Reflections

Charlotte Futcher participated in Holy Wisdom, the Mother of God with Matthew Wright in September, 2019 at the Cowichan Lake Research Station on Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada. She generously shared her experience. During that crisp and sunny week spent at the Lake Cowichan Forest Research Station, with the lake lapping and greens transforming to reds all around us, I went through a reintroduction to and transformation in the relationships with both myself and the Divine Feminine....

In April 2019 I attended a unique “retreat”, known as a Wisdom School (WS). This five-day event led by The Rev. Cynthia Bourgeault, PhD and sponsored by The Contemplative Society ( contemplative.org ) was held at the Lake Cowichan Education Centre and filled to capacity. Although it rained for four of the five days and I was sleeping in a tent, the WS was filled with a light and joy, carried in many radiant hearts. In her teaching Cynthia clarified and expanded on eight points she had drafted...

I have been a seeker/yearner since I was a teenager looking for a spiritual path that really spoke to me. I was raised Roman Catholic and left the church when I was 17. And although I tried a few times to renew my faith and understanding of Catholicism, for most of my adult life, I have called myself a recovering Catholic. I became very involved with Buddhism for many years and found a lot of it very helpful but it was missing something important—mysticism. In the last 3 years, I came to find...

Please Note: This article has been condensed from 8 original parts, published on the Contemplative Society's blog between March 4th 2019 and July 2nd 2019. Skip to the section you are looking for: Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7 Part 8 Part 1 This 8-part blog offers excerpts from my book, The Monk’s Cell: Ritual and Knowledge in American Contemplative Christianity (Oxford University Press, 2018). Photo Courtesy of The Society of Saint John the Evangelist To begin, let me...

Our Kamloops contemplative group has evolved through several incarnations over the years. Initially we were simply four people in our local parish who were getting together weekly to share our stories and to “pray”. That was some twenty-five years ago. Four years into our existence I found myself at a week-long workshop-retreat on Centering Prayer given by Cynthia Bourgeault and was profoundly affected by both the practice and the teachings upon which it was built. After what was, for me,...