'Meditation' dawned on my childhood consciousness as something from the Orient. The Beatles going to India in February 1968 to take part in a transcendental meditation training course at the ashram of Maharishi Mahesh Yogi was a big media story at the time (I was ten). Something weird and probably to do with drugs and long hair and psychedelia. (It occurs to me now that I assumed at the time that the word 'transcendental' came from the word 'trance', which I was told happens to you when you take drugs.) Meditation, then, had no part of the Catholic religion into which I was growing up.
And then, in the early 1970s at our Polish parish in West London, there appeared a priest, Ksiądz Andrzej, who opened our minds to the Eastern spiritual traditions during his Lenten lectures to our youth group. There were rumours that he had dabbled with LSD; however to me, he was the most convincing priest I had ever listened to while growing up. During his lectures (rekolekcje młodzieżowe) in 1972 or '73, he explained how meditation worked. "Imagine yourself lying on your back on a sandy beach, facing the the hot sun that's warming your body. Your eyes are closed, but the sun is there. Now imagine that the warmth is the Love of God..." Excellent. Mind opened. No other Catholic priest that I listened to over the decades has had the same profound effect on the development of my spiritual thought.
The meditative approach to religion, while not at all common in the Catholic church as encountered in Poland, has developed in Western monotheistic traditions too. The Eastern concept of the Mantra is closely related to the practice of contemplative repetitive praying or chanting - be it repeating the Jesus Prayer ("Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner") as practised in Orthodox Christianity, or making one's way through the Four Mysteries of the Rosary - a more complex set of prayers - which is the nearest that mainstream Catholicism gets to meditation.
The practice of contemplative or meditative repetitive chanting is well known in Buddhism and Hinduism. The chief difference is the place of the self. Western religions see meditation as the self uniting with God, while remaining a distinct entity. This ties in with the notion of personal redemption for a life well led. To quote the Beach Boys, Hang on to your Ego. Eastern religions, however, see the aim of meditation as becoming absorbed into God, shedding the ego, and thus reaching a higher state of mind. Breathing practices and postures are more important than in Western religion.
[How the practice of meditation arose across the different religions of the world over time is interesting; the caravanserais of the Silk Road, where Byzantine, Muslim and Buddhist merchants would trade goods and ideas, would have been interesting places to hang out in in pre-Renaissance times!]
I have only in recent years become more interested in meditation as a way of reaching a higher state of enlightenment. It is not easy! To switch the mind off, running all the time, concerned about Things That Need Doing, is incredibly difficult (I say this after half an hour in the sauna, during which time I couldn't switch my train of thoughts onto a quiet siding. Always something keeps intruding.)
My best daily meditation is in the mornings, when taking my blood pressure readings. With the cuff on, I think about the St Mary's churchyard, Perivale, the south side, sloping down to the river, at night. Above the dewy grass covering a simple grave hovers a luminous greenish-blue orb, radiating peacefulness and calm. I fix my mind on that, and breathing. The image just came to me unbidden one morning - and has stayed for a couple of years. And it works; my blood pressure remains optimal (average 104/78 over three readings this morning). But meditation should be for the good of the soul rather than for the body!
More study on the subject of meditation is required within this Lent's blog post series. Meditation and prayer - differences in purpose and practice - coming soon.
From Wikipedia: "Swami Ramdas is said to have attained Nirvana through constant repetition of Om Sri Ram Jai Ram Jai Jai Ram". This mantra is sung continuously from morning to night in the ashram he established, and is chanted throughout the Stooges song We Will Fall (1969).
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Refutation II
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Young Betjeman by Bevis Hillier
This time four years ago:
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This time nine years ago:
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This time 12 years ago:
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