DESERT CHURCHES

These were the thoughts that emerged yesterday when I was thinking about the place of prayer/contemplation/meditation in the midst of what I see as an urban desert.  A place that is becoming so devoid of God, peace, love, hope, that there needs to be something that quietly percolates in the midst of it to release those things again.

It seems to me that in the area of silent contemplative prayer we move away from the noise, distractions, and props of the world we live in.
We walk alone into the desert, as Jesus and many others have done before us, and take time alone to find and re-engage our Creator.
We are made in His image and the more of Him we discover and learn, the more whole we become.
The more functional we become.
We have a hope of finding our true self in His reflection, rather than a ‘self’ that revolves around our needs, thoughts and desires.
We come to the place of BEING, PEACE and REST, removed from the ceaseless, restless search that much of humanity are consumed with.

The ‘Desert Church’ is linked by contemplative prayers over the whole earth, always awake and alive at any given moment.  Always bringing a spring of hope into the arid places.

Is it possible that as we enter a place of contemplation, we become the stones He is using to build His Church?  Possibly His Church will never actually be seen in this realm but fills an entirely spiritual and heavenly place and is constantly becoming more and more established?  Crazy thought, but it lines up with Isaiah 56:7 These I will bring to my holy mountain and give them joy in my house of prayer.  Their burnt offerings and sacrifices will be accepted on my altar; for MY HOUSE will be called a house of prayer for all nations.
I find that quite a comforting thought.

All this began as I read Thomas Merton's “Contemplative Prayer” – he is speaking to the monastic orders because he wants to see reform, but says the layman who prays can apply it to himself.

“The option of absolute despair is turned into perfect hope by the pure and humble application of monastic prayer.
The monk faces the worst, and discovers in it the hope of the best.
From the darkness comes light.
From death, life.
From the abyss there comes unaccountably, the mysterious gift of the Spirit sent by God to make all things new, to transform the created and redeemed world, and to re-establish all things in Christ.
This is the creative and healing work of the monk, accomplished in silence, in nakedness of spirit, in emptiness, in humility.
It is a participation in the saving death and resurrection of Christ.
Therefore, every Christian may, if he so desires, enter into communion with this silence of the praying and meditating church, which is the Church of the Desert."