Center for Action and Contemplation – Father
Richard Rohr’s Daily Meditation – Wednesday, 8 January 2014 “The Contemplative
Alternative”
Richard Rohr's Daily Meditation
Yes, And
“The Contemplative Alternative”
Wednesday, January 8, 2014
We need to rediscover the Sic et Non approach
in our politics and in our churches. Otherwise, I do not know what we are
offering the world except violence, because angry conversation creates angry minds
and angry hearts and eventually angry behavior. It seems to me that we have the
possibility from our own Tradition of raising up the capacity for humane,
dialogical, Sic et Non conversations—where I do not need to prove that you are
wrong. I do not need to pretend that I am totally right. I can keep my mind and
my heart open. It really seems to me that could change the Church and change
the world. [1]
What we are enjoying now is a renaissance of
the contemplative mind, the one truly unique alternative mind and heart that
religion has to offer the world. Without this new mind, most doctrines,
moralities, dogmas, and church structures will almost certainly be
misunderstood, misused, and mishandled. Small people make everything small.
Dualistic people use knowledge, even religious
knowledge, for the purposes of ego enhancement, shaming, and the control of
others and themselves. Non-dual people use knowledge for the transformation of
persons and structures, but most especially to change themselves and to see
reality with a new eye and heart. They hold and “suffer” the conflicts of life
instead of passing them on or projecting them elsewhere. Such a holding tank
that agrees to hold the whole, eliminating nothing, is what I mean by living in
the naked now and being present to the moment outside the mind. [2]
[1] Adapted from Sic et Non; Yes, And webcast
recording (MP3 download)
[2] Adapted from The Naked Now:
Learning to See as the Mystics See, pp. 114-115
Gateway to Silence:
Yes . . . and . . .
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1705 Five Points Road SW
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PO Box 12464
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