Author: The Julian Meetings

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A Modern Psalm

Pete unseth Creative Commons CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedication Wikimedia

Members of the Julian Meeting on the Isle of Man decided to follow the advice of Abbot Christopher Jamieson, in his book ‘Finding the Language of Grace’.  So they had a go at writing their own psalms, and one of these is reproduced below

My Lord, my saviour, Comforter and friend: you protect me under your wings like a mother hen, and yet give me the freedom to emerge from the feathery warmth in order to go forth to explore your wonderful creation.

When you lead me up high mountains you guide my footsteps: when you plunge me down deep, dark tunnels you walk beside me.

When I stray from your desired path you reprimand me gently, like a loving parent, until I return to the straight and narrow.

Sometimes you withdraw your presence from me and I cry out in desolation: but you only do this in order to strengthen my faith and trust in you.

You have given me the sense of sight in order to see colour, shape and perspective: but also the see the plight of war-torn countries and the expression on the faces of starving children.

You have given me the sense of hearing in order to delight in the sound of music and birdsong; but also to hear the sound of heavy traffic polluting the atmosphere.  You have also given me the ability to listen to silence.

You have given me the sense of smell in order to inhale the scent of incense spiraling upwards towards heaven, taking my prayers with it: but also to smell the stench of death and rot in the mountain of waste rubbish thrown away by a profligate and affluent society.

You have given me the sense of taste in order to enjoy the good fruits of your land: but also to notice the ‘green-eyed monster’ of envy, jealousy and hatred in the world, which leave a bitter taste in the mouth.

You have given me the sense of touch in order to feel the sun on my face and the wind in my hair: but also to BE touched by feelings of empathy and unity with all my fellow men and women, heedless of gender, colour or creed.

For all this I praise and magnify your Holy Name
Help me, in my small way, to care for your universal ‘Garden of Eden’: to work to prevent the damage of climate change and to comfort all those who suffer.

Glory be to the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.  As it was in the beginning, is now and ever shall be, world without end.  Amen.

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The Lost Key

Christ_Handing_the_Keys_to_St._Peter_by_Pietro_Perugino_crop.jpg

Christ Handing the Keys to St. Peter by Pietro Perugino Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

The Lost Key

Sufism, which is sometimes described as the mystical tradition in Islam, has a tradition of the ‘wise fool’.  Stories about Sufi teachers often tell a tale of the master acting in a foolish way in order to give a lesson about spirituality, and about the misunderstanding of those with less knowledge.  The fictional Mullah Nasruddin, who appears, among other texts, in South Asian children’s books, is such a teacher.  The tradition of the fool, the truth-teller, is also deep in western culture.  The following is a story told in many different forms in the Sufi tradition.

A Sufi master had lost the key to his house and was looking for it outside. He got down on his hands and knees in the field outside his house, searching for the key. Some of his disciples came along and asked what he was doing.

He said, “I have lost the key to my house.”

 “Can we help you find it?” they responded

“By all means”, he replied.

So they all got down on their hands and knees and started desperately searching, covering a wide area between them.

One of the disciples, after a fruitless search, said, “Master, do you know where you might have lost the key?”

“Yes,” he replied.  “I lost it in the house.”

Then why are we looking for it out here?”

“Isn’t it obvious? There is more light here.”

We have all lost the key to our house. We don’t live there anymore. We don’t experience the divine indwelling. We don’t live with the kind of intimacy with God that Adam and Eve reportedly enjoyed in the Garden of Eden and the Sufi master seems to have enjoyed before he lost his key.

The house in the story is the place where we should be living, close to God, aware of his love and care. Living elsewhere, in a world of confusion and distraction, is only forced on us because the key to our happiness has been lost.  It has not been lost outside of ourselves, but within.  Through the contemplative dimension of life, we need to look for it inside ourselves, where our true link with the divine is to be found.

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Life on a Spin a Reflection by Gary Bowness

Image Attribution Ian Tresman Wikimedia Creative Commons Licence 3.00

Image Attribution Ian Tresman Wikimedia Creative Commons Licence 3.00

Many years ago, at Blackpool Pleasure Beach, one ‘ride’ was strictly for the physically fit. It was a flat wooden disc about 20 feet in diameter and set at an angle of 45 degrees in the floor. When it began to rotate, the aim was to get to the pole at the centre.  As the disc rotated faster, anyone who failed to get to the pole got flung off. It is now banned as far too dangerous!

The principle of the ride was a basic law of physics: when any wheel rotates, the outer rim moves fastest of all. Half way to the centre and you are moving a lot more slowly. In theory, at the absolute centre, is a point which is totally still. So anyone who reached the centre pole could stand there quite safely.

This ride can remind us that in our own rapidly spinning world, God is the still centre. 

All around God is motion, sound, change, growth and decay – galaxies circling, seasons and years rotating, life developing and decaying. And at the still centre, where there is no variableness, is God, the same yesterday, today and forever.

One great characteristic of Jesus was His stillness. Busy, harassed, injured people found someone with neither clever chat nor idle gossip, neither vulgar boasting nor loud opinion. His life always seemed to rotate round a still central point, which gave Him balance and authority.

“Be still and know that I am God” wrote the Psalmist.

A Julian Meeting can be a time for us to try and do just that – to find the still centre of God in our own individual lives.

Of course, we’re all very much in the world, and its busyness. But it may do none of us any harm to be a little more silent than we often are: to be quick to listen and slow to speak. 

And the more silent spaces we give ourselves, the more we’ll give that still, small voice within each one of us the chance to be heard.
                                                                                                Gary Bowness

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This Quiet Space – a poem by Elizabeth Mills

This quiet space

enriches

a deeper touching

a place of calm

and quietude

a place of healing

and recovery

a place of love

and enabling

There are no words

yet a sense

of meaning

and purpose

Reconnecting with

what is

and what forever

will be

This day and every day

Amen

                                                                      Elizabeth Mills

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Christian contemplative prayer and meditation a Julian Meetings experience

The video offers an experience of a typical Julian Meeting. Use for your personal prayer or in a meeting. Julian Meetings are a network of Christian ecumenical contemplative prayer groups across the UK, open to people of all faiths and none. Find out more details about a group near you at http://www.thejulianmeetings.net The website also has guidance for those not quite sure how to use the half hour silence for contemplative prayer and meditation.

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Poem for Christmas by Ruth Mwenya

Does Christ drop into you,

like water?

Sink into the deepest places,

seep into the narrowest ways;

right down into your feet

to ground you?

As Love descends,

does She hollow out your soul?

Stretch it at the edges.

Expanding your capacity for herself;

opening up the space inside you?

In the stillness,

Can you reach down?

Can you feel the warmth

on the tips of your fingers

as you touch the mystery

within?

Is it too deep?

Out of reach,

Just beyond your grasp.

Don’t give in to fear, dear one.

Be still.

Wait: the Christ is born again.

Love is rising.

Ruth Mwenya

wordsandmusingsruthm.blogspot.com

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JM in South Africa, Canon John Rowlands

In the 1980’s and into the 2000’s JM were very active in South Africa. There were several meetings. Canon John Rowlands was a key figure in promoting JM in South Africa. He gave a series of talks on Christian Meditation and Contemplative Prayer for the JM groups and these were recorded on tape. In 2022 we were approached by John Goodall who had acquired the tapes and a transcript of the talks. He wanted to make them more widely available. He gave us permission to format them in a modern and accessible manner. The content is still relevant today, although the language, style and delivery is of its time. We have improved the quality of the recordings but do not expect modern standards. Each talk is split into two or three sections. This was done to make it easier for the JM groups to use in meetings. A text transcript is still in preparation and will be added as available.

John Goodall writes: “Regarding Canon John Rowlands, he has indeed died. This was some years ago. He exercised remarkable pastoral care in his life. I understand that he worked in Cape Town’s District Six during the torrid Apartheid days, and I notice he received something of an honourable mention in Richard Reeves’s classic South African work, Buckingham Palace, District Six. He spent years promoting Julian Meetings from the early 1980s in South Africa. Also he was very kind, together with his sister, to my mother, a penurious missionary widow who lived in Cape Town. (As too was Bishop Tutu, who always supported clergy widows.)”

All the entries in bold blue are links to parts of each talk. Eg – Talk 1 is the introductory talk. Prepare for silence and Lead Into Silence are extracts. It is all as given to us. We have not done any editing apart from improving the sound quality. So just go with the flow.

First TalkPrepare for Silence First TalkLead In Silence First Talk
Second TalkWord or Phrase Silence Second Talk
Third TalkRelax Third TalkLead In Silence Third Talk
Fourth TalkSilence Fourth Talk
Fifth TalkMental Picture Fifth Talk
Sixth TalkRelax Sixth TalkWord Picture Sixth Talk