During the seminar, Bishop Kallistos speaks on the practice in the Eastern Church of the Jesus Prayer, a tradition that can be traced back to the Fathers and Mothers of the Egyptian Desert of the 4th century.
“In Prayer,” says Theophane the Recluse (1815-94) “the principal thing is to stand before God with the mind in the heart, and to go on standing before Him unceasingly day and night, until the end of your life. “Praying, defined thus, is no longer merely to ask for things, and can indeed exist without the need for words. It is not so much a momentary activity as a continuous state. To pray is to be in an immediate and personal relationship with God. It is to know at every level of our being that we are enfolded by the Divine.”
Bishop Kallistos illustrates the common roots of the Jesus Prayer tradition of the Eastern Church and the way of the mantra, as taught by John Main, in the Western Tradition.
These recordings will be available shortly.
