Visit this online resource to support priests seeking a contemplative dimension to their ministry!:
http://christianmeditationforpriests.blogspot.com/
Meditation is for the joy and hope of the world, as John Main OSB himself said: "It is a way of growth because what we are growing into is life itself." In his book The Heart of Creation he says: "In the same way that there is only one essential prayer, the prayer of Christ Himself, so there is only one Christian worship, the communion we have through Christ in the Trinitarian love. Each member of the Trinity wholly at the service of the other." (See Silence and Stillness in Every Season for August 18th.)
Meditation is therefore concerned on the one hand with communion:
That they may all be one...
“God, Who has fatherly concern for everyone, has willed that all men should constitute one family and treat one another in a spirit of brotherhood. For having been created in the image of God, Who
"from one man has created the whole human race and made them live all over the face of the earth" (Acts 17:26), all men are called to one and the same goal, namely God Himself.
For this reason, love for God and neighbor is the first and greatest commandment. Sacred Scripture, however, teaches us that the love of God cannot be separated from love of neighbor: "If there is any other commandment, it is summed up in this saying: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself... Love therefore is the fulfillment of the Law" (Rom. 13:9-10; cf. 1 John 4:20). To men growing daily more dependent on one another, and to a world becoming more unified every day, this truth proves to be of paramount importance.
Indeed, the Lord Jesus, when He prayed to the Father, "that all may be one... as we are one" (John 17:21-22) opened up vistas closed to human reason, for He implied a certain likeness between the union of the divine Persons, and the unity of God's sons in truth and charity. This likeness reveals that man, who is the only creature on earth which God willed for itself, cannot fully find himself except through a sincere gift of himself (Luke 17:33).” (Gaudium et Spes 24)
On the other hand Meditation is concermed with Mission:
That the world may believe...
"... the life of the Church communion will become a sign for all the world and a compelling force that will lead persons to faith in Christ: '...so that the world may believe that you have sent me.' (John 17:21) In such a way communion leads to mission, and mission itself to communion." (Christifideles Laici 31)
"Thus, communion is itself mission, indeed communion begets communion and is essentially a missionary communion." (Consecrated Life in the Third Millennium - Starting afresh from Christ 33)
- Pope John Paul II in his address to the Bishops of the U.S.A. in 1987:
“It is of great importance to the Church that in the full power of the Church's communion we continue to proclaim together Jesus Christ and his Gospel. In this way we ourselves live fully, as successors of the apostles, the mystery of ecclesial communion. At the same time through our ministry we enable the faithful to enter ever more deeply into the Church's life of communion with the Most Holy Trinity.”
- Pope Benedict's visit to the U.K. 2010, in his address to Youth:
“Deep within your heart, he is calling you to spend time with him in prayer. But this kind of prayer, real prayer, requires discipline; it requires making time for moments of silence every day. Often it means waiting for the Lord to speak. Even amid the ‘busyness’ and the stress of our daily lives, we need to make space for silence, because it is in silence that we find God, and in silence that we discover our true self. And in discovering our true self, we discover the particular vocation which God has given us for the building up of his Church and the redemption of our world.”
“God, Who has fatherly concern for everyone, has willed that all men should constitute one family and treat one another in a spirit of brotherhood. For having been created in the image of God, Who"from one man has created the whole human race and made them live all over the face of the earth" (Acts 17:26), all men are called to one and the same goal, namely God Himself.