Centering Prayer Workshop March 21 in St. Charles
Healing Gardens, a two-acre expanse of woodland and perennial gardens at Stone Hill Farm off Dean Street in St. Charles, will host a workshop on Saturday, March 21, teaching a prayer method called "Centering Prayer."
The workshop is scheduled for 9 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. The cost is $65, which includes six follow-up sessions that will assist in strengthening the Centering Prayer practice. Scholarships are available. Register by calling (630) 377-1846 or register online at www.healinggardensatstonehillfarm.com.
Deborah Marqui, a licensed clinical social worker who will team-teach the workshop along with Alan Krema, said, "Many are finding that Centering Prayer helps them move toward a closer and more meaningful relationship with God. Centering Prayer is a well-grounded method of silent prayer and Christian meditation that prepares us to experience God's presence within us, closer than breathing, closer than thinking, closer than consciousness itself."
Based on the teachings of the early Christian Desert Fathers and Mothers in an updated form, Centering Prayer is not meant to replace other kinds of prayer. Rather, the method facilitates the opening of mind and heart - one's whole being - to God.
About the Workshop Teachers:
Deborah Marqui is a licensed clinical social worker with a private practice in St. Charles. She owns and operates, along with her husband, Buzz, Healing Gardens at Stone Hill Farm, a two-acre expanse of woodland and perennial gardens that are open to the public on set dates to help others connect with the restorative power of nature. She leads retreats and is a commissioned presenter of Introduction to Centering Prayer
Alan Krema has been a member of Contemplative Outreach and Pathways at St. Michael's Parish in Old Town Chicago for the last 15 years. He is currently enrolled in the Living School founded by Father Richard Rohr at the Center for Action and Contemplation in Albuquerque, N.M. He is also a student in the Wisdom School tradition of Rev. Cynthia Borgeault and is in the process of becoming a Wisdom School facilitator.
About Healing Gardens:
Healing Gardens at Stone Hill Farm is two acres of perennial gardens in a beautiful wooded setting in St. Charles. The gardens are open to the public on the second Sunday of each month from April through October. The admission fee is $5 per person and $10 per family. Cancer survivors are free. Call for discounted group rates. Donations of time or money for upkeep are appreciated.
Healing Gardens is located at 37W249 Dean St., St. Charles. For information, call (630) 377-1846 or visit www.healinggardensatstonehillfarm.com.
Background on Centering Prayer:
In the early 1970s, Trappist monk and priest Thomas Keating and two other Trappists, Fr. William Meninger and the late Fr. Basil Pennington, worked to bring people living outside monasteries a form of silent prayer now known as Centering Prayer. With roots in the 14th-century book, "The Cloud of Unknowing," this kind of prayer allows people to sit silently and become receptive to God's gift of contemplation.
Of course, contemplation has been an important part of Christianity from the beginning. Centering Prayer presents the teachings of earlier times in an updated form. This method of prayer is both a relationship with God and a discipline to foster that relationship.
Centering Prayer is not meant to replace other kinds of prayer. Rather, it adds depth of meaning to all prayer and facilitates the movement from more active modes of prayer - verbal, mental or affective prayer - into a receptive prayer of resting in God. Centering Prayer emphasizes prayer as a personal relationship with God and as a movement beyond conversation with Christ to communion with Him.
Background on Contemplative Outreach, Chicago:
Contemplative Outreach of Chicago has been serving the contemplative community in northeastern Illinois and northwestern Indiana since 1989. It is a chapter of Contemplative Outreach, Ltd., an international spiritual network with offices in Butler, N.J. Its mission is to teach the method of Centering Prayer and to support those whose spiritual journey includes a practice of this prayer. The volunteers in the chapter are grounded in contemplative service - "God in us serving God in others."