Practicing Between Traditions

Meetingbrook invites the contemplation, the conversation, and the correspondence that takes place between religious traditions and the personal expressions of the sacred in individual’s lives. It is an invitation to attend, trust & embody solitary or communal practice…

Everyday:	Silent Sitting - (Centering Prayer or Zazen),
	Liturgy of the Hours -  (Psalms, readings through the day),
	Conversation - (celebration of Word-with-others, or, Eucharist),
	Lectio Divina - (Repeated readings of scripture/sutras with silences)
	Walking Meditation - (Mindfulness activity),
	Engaged Service - (Intentional daily interaction);
Monthly:	Recollection day;
	Soul-Friend or spiritual direction meeting;
	Journal/Letter recounting an aspect of our prayer/practice;
Yearly:	Retreat in a monastic or retreat house setting for 3-7 days;
	Weekend solitary and silent retreat in nature wilderness setting.

Hermitage Invitation        

1)   We attend to the promise and practice of Contemplation, Conversation, Correspondence.  These three ways  -- of simplicity, integrity, faithful engagement -- invite us to dwell in wholeness and loving-kindness, an ordinary being-with-others, solitude, & seeing no-other.

2)   We trust God at center, Christing companionship, revealing guidance of Sacred Spirit. In this Sacred Presence, we participate in the ongoing creation of the Hermitage.

3)   We trust the compassionate, enlightening, and freeing presence of Christ, Buddha & all holy ones to invite, gather & guide all creation & sentient beings to live in peace, love, justice, spirit and truth.

4)   We trust the Buddhist Shunyata and Christian Kenosis experience of emptying, mirroring, transparency, unbounded openness. We trust the Jitai experience, the Itself, the returning to present actual reality. We pray and practice what silence invites: creating, wording, embodying.

5)   We attend, trust, and seek to embody the Bodhisattva & Saint way: to embody the dwelling place of the Alone, to remain present, to step aside & make room for others in that holy dwelling.

Quotes:

1. He emptied himself…(Philippians 2)

 2. In returning and rest you shall be saved; In quietness and in trust shall be your strength. (Is.30)

 3.  Life is what it is about;/ I want no truck with death.(In Keeping Quiet by Pablo Neruda)

 4.  Better to see the face than hear the name.  (Zen saying)