Customer Reviews

Contemplative Prayer

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Contemplative Prayer is the traditional Christian method of meditation and yet most Christians have never heard of it! It has been actively repressed at times in history and now is "damned by faint praise" by the Catholic Church.

Meditation in general is looked upon with great suspicion by most Protestant religions, who feel that it opens one up for possession. Thus one of the most valuable tools for salvation - the ability to place oneself in the Presence of God - is being unwittingly withheld from the faithful!

Fr. Keating is a kind, wise and gentle teacher. He explains why people get unhappy with their earthly circumstances based on programming received prior to their ability to "defend themselves" mentally. He then offers a very simple and straight-forward form of meditation that brings profound peace and deep rest for the body, mind and spirit.

Anyone seeking peace and true rest in their lives will find this presentation to be a godsend.

If you pass the first cassete, congratulations!! There is so much rich material, you can play it till the tape wears out. Keating tells the story of our lives right from the womb to our destructive adult life. Our maturity being hampered by the emotional wounds we all receive as kids, the degree being the difference. This is not the place to blame any parent as there is no perfect parent and also the fallen nature of man prevents this. Besides, it seems by the design that we will face external dissapointments and insecurity since we have a society built on such wounded beings. The purpose is to turn you inward and find the security, love and self indenty in God within you. This is the story of Man, an excellent tape series.

I really enjoyed this CD. I especially liked Father Keating's explanations on contemplative prayer and I also enjoyed the guided prayer sessions. Like other reviewers I found that some of the psychological explanations were at times tedious and off the mark but the basic notions that change is difficult due to developmental experiences and related defense mechanisms made sense and I would have no problem recommending this CD to many of my clients. However, there would be a few caveats. Mostly, I would encourage them to listen to the entire CD but to have patience and wait for the last few sessions. Personally, I have worked at incorporating centered prayer in my life by practicing it a half an hour a day and have found that it does help change your emotional reactivity to the events of daily living in a positive manner. Interestingly, my wife did not like the CD at all. She found it tedious and somewhat impractical. It just goes to show how two people can go through the same experience and come out with different conclusions!

Father Keating uses the simple technique of centering prayer to help us come to terms with events and situations in our lives. I believe that anyone who practices this technique will have a much calmer and happier life. I have studied and utilized the method, especially during the course of this past summer, and can verify that this Trappist monk's technique is an easy way that any one can learn to help relieve and deal with the stress and anxiety of life, especially as we move into the 21st century. This is something ALL of us need in our day and age.

This is an excellent audio presentation by a very gifted Cistercian monk who is well versed in the Scriptures and the Christian contemplative traditions.

It has helped me discover the presence of God - hidden, waiting, healing - but above all else a relationship with divine uncreated love overflowing. Surely that is better than mere calm and a relaxed state of mind!!

An excellent and practical guide to the reasons for/results of contemplative prayer. A wonderful resource for anyone involved in any Christian healing prayer. Explains how our emotional "programs" are healed through contemplative prayer and what the symptoms of that healing are. There are three tapes in this set and the third tape is confusing and repeats almost verbatim sections from the first two tapes. Nonetheless, it is extraordinarily informative and helpful. Do yourself a favor and get this book.

Father Keating uses the simple technique of centering prayer to help us come to terms with events and situations in our lives. I believe that anyone who practices this technique will have a much calmer and happier life. I have studied and utilized the method, especially during the course of this past summer, and can verify that this Trappist monk's technique is an easy way that any one can learn to help relieve and deal with the stress and anxiety of life, especially as we move into the 21st century. This is something ALL of us need in our day and age.

I liked the discussion of contemplative prayer techniques. However, I could have gone without the child psychology lecture that takes up the first 2 out of 3 CD's.

I read the other reviews and knew that there was a lot of talk, but truly there was almost no guided meditation whatsoever. Maybe five minutes worth. The rest was talking about Contemplative Prayer and the benefits of it, but there was almost no actual meditative content. Very disappointing.

This is good especially for Catholic's who need to be able to justify meditation. I have been meditating for years. When I would talk about meditating, a couple of my Catholic friends would say oh, Contemplative Prayer. I heard about Fr. Thomas Keating and his knowledge of Contemplative Prayer so I purchased this. I listened and listened and listened. I found his information to be very accurate, and he spent a lot of time talking about very basic stuff.....almost like defining an argument in favor of why meditation is a viable why to communicate with God. By the time I got to the 3rd cd...it appeared to me to be a Catholic way of re-packaging "Meditating" {What the Church may have defined as New Age} and give it a Catholic blessing and call it "Contemplative Prayer"

Most of the time is spent on the foundation that it's ok to meditate, and very little information on how to meditate. I felt like his talk was good, but he took you up to the threshold of the door...but didn't take you through the door.