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Welcome to OneLife Ministries. This site is designed to lead you prayerfully into a heart experience of Divine Presence, Who is Love. I hope persons of varied faith paths will find inspiration here. Please share this ministry with others, and please return soon. There is a new offering daily. And to be placed on the daily OneLife email list, to request notifications of new writings or submit prayer requests, write to briankwilcox@yahoo.com .
Blessings,
Brian Kenneth Wilcox MDiv, MFT, PhD
Interspiritual Pastor-Teacher, Author, Workshop Leader, Spiritual Counselor, and Chaplain.
You are invited to join Brian at his fellowship group on Facebook. The group is called OneLife Ministries – An Interspiritual Contemplative Fellowship. Hope to see you there. Blessings.
SPIRITUAL TEACHING
There is a principle which is the basis of things, which all speech aims to say, and all action to evolve, a simple, quiet, undescribed, undescribable presence, dwelling very peacefully in us, our rightful lord: we are not to do, but to let do; not to work, but to be worked upon.
*Ralph Waldo Emerson. The Conduct of Life.
The Jesuit William Johnston, in “Arise My Love…”, writing of mysticism, speaks of a stage of having awakened to Love. The person in meditation becomes “increasingly passive—just waiting, doing nothing, allowing the Spirit to act.” Or, “she may enter the prayer of quiet, a form of contemplation in which the upper layer of the psyche runs wild with all kinds of distractions, while the deeper layer quietly enjoys the sense of divine presence.”
Here, one has evolved in meditation to a deep letting go. Earlier, she may have been taught to let go of thoughts. Now, she is to let go of letting go of thoughts.
The experience Johnson describes is a joyful one of the mysterious, inner Work of Pure Spirit. As we meditate, we can make the mistake of trying to calm the surface of the psyche, when we need to let the surface be turbulent. We let the surface remain turbulent, when we experience this deep, inner repose. We can acknowledge that the turbulence is a manifestation of the One Energy we all are part of.
This is a resting in Grace, even while we cannot grasp the content of this Work deep in mind and heart, transforming the will to respond to the wooing of the Inner Wisdom, even when the response is simply to be.
However, this stage, generally, is something we have to grow into. Initially, our will to know and control, as well as our lack of being comfortable with the inner mystery of the Work in the soul, blocks this loving, passive receptivity. Only after a long time of practicing meditation, can one expect to be consistently experiencing this Passive Prayer of Love.
The joy of this intimacy waits, however, she who is faithful in prayer and meditation, being transformed to let go of resistance to the inner Work. The will is being transformed into the Will of the One Life. And, paradoxically, the growing strength of the will manifests in its experience of emptiness before the Fullness of Grace. This is a reason meditation, as understood by the mystics, is not self-hypnosis or relaxation exercise. Rather, meditation, as understood by mystics of the religious traditions, is a means of dissolving the resistance of the ego-self, what St. Paul called sarx (translated, often and unfortunately, “flesh”), so that one in passive Loving can rest, cooperating in affective surrender to the Mysterious Action transforming and healing the Person at deep levels and in calm and quiet.
REFLECTIONS
1.What kind of trust would be required for a person to grow into the experience of the Prayer of Passive Love?
2.. How might the Prayer of Passive Love challenge cultural notions of personal control?
3.How can human activity and rational activity block the mysterious inner Work of Pure Spirit?
4.Why do most persons resist solitude and silence?
5.Can you describe ways the sarx attempts to block your open, passive receptivity to the inner Work of Grace within you?
6.Would you be interested in growing into the joy of this passive openness to Love in your daily life? If so, are you willing to seek teaching or spiritual direction to learn more about meditation in your religious tradition?
7.Johnston speaks of two levels of religion: the cultural superstructure and the mystical core. What do you think he might mean by these terms? Which level do you think one experiences in the Passive Prayer of Love?
© OneLife Ministries. Jan 25, 2010.
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*OneLife Ministries is a ministry of Brian Kenneth Wilcox, SW Florida. Brian lives a vowed life and with his two dogs, Bandit Ty and St. Francis. While within the Christian path, he is an ecumenical-interspiritual teacher, author, and chaplain. He is Senior Chaplain for the Charlotte County Jail, Punta Gorda, FL.
*Brian welcomes responses to his writings at briankwilcox@yahoo.com . Also, Brian is on Facebook: search Brian Kenneth Wilcox.
*You can order his book An Ache for Union from major booksellers.
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