Contemplative prayer is a conversation in which God’s word has the initiative and we, for the moment, can be nothing more than listeners.
Hans Urs von Balthasar
The contemplative has to be clay in the hand of the potter, a clay which is molded through prayer itself, content not to know in advance where it is going, only sensing it, as the process is actually taking place, from the disposition of the potter’s shaping hands, confident that it is a good and loving work taking place.
Hans Urs von Balthasar
Great simplicity of heart sustains contemplative prayer.
Brother Roger
In the silence of contemplation we begin to observe the process whereby we actively choose and create what we pay attention to. That is why the first twenty minutes are usually so tedious. For the first twenty minutes only the primary agenda shows itself.
Richard Rohr
We don’t know just how ephemeral our thoughts and feelings are until we take the time to sit and observe. That’s the early stages of contemplation; where you begin to notice how this feeling grabs you, how that identity grabs you, how that hurt grabs you, and even so, you want to identify with it because in some way it gives you some ground to stand on.
Richard Rohr
Pure contemplation lies in receiving.
St. John of the Cross
Contemplative prayer deepens in us the knowledge that we are already free, that we have already found a place to dwell, that we already belong to God, even though everything and everyone around us keeps suggesting the opposite.
Thomas Keating
Contemplative prayer is a process of interior transformation, a conversation initiated by God and leading, if we consent, to divine union. One’s way of seeing reality changes in this process. A restructuring of consciousness takes place which empowers one to perceive, relate and respond with increasing sensitivity to the divine presence in, through, and beyond everything that exists.
Thomas Keating
Contemplative prayer is the world in which God can do anything. To move into that realm is the greatest adventure.
Thomas Keating
Contemplative prayer is not so much the absence of thoughts as detachment from them. It is the opening of mind and heart, body and emotions ‘our whole being’ to God.
Thomas Keating
Receiving is one of the most difficult kinds of activity there is. To receive God is the chief work in contemplative prayer.
Thomas Keating
Contemplative prayer is not on the level of thinking. It is consenting with your will to God’s Presence in pure faith.
Thomas Keating
The principal discipline of contemplative prayer is letting go.
Thomas Keating