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Centering Prayer is a silent prayer practice that can move you toward a profound relationship with the Spirit of God within.

Centering prayer is echoed in the wisdom sayings of Jesus and can be traced to the contemplative prayer practice of the ancient Desert Fathers and, more specifically, to mystic authors of the late Middle Ages and early Renaissance. In our era the Trappist monk Thomas Merton helped open the door that would lead the founders of centering prayer to rediscover this practice. These founders are Abbot Thomas Keating and Fathers William Meninger and Basil Pennington. From its modern beginnings the rebirth of this practice has been marked by a profound ecumenical openness. In the Episcopal Church the Reverend Cynthia Bourgeault has worked closely with Keating and others in spreading the word about centering prayer.

A small centering prayer group has met in Wheeling for over six years, originally convened by Sister Mary Lou Lisowski in her home. The group meets weekly and begins with general conversation and fellowship followed by our attending to an audio tape or DVD that concerns some aspect of Christi an meditation. This usually lasts approximately 20-30 minutes followed by 20 minutes of centering. We gather on Tuesdays at 4:30 and finish no later than 6 p.m.

With Sister Mary Lou’s illness and departure, the group has been meeting for several months here at St. Matt hew’s in Tatum Lounge. We are now drawing to the close of a long series of tapes begun earlier and will be starting a new tape which features Abbot Keating outlining the basics of centering prayer. The group would first of all like to thank Father Seitz welcoming us to meet here. As we begin this new tape, we would also like to invite any parishioners who feel they might have an interest to join us on Tuesday, March 15th at 4:30 p.m. in Tatum Lounge.

-- Peter Freeman and Marc Harshman
In the morning, while it was still very dark, Jesus got up and went to a deserted place and prayed there. Mark 1:35