Meditatio Audio

Australian National Retreat July 2012 led by Laurence Freeman OSB. Six talks from the retreat held in Melbourne and attended by 200 Australian meditators

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A spirituality that does not occupy 24 hours of the day is not a full spirituality. Laurence Freeman shows in these talks how the Christian tradition teaches us to live mindfully in the present moment - practicing the presence of God in all we do and say. In the present moment, he says, we recover that sense of the sacred which every society and individual needs in order to live healthily. With characteristic humor and fresh insights into scripture and tradition, these talks offer a new sense of what it means to live today and everyday in the mind of Christ.

Note:  Purchasing this product will allow you to download the MP3 of the tracks. No physical CD will be shipped!

Fr. Laurence challenges us with this powerful insight: For the first time in human history, humans are now in control of the environment. But we are not handling this very responsibly. An environmental crisis has been generated by economic activity driven by competition and short-term gains. But if we made the crisis, then we can change it. To do this, we ourselves must be prepared to change radically. This, Fr Laurence says, is what meditation does. As the mantra sinks deeper into the heart, it opens within us the spirit of wisdom and compassion, the spirit of Christ who came to love the world and to heal it.

Meditation puts the ego back in its proper place, develops self-control and opens us to a new perception of universality: that we are one and interdependent, that our actions are mutually beneficial or mutually harmful. Meditation creates community on a planetary scale.

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A profound understanding of losing and finding that points us to the gospel way of seeing things. Losing and finding are not irreconcilable opposites, Fr Laurence says, they form the rhythm of life. If we can accept this rhythm of losing and finding and stand within it, we will come to the stillness that will allow us to see the divine nature, to see God: "Be still and know that I am God". God is love. In love we give and in the giving we find ourself in the other. This is voluntary renunciation, the call of all spiritual teaching. Jesus' life, Fr Laurence explains, this the full human expression of this call. We must lose in order to find. To find we must seek. The mantra, he says, opens the way to this ultimate growth, the poverty of spirit that is the refrain of all Jesus' teaching.

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Fr Laurence explains the human hunger for wholeness as something even deeper and broader than our personal healing. Relating it to the Genesis story, he says we have a collective sense of losing a primal wholeness and innocence as we awake to the sense of individual identity. With this comes a sense of shame and guilt, and a search for restoration. These talks show how meditation is a spiritual path that helps us achieve this re-integration. In the simple 'saying of the word', we evolve beyond the ego with its complexity and possessiveness to the universality of the spirit where everything is inter-related, whole, and where all is one.

Note:  Purchasing this product will allow you to download the MP3 of the tracks. No physical CD will be shipped!