Customer Reviews

Christian Meditation: Practice and Teachings for Entering the Mind of Christ

5 star:		(12)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

This book is one that I enjoyed despite some stylistic quirks. The author's tone is one of benevolent teacher, mainly for the novice. I would say that I am a novice meditator. I pray regularly but have always ound meditation a bit more difficult so I appreciate Finley's advice about breathing and sitting. His personal stories and the quotes he picks are excellent, one feels that that the saints and holy people he quotes are better, more concise sources of information.

My main complaint is that Finley is extremely repetitive, to the point of redunduncy; there are only so mnay ways to make a point and he makes them over and over again.

If the rest of the book had been like chapter 7 (entering the mind of Christ) I would have been a happier reader. This chapter is far more theological but also more mystical. I suppose that this is what I was looking for in a guide.

There is so much in this hardback with the attractive dustcover that it is difficult to know where to start. The author, James Finley, says what his book is about from his perspective as the writer, and what could be better: "...I am sharing with you what I have learned thus far in my ongoing spiritual journey." For people who see their life as a spiritual journey, even a pilgrimage or travel through the desert, James Finley has written an articulate if somewhat detailed text on being with and learning to seek God in ones life.

I had read somewhere in a book about the poor by the Jesuit Gary Smith that Christ is seeking us, and that we are "followed" by Christ. This book purports that one lives and prays a realized oneness with God, preparing oneself through contemplation as one discipline. "When engaged in contemplation, we rest in God resting in us. We are at home in God at home in us." The role is basically receptive.

The person who seeks God in this way, so the book instructs, and the book is a kind of instruction by one who has knowledge to share, and a heart with love to teach, will have a "life-transforming realization of oneness with God." In some way, by manner of practice, and the nature of contemplation. Some of his phrases are moving, and give reason to think about with a reverent consideration that looks towards divine destinations. He does this in the Christian way. One can "...quietly begin to illumine the most intimate of moments."

In this conversion of life and the heart, which I have practiced and in practicing found this book useful as a contemplative seeking and traveling the way, even when not knowing the path but being there anyway, I found the practice of meditation is a starting point in the interior journey. This isn't a gibberish of the supernatural; the practice can extend to quiet moments of the sunset, or taking coffee in the morning. He suggests the day by day time of "Here I am, Lord."

There is a lot of ground and stuff and thoughts and ways discussed in this 286 page book by the former Trappist Monk who studied with Thomas Merton. Ones heart can be combined or moved in a way that connects it with similar experiences of past and passing centuries. Here is one lesson that is gained through Christian meditation:

"...meditation embodies a desire for God that brings us back full circle to a more clear-minded, Christlike compassion for others and our selves." I am going to tell you something that took the author a while to say in the section on "A Ladder to Heaven." When the Lord or we self disclose our love to another we seek to have our heart met and hearing that love come back to us. God does this with us in contemplation and meditation. There is this God of love which is the Christian love, and it is a powerful, drawing, and fulfilling force.

There are risks to the contemplative practice in the Christian tradition, outlined, explained, and taught in this book by HarperSan Francisco. "Dealing with the dying away of who we used to be." "Ego-based ways of experiencing ourselves are yeilding..." Sometimes the transformative experience is extremely difficult.

James Finley likes to explain the journey, and he tells us that the journey can be hidden, that He is hidden and that He does abide within us. So he quotes Saint John of the Cross. In my own life I have sought this method of prayer and practiced it, relying on the centering qualities and the quietude. Sometimes I have entered into the desert of aloness of my own life, and faced myself and memories. A hard thing to do, and one that can necessarily be something one endures. All in all, on what is called in this good book of contemplative life and doing, one is learning and practicing the general loving awarenesss to rest in the passageways. It is the claim of the author that this method of prayer, more a practice and part of living life, is an experience of spiritual fulfillment. The contemplative would say so, too. By that I mean others than James Finley, who has been steeped in this knowledge and carefully writes about it as a teacher in the book.

Before I close, here is the nondual oneness with God that is a ground of the experience, outlined as entering the mind of Christ. "...rest silently in God's presence..." This way allows "...access into the depths of realized oneness with God that is at once Christ's life and your own." As a reviewer, my suggestion is to read with care and with some patience this detailed book about Christian meditation, and to pause from time to time to think on some of the concepts and things written. Plainly, the practice is a simple resting in attentive openness to God.

There is some how-to in the book, where to set your eye glance, breathing, and the like. For this reader, who recommends this book to the seeker, the better parts are the explanations of experience and the preparation for the silent reception of God. Certainly a good book for seekers. This is a book of the ongoing spiritual journey.

--Peter Menkin, Obl Cam OSB

The silent path is difficult to describe with words. Finley does it well.

If you have been walking the silent path of the Buddha in part because there seems to be more assistance available you may want to read this book. It was written by one who has rediscovered "Lost Christianity", and is not only living it but can describe it well.

If you are of a Christian tradition and have considered meditation as a pracitce to deepen your faith you are not likely to find a better book to begin with than this one.

"Christian Meditation: Experiencing the Presence of God: a guide to contemplation" by James Finley
HarperCollins, San Francisco, 2005

Finley is a former Trappist monk who studied with Thomas Merton. He is now married and is a practicing psychotherapist. His description of the meditative process is a meditation in itself:

"We glimpse, however obscurely, that God is the infinity of the perpetually unfolding newness of the present moment in which our lives unfold." (p. 59)

"We sit, quietly attentive and receptive to our breathing, until, by God's grace, our awareness of this breath awakens to the presence of God that wholly transcends this breath." (p. 46)

It's one of the few of the many books I've read on meditation that speaks to me, the reader, as though Finley knows that although "we are powerless to produce by our efforts that union with God that alone fulfills our hearts... we can ... freely will to make ourselves as vulnerable and receptive as possible to the influx of grace." (p. 57)

James Finley has attempted and accomplished a truly difficult task. He has constructed a book that is helpful to beginning meditators while it is an inspiration to experienced meditators. The chapters of this book look somewhat traditional with familiar concepts like "A Ladder to Heaven","Entering the Mind of Christ." Yet in each aspect of Christian meditation that he discusses he discovers new depths.

One example. Simply but profoundly he describes the flow of thoughts and memories that inevitably discourage those who are seeking the empty mind. He encourages a "don't accept, don't reject" attitude that is grounded in compassion for ourselves that mirrors the compassion of God for us.

Finley's style itself is meditative with sentences that parallel each other and lend themselves to thoughtful pauses. This is an extremely valuable book for which anyone who reads with a sincere seeking will be grateful. (Rating should be 5 stars)

This book wasn't bad, and it was nice having a meditation source with a Christian feel. Mr. Finley writes in a very relaxing mode, and really pounds in the basics; sitting, silence, release thoughts, etc..
If your familiar with meditation, not much new here. If your new to meditation, it would be a good starting point.
Again, Mr. Finley writes in a peaceful and calm way, very friendly, but don't get too relaxed or you might miss some points.

Finley does a wonderous job of explaining the silence and its relationship to God or a God. His take on the comtemplative path is thoroughly explained in surprising detail. My leanings are Buddhist, but this is the best and most detailed explaination of the meditative process that I have ever heard. For those new to meditation as well as very experienced ones of all faiths.

James Finley, in "Christian Meditation: Experiencing the Presence of God," briefly discusses his traumatic childhood at the hands of an abusive father, and reveals how his suffering led him, after high school, to the monastery in Louisville, Kentucky, where for the next five and a half years Thomas Merton would serve as his spiritual advisor. As might be expected, James Finley learned quite a bit during those five and a half years, as well as in the subsequent years after the monastery. He shares this with the reader, not so much as an autobiographical odyssey, but as reflections on the interior life pertinent to all contemplatives, whether lay or monastic.

Finley often makes good use of metaphor, as when, for example, he talks about a caterpillar with wings that has not metamorphosed into the butterfly it was meant to be, and therefore remains too heavy to fly. We are like that caterpillar, says Finley, when, though we have faith in Christ, we remain earthbound because we are too afraid of relinguishing our ego consciousness.

It is interesting to learn that Finley was never specifically taught how to meditate in the monastery because the Order believed that Spirit would guide the monastic to the proper prayer form best suited to the individual. James Finley takes a similar approach in this work, though he does offer some mechanics later in the book.

This is a gentle, compassionate, and reassuring guide on the contemplative life, and James Finley is to be commended for both his honesty and his encouragement to the reader interested in pursuing a Christian life of prayer. Despite what was said earlier about Finley's dysfunctional father, this is a very positive book, sure to inspire many readers to embark on their own interior journey.

James Finley's calm voice, clear and accessible teachings and his way of talking one through the various meditations are all very life-giving! I have energitically recommened this to others who are interest in exploring ways of praying that give them a sense of becoming quite and more focused in prayer. I am a spiritual director and involved in ecumenical retreat work and plan to use these tapes with others on retreat.

This is a great resource for anyone on the spiritual path. I get to hear Dr. Finley speak regularly so I was familiar with his work before reading the book. In this book, as in person, his presentations are enriching, poetic, and inspiring! I also recommend his CD set "Christian Meditation."