what they belong to makes them participate more responsibly in the democratic process.
The Personal Impact of the Covid-19 Crisis
Many, who did not fall sick or have people who were close to them suffering, will shyly say they enjoyed some aspects of confinement. Even
Meditatio Newsletter May 2020
with anxieties about work or finances, they followed a balanced daily schedule of exercise, reading, meditating, chatting online, doing things they liked at home like baking or painting. They often felt relieved not to be rushing all day, commuting, jumping on and off planes or trains, shopping. Even though they also missed hugs and kisses they benefited by this time of slower living. Others, however, with tendencies to depression or issues like anger or addiction have found it excruciating. It brought the dark side to the fore and subjected them to much suffering. Everyone has learned something more about themselves. Some may even apply the self-knowledge they have gained to rebuild a healthier lifestyle. Confinement, enforced stability and simplicity, confront us with our capacity to be simply content with what we have. Many political prisoners like Gandhi, Solzhenitsyn and Mandela attest to this. Monastic life builds degrees of solitude into its programme of spiritual development. Spirituality – however one defines it – begins with the often lonely work of accepting what is. Denial, resistance, rage or violence do not change reality to match our preferences. Eventually reality wins. It teaches us and we have to obey what is. Only then can we do good work for others. Until then, our efforts to change things are largely projections of fantasy. And so, at this basic level of accepting life itself as a spiritual journey, the crisis has been an awakening for many. Confinement and loss have been a deeper call to acceptance, self-knowledge and a spirit of service. The frustration of normal habits and desires led many to realise how to control anger, handle restlessness, acknowledge our addiction to dis-
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traction, expose our evasions, selfdeceptions and our tendency always to blame others. It has been a desert experience – of more than forty days and is not fully over yet. Perhaps we glimpsed how our hunger for distraction, novelty and stimulation contradicts our innate hunger for God. This is true even if we do not have the word God in our vocabulary of meaning. God is present and we thirst for union with God, named or unnamed, invoked or not. Spiritual hunger is our most intimate longing, the reality check of all the distorted compensatory desires we pursue. It is also the great unifying bond between us all. If beauty, love, compassion, and
Accepting our ordinariness and limitations unexpectedly becomes a strength justice unite us across all differences, at the heart of them is the thirsty hunger for God. It is the great privilege of the human condition to feel it. If we accept it for what it is, it contains its own fulfilment. The deepest self-knowledge is not psychological awareness of our formative experiences and conditioned patterns of mind. Important though this is, the essential self-knowledge that effects permanent transformation and liberation, is not found in our thoughts, memories or imagination. It arises from a direct encounter with our being, at its source, in utter stillness and silence. This may sound like an experience for the few but it is much closer to us than we think and more universally accessible. Sometimes suffering pushes us into this space when our efforts to find it have
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failed. The self-knowledge it brings is the greatest asset we have in our quest to be happy and free. It may come as the glass of water or as the thirst. It simply is. Knowing it once will forever change the way we cope with the swings of fortune that previously controlled and dominated us. Humans are a mass of paradox. We belong to one human family. What happens anywhere on our home planet influences each of us. But we are also locals embedded in the physical and cultural conditions of our home and immediate companions. We are also solitary in the sense of being unique and unrepeatable. And we are all ordinary, too, however high we have risen or low we have fallen. We all need attention and love, even the hermit. Accepting this paradoxical ordinariness exposes our hidden glory and real value. This is the outcome, the humility of meditation. When they meditate the most intelligent, powerful or famous meet the same challenges as everyone else. Accepting our ordinariness and limitations unexpectedly becomes a strength and source of encouragement. Solitude then expands into communion. Experiencing equality, fraternity and liberty of spirit we begin to function maturely in community. The crisis of the past months can teach us these essential lessons of life when it is understood as a spiritual journey. In confinement many people decided to learn something new, to restart a long-abandoned task, to be creative. It is vital to develop, until the end, to risk learning new things and change old habits. As we are enduring it now, disruption of life feels cruel. But it may also be a kind teacher and catalyst for change. Hard times have taught many already that they really can change: their sense of self
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and their character traits can be repaired. It is never too late to be have a conversion of heart. In the most challenging conditions, we are capable of transformation. Brain scientists say that plasticity is with us till the end. If we believe the Christian mystics, it continues even after the end, because in eternity we are transformed ‘from glory to glory’. Limitations accepted push back the walls confining us. Weaknesses become sources of strength, of grace from God. If this is true of us at the personal level, might it not be equally true for our communities, the church, our national and global institutions?
Serpents and doves
When we pay attention to one thing, other than our self or what concerns our self-interest, we become a foot soldier in the contemplative revolution. All the spiritual teachers of humanity have seen and shown this. But to build a contemplative practice into life means to work continuously, humbly to come to an ever-purer degree of attention. At its fullest, purity of attention is the Mind of Christ. The trick is not to see this as a heroic task but as a simple and ordinary one. Of course, it has an element of the hero’s quest but heroes are never as heroic as they are portrayed and the real heroes know it. To meditate is not to be heroic but to be a disciple. This is a less flattering designation for the ego, so we resist discipleship; but dealing with the resistance leads to self-knowledge which makes us humble and more useful to others. This moment is always a crossroad in our personal journey. It returns periodically. If we make the right turn, we grow beyond anything we can
Meditatio Newsletter May 2020
Online meditation and yoga sessions live from Bonnevaux, more info: http://tiny.cc/liveevents
imagine, by becoming the person we exist to become. Is this also the crossroad where humanity finds itself now? The heroic path – mastering and exploiting the earth till its ecological balance collapses; embracing the hyper-individualism of the warrior pursuing glory and ambition in politics and business even when hiding behind Green camouflage; viewing the poor and powerless as cannon fodder for the march of a jungle deviant of capitalism; fuelling greed (the illusion that we can have everything) with gluttony (the attempt to stuff ourselves with everything); losing faith in the existence of truth because we have sold our soul to falsehood. We have felt this for some time. We have also felt that a crisis was bound to come one way or another – through a financial collapse, a major environmental tipping point, a political collapse into totalitarianism. This may be only the first of a series of crises that awakens us to the failure of our outdated view of civilisation. But it may also trigger a new vision of reality. Individually we have to surrender egoism, collectively we need to sacrifice nationalism.
Personally, we need to rediscover poverty of spirit. Economically we need to let go of possessiveness and share. Meditation guides us to moderation. Materially, we need to reduce and simplify. The values of contemplative consciousness and the new world order are aligned. The more radical the spirit of revolution, the less force it will use. The contemplative revolution uses no force. It does not market itself. Its leaders know they are flawed and admit it. Jesus said that to advance the reign of God people would need to be as cunning as serpents and as simple as doves. It’s a hard combination. It seems unlikely to succeed. But then success isn’t what it’s about. It’s a strange goal and a weird time. But stranger things have happened. After all, as I write it is still the Paschal season which recalls a very strange event and time indeed. And Ordinary Time means travelling as if we have arrived. With much love
Laurence Freeman OSB
Meditatio Newsletter May 2020
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Visit and join the Path at www.acontemplativepath-wccm.org
A Contemplative Path Through the Crisis
Since the crisis hit the world the World Community has been approached by many people asking how we can help. We have consulted widely, reflected deeply, and we feel that A Contemplative Path Through the Crisis is a response that meets many needs in different ways. Meditation will not instantly solve all problems. But it changes how we view and deal with the challenges we face. It helps us to ‘set our troubled minds at rest’ and to find the authentic, interior peace that stabilises us when we are in turmoil. For many who have a spiritual path and practice, this crisis is a call to deepen it. For those who never had time to
develop a path before, this is the opportunity. The immediate need is to reduce fear and anxiety and – even in a time of social isolation – to discover a sense of connection with others. The ‘Contemplative Path’ programme grows from the essential teaching of the community about the daily practice of meditation. For a generation or more we have taught this simple way from the Christian contemplative tradition to people of faith and those who belong to no special tradition. Building on this practice, the Contemplative Path online programme offers meditation sessions, contemplative eucharists, psychological insights about
how to deal with the feelings stirred up by the crisis, bodywork sessions, teachings and reflections from a range of people who follow a spiritual path while living and working in the world. Each of us can be build an inclusive contemplative response that makes a difference to everyone around us even when we are physically separated. Social distancing can bring us closer together spiritually. But we need to go deeper. To go deeper we need to be still. Meditation does both. Following such a path also means becoming more other-centred, turned practically towards the relief of others’ suffering. This is to be, in a Christlike way, what every contemplative path aims to be: ‘medicine, physician and nurse to those in need’. We need to get through the crisis but also to see the opportunities it offers. With a path, we can better see how to be ready to play our part after the crisis. A contemplative path commits us all not only to survival, but to a better human flourishing. Welcome to A Contemplative Path. Laurence Freeman OSB
The impact in Bonnevaux Because of the pandemic crisis, retreats between June and August will be offered in an online version. From September we will aim to offer in-person retreats at Bonnevaux. You will find further information at bonnevauxwccm.org. In self-isolation the resident community continued the routine of work and prayer. Bonnevaux is a key part of the new programme A Contemplative Path Through the Crisis. The first online event was The Inter-Contemplative Dialogues (see page 9). The Holy Week retreat was also an opportunity for the global community to feel connected to Bonnevaux - with live mass and recorded talks by Fr. Laurence. The Bonnenaux website provides information on how you can join live transmissions for Sunday Mass, Yoga class and Online Meditation every week. The crisis paused the renovation work, but the good news is that the Barn (the Conference Centre) is ready and in use for meditation, mass and other celebrations.
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Meditatio Newsletter May 2020
Special In response to the crisis, technology is helping communities to support their the practice with the feeling of connection
Vibrant initiatives in Latin America Besides the surge in regular online groups, we have been offering several live-stream events. In mid-March we launched a series of weekly contemplative masses in Spanish. Another initiative we have recently launched is a series of live-stream sessions called “today we meditate with”. The format consists of short interviews hosted by Elba. In the live clips we interview a member of our community, give pointers on how to meditate, and then meditate for 20 minutes. New or current meditators can join
us for the interview and the meditation session via Facebook Live or watch at a later time. What came out of the latter initiative was an extension of meditation with children. Enrique, his wife Paty (WCCM Mexico), and Elba will be offering a live webinar series, streaming through Facebook, on Christian meditation with children. The format consists of simple talks and a five-minute meditation to help parents, aunts and uncles, and grandparents during these trying times. (By Elba Rodríguez)
Sergio Peixoto, Brazil: “I hope everyone takes this opportunity” Some people asked me if we could go online after our group was suspended because of the pandemic crisis. I explored various means and finally decided to try live streaming via Youtube. Unlike Facebook and Instagram, I didn’t need an account to join. The feedback is good so far, and we are exploring continuing an on-line group even after the crisis. It will not replace the actual group, but will offer an alternative for those who
cannot physically meet together. Crisis asks for change and people are looking for solutions. Some, of course, want to keep expanding, achieving and competing; they still want to “come in first” and not lose the competition. But mediation offers us another way to grow: the way of “not doing”, of stillness and silence. I hope everyone takes the opportunity the crisis offers to seek true change within. (By Sergio Peixoto)
Hong Kong: online meeting in Cantonese and English Ever since the beginning of February, when Hong Kong people were aware of how contagious the Coronavirus was, it was clear that meeting weekly for meditation had to cease. Instead, we migrated online, to one Hong Kong-wide online meditation meeting. Now we have refined our presentation. It has become
bilingual, Cantonese and English, with each week’s meeting involving members from various groups serving as the host and readers for the teaching and the Gospel of that day. We aim to have every one of our 14 groups represented as we continue, promoting a distinct feeling of community. In our meeting in
26 Mar we had 51 participants, a few of whom were invitees new to meditation. With confinement, people with time on their hands will likely turn to spiritual matters, and online meditation is an excellent way to introduce them to this type of prayer. (By Vivian Lee)
Meditatio Newsletter May 2020
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Teaching meditation to Children and Young People during the Crisis To reduce stress and loneliness when Young People are isolated at home or in schools only open to the children of key workers, meditation offers an inclusive and immediate solace and inspiration. From our work worldwide we know for certain that children can meditate, that they love it and ask for it. In collaboration with The Catholic Children’s Society in the UK, the WCCM is introducing meditation into Primary and Secondary schools. We encourage you to share these videos with children, parents, grandparents and teachers
Inter-Contemplative Dialogues The first event of “A Contemplative Path” programme was a webinar, from 21st to 28th of March, with Alan Wallace and Eva Natanya (speaking from USA) and Laurence Freeman (from Bonnevaux). The five talks were webcast live and you can watch them here: https://rebrand.ly/ctdialg)
at home during this time of crisis. More info here: https://rebrand.ly/medchcv19
Ukraine: a time to go deeper into the silence
These are strange and surprising times. Pandemic crisis has a special character - it brings silence to our cities, whether we like it or not. Here in Ukraine we understand that we are not ready to face this challenge, either internally or externally. Therefore, so many people now suffer from the effects of this disease, fear of illness and loss and the loneliness of quarantine. But for our local meditation community, this time has become an oppor-
tunity to go deeper into the silence. Now we can do it together online, forgetting about the distances between our local groups located in so many different cities. We have launched three weekly online groups, and we continue to translate the Fr. Laurence’s Lenten reflections. Each time we meet in the Zoom chatroom, we recall that our meditation is part of our community’s web of silence. We just want to thank every community meditator for our common presence. We hope that our local community will benefit from this time, using it as a free space where we will learn just to be. After the epidemic is over, we look forward to being with one another again, so we could see in our meditation and in each other the Word which has become Flesh. (By Albert Zakharov)
In times of crises like this, which humanity has been facing for as long as there’s been humanity, it’s a time when the outer pursuit of happiness, everything outer, the sources, my problems and my happiness, are outside. (...)When things are going well, then the outside looks like a good bet. You don’t need to have much of an inner life because outside it’s just going fine. But then when something like this has happened and, of course, we’ve had so many of these sort of things—wars, pandemics, economic meltdowns and so forth... then suddenly that outer pursuit looks very very precarious. (Alan Wallace)
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Special
Far from home, Emily found community support online This meditator from USA was part of the Young Adult Retreat at Bonnevaux in 2019 and got stuck in Peru during the pandemic crisis.
In 2019, Emily Waters-Leiga was part of the first Young Adult Retreat in Bonnevaux. She also did the five-day walk in the French part of the Camino to Compostela. This year her life took another unexpected direction: she was in Argentina to study Spanish when the pandemic crisis worsened. On her way back to the USA she got stuck in Peru. She replied to some questions before finally getting back home, middle of April. How are you keeping the balance during this time in Peru? The main way I’m coping with the
situation is by trying to remember the bigger picture- that fighting this pandemic is much bigger than any one of us. Even everyone who is fortunate enough to be healthy is experiencing some type of loss or hard times right now. I try to keep in mind that all the sacrifices being made, including me staying here in Peru, are for the greater good. I have meditated several times, and every day, have taken time away from my phone and the news to just sit in the sun and journal, or just sit and think. This has been incredibly helpful. I have been in touch with several people whom I was with on the Camino. Recently I participated in our Zoom catch up + meditation session, and a few of them have reached out to me individually to check in about how I am doing. They are such an amazing and supportive group of people. What are you learning from this personal experience? It’s always been valuable to me to try to not take things in life for granted, but never in my life have I been
confronted with just how much can be taken away seemingly overnight. One of the hardest things I dealt with in Peru was not knowing if I would continue to have a place to stay. Having a place to stay was something I’ve always taken for granted, and now this experience has made me so appreciative of it. I hope that this time of uncertainty and loss ignites immense gratitude for the things in our lives that we all took for granted before. I also hope people are amazed at just how small our world really is. Everyone in the world is dealing with varying amounts of social restrictions and isolation, and most people are experiencing some type of anxiety or loneliness. When I participated in the video chat with people from the Camino, we were all in different countries, but experiencing the same thing. It’s really uniting to think about how we are all in this together. I hope that moving forward we can continue this sense of unity to tackle other global crises, including climate change. ONLINE: Visit Emily’s blog here: https://emilyabroad.home.blog
Briji Waterfield, Director of Meditatio Briji was appointed as the new Director of Meditatio in March 2020. She is no stranger in the Community as she retired as Director of Special Projects in 2018 but has come back to this new role. Briji was part of the initial team that launched Meditatio in 2010 and looks forward to taking meditation out into the secular world especially in the fields of Business, Education, Health, Religion and Spirituality, Science
and Social Justice. She will be working closely with The Meditatio Council whose members are professionals in these fields and with the national communities. She is still enjoying the joys of semi-retirment - walking with her dog, gardening, cooking, partying with friends and re-discovering her home country, India. She hopes to resume some of these social pleasures once the virus has abated!
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In Focus
Angelene Chan, Singapore
At River Jordan in February 2020 where I renewed my baptismal vows with Fr Laurence
There is nothing like a crisis to put your spiritual practice to the test. In these last few weeks, as the world fights tooth and nail to contain a virus outbreak of a scale that has never been experienced in our lifetime, I find myself having to make many swift decisions amid uncertainties; decisions that will have far-reaching effects on the profitability of the group of companies I am entrusted with, and more importantly, on the wellbeing and livelihood of its 1200 employees. I constantly second guess myself: Am I doing enough? Am I doing too much? It is stressful, to say the least.
It is in these days that I came to realise how precious my meditation practice is to me. Twice a day, I am able to pause, shut out the noise and bad news, and withdraw inward. Meditation opens the pressure relief valve of my brain to release the steam, this is the best way I can describe one of the most tangible benefits of meditation. Because the pressure builds up over the course of the day, I find that the second sitting in the evening has become indispensable. I am a beginner. My practice began in earnest only in 2016 after I attended a leadership course conducted by Father Laurence in Singapore. In January that same year, I was appointed the CEO of a large company. There were a lot of expectations, not least from myself, to do well. Besides the financial side of business, I want to make my colleagues happy and our company the best place to work in. Listening to Fr Laurence convinced me that contemplative leadership is the way to achieve the goals I have set for myself. The profession I am in, architecture, is a highly demanding and competitive one that requires in-
Meditatio Newsletter is published four times a year by the International Office of The World Community for Christian Meditation, St Marks, Myddelton Square London EC1R 1XX, London, UK. Tel: +44 (0) 20 7278 2070
tense creative energy and mental endurance. The work life of an architect is very hectic and it is very easy to burn out if we are not careful. Meditation started out as a way for me to find balance and clarity. By God’s blessings, quite early on in my practice, I discovered an infinitely profound reward – personal communion with God that is deeper than what I had previously experienced. Using meditation as prayer and as a way to deepen my Catholic identity was not my motivation when I started. But I find that the practice has deepened my faith, and my faith is the inspiration for me to persist in the practice. This became clear when I joined Fr Laurence’s Holy Land tour in February. In tracing the steps of Christ, praying and breaking bread with my fellow pilgrims, the shared practice of meditation took us deeper into an inward journey that we were all undertaking. When we looked into each other’s eyes, sometimes through tears, we witnessed the Divine in each other and in the physical world around us. Through meditation, we acquired the inner silence to experience God. It is His gift to us.
Editor: Leonardo Corrêa (leonardo@wccm.org) Graphic Design: Gerson Laureano Would you like to contribute to the Meditatio Newsletter? Our next deadline is 20 June.
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Meditatio Newsletter May 2020
www.wccm.org
ents Resources & Ev
Online retreat
WCCM retreats and events affected by the pandemic crisis
Audio & CDs
Given that most of our communication and exploration is - for the moment – online,what better time to take part in an online retreat? Sources of Wisdom, with Laurence Freeman is structured into one-and-a-half hour sessions: meditation, video of a talk, followed by a time for personal reflection. Enroll now: https://rebrand.ly/sowsdm
Books Frankie The Still Fox by Ernie Christie & Mary Hosking More info: https://rebrand.ly/fkfox When you turn the pages of this book you will learn how to become still and silent. Even when the world around you is so noisy and busy and distracted, you, like Frankie, can choose another way of being and learn to be attentive. This is a book for young ones to discover meditation and make friends with Frankie along the way.
The latest Meditatio CD Series. Listen to or download the tracks: http://tiny.cc/Med2020A Order a copy of the CD: http://tiny.cc/WorkSA
The Monte Oliveto Retreat in July cannot take place but in 2021 the dates are June 26- July 3 (Registration fees may be transferred to next year). For more information contact monteoliveto@wccm.org. We will soon be announcing a weeklong Bonnevaux online retreat to replace this year’s Monte Oliveto Retreat.
Meditatio Series goes digital only The distribution of the Meditatio Talks series in physical CDs will be discontinued starting from the 2020-B Apr-Jun issue. Postal services worldwide have been disrupted or even suspended in some countries due to the COVID-19 pandemic. A set of talks will continue to be released every quarter. The audio tracks and their corresponding transcripts will be available from this link http://tiny.cc/MeditatioCDs and soon also on the WCCM app. A simple step by step guide on how to access that talks will be made available on the WCCM website. It will be possible to listen to the talks from a computer or mobile device and also to download the talks for listening to offline.
The John Main Seminar 2020, in October, in Mexico, was also affected and it will be hosted as an online event. The theme will be the same “One Heart, One Hope - Indigenous Wisdom and the Future of Humanity”, as well as the speakers. The keynote speaker is Fr Alex Zatyrka SJ. All new details and registration information will be available soon at the JMS website: www.johnmainseminar.org
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