Thomas Keating Professionals Fr. Thomas Keating is a spiritual guide and one of the founders of Contemplative Outreach, LTD. It is also an international network that is committed to improving the contemplative facet of the gospel in people’s lives.
He is also considered as one of the greatest foremost teachers of a Contemplative Prayer within the Christian tradition. He is an author and an instructor who remains as a prominent influence within the movement of Christian Centering Prayer.
Know More About Centering Prayer
Centering prayer is a technique of silent prayer. This is essential for individuals to be prepared to receive the reward of a meditative prayer. Through this prayer, individuals can feel the presence of the Lord inside them. This is an approach of prayer that serves as a relationship with God as well as a discipline in order to foster such relationship.
It is also important to note that Centering Prayer isn’t meant to replace those others types of ways of prayer. Rather, it is meant to add a deeper meaning to all the different kinds of prayers. This will also facilitate the movement from a more active mode of prayer into receptive prayers. This type of prayer also emphasizes prayer as something that is personal or creating a personal relationship with God. The primary function of this type of prayer is to have a deeper relationships with the Lord and Christ.
Its effects are ecclesial because prayer is intended to build a community of faith, chastity, and will link together the entire group members in a shared feeling of love and relationship. Thomas Keating also defines centering method as a highly simple way in which a person open his/herself to God and approves to His presence within him/her.
Too often, people’s prayer emphasizes on telling Him the things they want to obtain and they mostly forget to open their hearts and listen to Him. Centering prayer is a type of prayer that is spoken in calmness and quietness. Through this, you can listen to the answers provided by God to your prayer. God has different ways of answering to your prayers. It sometimes depends on your condition, or how willing you are to listen or receive the answer.
Thomas Keating stresses that the main root of prayer in within an internal quietness. You may think that prayer only comprises of feelings and the things in your mind uttered through words, but its real meaning lies inside your mind and what you’re thinking about. link
Born on March 7, 1923, Fr. Thomas Keating is a priest and a Trappist monk, who is recognized as one of the inventors of the Centering Prayer. A priest and a Trappist monk with birth date March 7, 1923, Fr. Thomas Keating has been identified as one of the designers of the Centering Prayer. Centering Prayer is a modern contemplative prayer, which came out in year 1975 from St. Joseph’s Abbey, in Spencer, Massachusetts. The priest was born in New York City and studied at Fordham University, Deerfield Academy and Yale University. It was December 1943 when he graduated. Aside from being a founder of the Centering Prayer Movement, Thomas Keating is also the founder of Contemplative Outreach.
Thomas Keating is recognized as one of the biggest contributors to spirituality development. He is a spiritual guide and the founding member of the Contemplative Outreach Ltd. Fr. Keating is serving in the Board of Trustees of the organization. This is ever since it all started. Presently, he has been serving as the respected Chairman of the Board. Fr. Keating is serving as one of the teachers and principal architects in Christian’s Contemplative Prayer Movement. This, in many ways, attests his true commitment in helping individuals their spirituality development. This enables the Contemplative Outreach from being a sign of the priest’s longtime longing to assist in the upturn of the contemplative dimension of Christians.
Apart from becoming a globally renowned theologian, Fr. Keating has been recognized for his writing talent as well He travelled different places worldwide so as to address the Christianity’s contemplative practices and spiritual journey’s psychology to the communities and laypeople. This has actually been the subject used in his DVD series and Spiritual Journey video. Ever since the Vatican II reforms, the priest became a primary supporter of the interreligious dialogue on which he also served as a key participant.
Fr. Thomas Keating has helped in the foundation of the Snowmass Interreligious Conference that had its very first meeting within the 1983’s fall season and continuously meeting every spring. Apart from these significant roles, Fr. Keating has also been the previous president of the Monastic Interreligious Dialogue and the Temple of Understanding. This becomes truly exceptional how this simple man managed to affect the whole world of Christians with his straightforward spiritual words.
There are several proofs that can show the true dedication of Fr. Keating to enlivening the contemplative practices on Christianity. The most compelling proof includes his choice of being on a public, busy living instead of a monastic, quiet one. For this, he should serve as a good example and model to the whole world. The whole life of Fr. Thomas Keating is spent within the service of disseminating the gifts given to him by God with others.