[D]rinking the Kool-Aid usually refers to people who blindly accept the "truths" of charismatic charlatans that have alternate agendas, which can lead their followers to physical, emotional, or financial harm and even death. . . . Drinking the Kool-Aid usually refers to well-known religious leaders like Jim Jones and David Koresh, but should also include lesser-known religious leaders, who can be more subversively destructive to relationships and general well-being.One thing that strikes me about "centering prayer" advocates is how they seem to limit their apologias to a very small number of highly circumscribed examples, which they repeat as a formula, like "St Theresa of Avila, St John of the Cross, and the desert fathers". But the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith has addressed these issues, partly in the Letter to the Bishops of the Catholic Church on Some Aspects of Christian Meditation, October 15, 1989:
Pope John Paul II has pointed out to the whole Church the example and the doctrine of St. Teresa of Avila who in her life had to reject the temptation of certain methods which proposed a leaving aside of the humanity of Christ in favor of a vague self-immersion in the abyss of the divinity. In a homily given on November 1st, 1982, he said that the call of Teresa of Jesus advocating a prayer completely centered on Christ "is valid, even in our day, against some methods of prayer which are not inspired by the Gospel and which in practice tend to set Christ aside in preference for a mental void which makes no sense in Christianity.The responses to people who express reservations like this concerning "centering prayer" are also set-pieces.. When I raised my question, which struck me as sound, that the Catechism says that prayer requires deliberate effort, Passionist Dcn Manuel Valencia oddly reverted to repeating the term Imago Dei, which I'm discovering is "centering prayer" jargon that has a specific and non-Catholic meaning within the movement. This site, for instance, says that "Imago Dei" is parallel with "Buddha-nature", and that "Christ within you" is parallel with "Realizing your Buddha-nature".
The "centering prayer" movement doesn't have a catechism of its own -- in all honesty, it should, because it seems deliberately to say things that sound Catholic, but that it's using in a non-Catholic context.. So there's no way anyone can conclusively say it's selling Buddhist ideas dressed up in pseudo-Catholic clericals, but I'm increasingly convinced this is what it's doing. But the real Catechism in paragraphs 355-361 takes a very different view of the Imago Dei:
355 "God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him, male and female he created them." Man occupies a unique place in creation: (I) he is "in the image of God"; (II) in his own nature he unites the spiritual and material worlds[.]The series of explanations in the Catechism contrasts very clearly with the muddled idea of "realizing your Buddha-nature", which doesn't appear anywhere in the CCC. And Dcn Valencia's retreat into jargon is in clear contrast to an ordinary Catholic apologist's willingness to pursue questions transparently with appeals to reason. But Dcn Valencia went farther: in exasperation, he said, "These techniques are thousands of years old! The Buddhists use them!" Just after he blurted this out, he seems to have caught himself; I raised my hand, and if he'd recognized me, I'd simply have asked if he's teaching Buddhism. He ignored me, of course.
According to Catholic Culture,
Centering prayer originated in St. Joseph's Abbey, a Trappist monastery in Spencer, Massachusetts. During the twenty years (1961-1981) when [Thomas] Keating was abbot, St. Joseph's held dialogues with Buddhist and Hindu representatives, and a Zen master gave a week-long retreat to the monks. A former Trappist monk who had become a Transcendental Meditation teacher also gave a session to the monks.My regular correspondent noted that, if Dcn Valencia became so clearly exercised at my question, in which I basically challenged him to explain how "centering prayer" is not in conflict with the CCC's clear statements that prayer is deliberate, requires effort, and is a dialogue in a dualistic universe, then something else must be going on. In the end, this isn't about "centering prayer", it's about something else.
Good point. Well, of course, Pope Francis's non-response to Abp Viganò isn't just about gay cardinals, either. Something else is going on. If I could e-mail my questions to St Alphonsus, I'd have a much easier time. I'll try at least to nibble at the edges of this tomorrow.
