Online Contemplative Chapel Gatherings On Brief Break

Expecting to resume in February of 2025

If you are new to Contemplative Chapel gatherings via Zoom, we welcome your participation, once we resume. Here is a description of our practice:

All are welcome. Once you’ve registered for the Zoom link (see below), you will receive the link, along with a weekly invitation reminder. The weekly Zoom reminder allows you to cancel your registration at any time.

If you are interested in learning about contemplative practice and meditation, or if you are a seasoned practitioner who would like to join us for quiet reflection and the practice of silence, please join us. No experience is necessary. Each Wednesday session is from 5:00 pm - 6:00 pm Eastern. Click here to register for the Zoom link. (For returning participants, this is the same link we’ve always used.)

A good place to begin: Contemplative Outreach publishes two pamphlets that I recommend highly - one on the ancient practice of Lectio Divina and the other on Centering Prayer. If you would like to join our virtual gatherings, please read these two pamphlets carefully. Although I will review the basics when we gather, these pamphlets will prepare you nicely. Even if you are experienced in these ways of contemplative prayer, these little pamphlets can be read regularly to remind us of a counter-cultural way of being present. The world is reminding us every day about the importance of planning, being organized, and orchestrating our lives. Lectio Divina and Centering Prayer depend on an entirely different posture: a posture of openness, receptivity, trust, surrender, letting go, and listening, so that Another may speak and welcome you home again. These pamphlets can help with that.

Note that we all arrive with our microphones muted, and they will remain so until the very end of our time together, when some briefly unmute to say goodnight or express good wishes for the group. It’s good, if possible, to arrive a few minutes early and simply settle in.

Our virtual gatherings continue to be important to many. Just knowing that this community of support, goodwill, and warm welcome exists is a great encouragement.

Caring for one’s own soul is not a selfish practice; rather, it’s inherently selfless. Reverent care for one’s soul inevitably awakens greater depths of compassion and care for others. Many of you have clearly experienced this deeper awakening and soulful softening, and your spiritual companionship on the journey is a gift to us all.