Off-Centering Prayer - part 1

Ordinary Prayer comprises of four degrees:
1. vocal prayer;
2. meditation, also called methodical prayer, or prayer of reflection, in which may be included meditative reading;
3. affective prayer;
4. prayer of simplicity, or of simple gaze.
The last two degrees (also called prayers of the heart) border on the mystical states.

Contemplative prayer, which is above and beyond ordinary prayer and intimately connected with that of mystical theology, has a long tradition in the Catholic Church. The entryway to contemplation, called aquired, active, or ordinary contemplation is prayers of the heart, which are the higher degrees of ordinary prayer. Beyond aquired or ordinary contemplation is Higher contemplation, then Mystical union with its 12 characters which pass through the lower degrees of spiritual quiet to hopefully grow and become successively full union and ecstasy, ultimately leading to Transforming union or Spiritual marriage.

While meditation is work we can do in our prayer life, contemplation cannot be achived by any labor on our part, it is a gift totally gratuitous. We can only approach the doorway of contemplation as it were, through prayers of the heart and ordinary contemplation.

Some Catholics practicing acquired contemplation call what they are doing Centering Prayer, but Centering Prayer is not true acquired contemplation. Centering Prayer as taught by three Trappist monks of St. Joseph's Abbey in Spencer, Massachusetts since the 1970s: Fr. William Meninger, Fr. M. Basil Pennington and Abbot Thomas Keating, is problematic at best, deceptive and corrupting at worst. Centering prayer eschews mortification while all the saints and doctors of the Church encourage penetential exercises or mortification. It is a method that seeks a short-cut to Higher Contemplation. Centering prayer is a kind of self-hypnosis that convices one they have the consolation of peace. Even its name shouts 'me'! Centering prayer is ultimately self-centered.


Reference Is Centering Prayer Catholic? 2nd Ed. by Connie Rossini

Reference Is Centering Prayer Catholic? 2nd Ed. by Connie Rossini