I came across this on one of the forums, which says comes from a article by David Cloud, but am having a hard time digging it up as it seems to have other articles included. Well here is the part that was posted...
"...Everywhere we look evangelicals are turning to Roman Catholic styles of contemplative spirituality (which in many cases were borrowed from pagan sources), such as ritualistic rote prayers, chanting, meditation, mindless centering prayer, the use of prayer beads, the Stations of the
Cross, lectio divina, labyrinths, and "the daily office."
The cover story for the February 2008 issue of Christianity Today was "The Future Lies in the Past," and it describes the "lost secrets of the ancient church" that are being rediscovered by evangelicals. The ancient church in question happens to be the Roman Catholic, beginning with the so-called "church fathers" of the early centuries. The article observes that many young evangelicals dislike both
"traditional" Christianity" and the seeker sensitive churches.
Traditional Christianity is described as too focused on "being right," too much into "Bible studies" and "apologetics materials." Instead, the young evangelicals are lusting after "a renewed encounter with a God" that goes beyond "doctrinal definitions." This, of course, is a perfect definition of mysticism. It refers to experiencing God beyond the boundaries of Scripture.
Christianity Today recommends that evangelicals "stop debating" and just "embody Christianity." Toward this end they should "embrace symbols and sacraments" and dialogue with "Catholicism and Orthodoxy"; they should
"break out the candles and incense" and pray the "lectio divina" and learn the Catholic" ascetic disciplines" from "practicing monks and nuns."
Christianity Today says that this "search for historic roots" will lead "to a deepening ecumenical conversation, and a recognition by evangelicals that the Roman Catholics and Eastern Orthodox are fellow Christians with much to teach us."
This is a no holds barred invitation to Catholic mysticism, and it will not lead to light but to the same darkness that has characterized Rome throughout its history, and it will lead beyond Rome to the paganism from which Rome originally borrowed its "contemplative practices."
The January 2001 issue of Christianity Today contained a lengthy description by Mennonite pastor Arthur Boers of his visit to four ecumenical religious communities-Taize, Lindisfarne, Iona, and Northumbria--and HIS INCREASING LOVE FOR LITURGICAL PRACTICES. Boers testifies: "About two decades ago, on a whim, I bought a discontinued book by a famous Catholic priest. As a convinced evangelical Anabaptist,
I was skeptical. But I was also curious. As it turned out, this book became the starting point in my recovery of a fuller prayer life through the daily office."
THE TAIZE APPROACH
The mystical movement is strongly influenced by Taize (pronounced teh-zay). This is a religious community that was formed in southeastern France during World War II by Roger Schutz, a Swiss Protestant pastor who went by the name of "Brother Roger" and who led the community until his death in 2005. Its goal is to work for world peace and ecumenical
unity. The Taize monastic order includes some 100 allegedly "celibate brothers" from different countries and denominations, including Roman Catholic, Lutheran, Anglican, and Reformed. While the Taize community itself is very small, the Taize philosophy has influenced churches throughout the world. Taize is a major force for non-doctrinal ecumenism. Thousands of people per week make a pilgrimage to Taize. These include Christians, Jews, Buddhists, and the unaffiliated. The Roman Catholic connection is very
strong. Schutz participated in the Catholic Vatican II Council, and Pope John Paul II visited Taize in October 1986. Since Schutz's death, Taize has been led by a Roman Catholic priest named Alois Loeser. The Taize services are non-dogmatic and non-authoritative. There is no preaching. "It does not dictate what people must believe. No confessions
of faith are required. No sermons are given. No emotional,
evangelical-style testimonials are expected. Clergy are not required."
Schutz described the philosophy of Taize as, "Searching together--not wanting to become spiritual masters who impose; God never imposes. We want to love and listen, we want simplicity" ("Taize," Religion and Ethics Newsweekly, Sept. 20, 2002).
Taize's non-doctrinal ecumenical Christianity is fueled by mysticism. A "shadowy medieval" atmosphere is created with the use of such things as candles, icons, and incense (Vancouver Sun, April 14, 2000). The goal is to bring the "worshipper" into a meditative state, "to a place beyond
words, a place of just being." There is a lot of repetition, with "one-line Taize harmonies repeated up to 15 times each." The Taize web site promotes the use of icons. The Taize community is heavily involved in the same type of
"social-justice" issues that are popular with evangelicals today.
A DESCRIPTION OF ONE OF THE CONTEMPLATIVE PRACTICES
To illustrate how unscriptural and spiritually dangerous the
contemplative practices are we will look at the most popular one called Centering Prayer. Centering prayer is also called centering down. It involves quieting the mind and emptying it of conscious thoughts about God with the objective of entering into a non-verbal experiential communion with God in the center of one's being and thereby achieving direct revelation from God.
Thomas Merton, one of the modern fathers of centering prayer, claims that "the simplest way to come into contact with the living God is to go to one's center and from there pass into God" (Finding Grace at the Center, p. 28).
Here is how he describes it:
"Then we move in faith to God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, dwelling in creative love in the depths of our being. This is the whole essence of the prayer.... All the rest of the method is simply a means to enable us to abide quietly in this center, and to allow our whole being to share in this refreshing contact with its Source" (Finding Grace at the
Center, 2002, p. 32).
"... savor the silence, the Presence..." (p. 35).
"As soon as we move in love to God present in our depths, we are there... we simply want to remain there and be what we are" (p. 39).
"We might think of it as if the Lord Himself, present in our depths, were quietly repeating His own name, evoking His presence and very gently summoning us to an attentive response. We are quite passive. We let it happen" (p. 39).
"... to enter into our Christ-being in the depths" (p. 42).
"... we want immediate contact with God Himself, and not some thought, image, or vision of him..." (p. 42).
"... open yourself interiorly to the mystery of God's enveloping presence" (p. 48).
"... interior silence is the proximate goal of this prayer" (p. 52).
"... our theme is the center, that is, the place of meeting of the human spirit and the divine Spirit" (p. 80).
The practice is called "this union, this face-to-face encounter" (p. 15), "passive meditation" (p. 20), "a fourth state of consciousness" (p.34), "savoring the silence" (p. 35), "this nothing" (p. 49), "the deep waters of silence" (p. 52), "deep tranquility" (p. 54).
The practice of centering prayer requires entering into a non-thinking mode. Basil Pennington said: "In a meditation like Centering Prayer, you leave the rational mind and emotions behind, open yourself to rest in the Divine. St. Thomas Aquinas says,'Where the mind leaves off, the
heart goes beyond'" (interview with Mary NurrieStearns published on the Personal Transformation website,
http://www.personaltransformation.com/Penning... ).
In The Signature of Jesus, Brennan Manning says centering prayer requires three steps.
The first step is to quiet down and "stop thinking about God" (p. 212).
The second step is to choose a "sacred word" and "without moving your lips, repeat the word inwardly, slowly, and often" (p. 218). The word might be "love" or "God" or something else. This is to be done until the mind is dwelling upon that one word without distraction and is carried
by that practice into a non-thinking communion with God at the center of one's being. The mantra is the key to entering the non-thinking mode.
Ray Yungen explains:
"When a word or phrase is repeated over and over, after just a few repetitions, those words lose their meaning and become just sounds....
After three or four times, the word can begin to lose its meaning, and if this repeating of words were continued, normal thought processes could be blocked, making it possible to enter an altered state of consciousness because of hypnotic effect that begins to take place. It really makes no difference whether the words are 'You are my God' or 'I
am calm,' the results are the same" (A Time of Departing, p. 150). The mantra, or repetition of a word, produces a mindless hypnotic state. The actual meaning of the word quickly becomes lost to the mind, and that is the objective. The mantra allows the practitioner to put aside thinking in order to reach an altered state of consciousness called "the
silence place" in which one allegedly experiences God directly. Practitioners of eastern religions recognize the power of the mantra in entering this state. Deepak Chopra, for example, says: "A mantra ... has little or no meaning to distract us. Therefore it is an easier vehicle for going inward than prayer or verbal contemplation"
(How to Know God, p. 94).
Amazingly, Chopra, who is a New Age Hindu who believes in the divinity of man, recommends the ancient Catholic contemplative manual The Cloud of Unknowing. He considers the centering prayer techniques to be the same as Hindu yoga.
"There is no doubt that people resist the whole notion of God being an inner phenomenon.... Yet its importance is stated eloquently in the medieval document known as 'The Cloud of Unknowing,' written anonymously in the fourteenth century.... The writer informs us that ANY THOUGHT IN THE MIND SEPARATES US FROM GOD, because thought sheds light on its object.... Even though the cloud of unknowing baffles us, it is
actually closer to God than even a thought about God and his marvelous creation. We are advised to go into a 'cloud of forgetting' about anything other than the silence of the inner world. For centuries this document has seemed utterly mystical, but it makes perfect sense once we realize that THE RESTFUL AWARENESS RESPONSE, WHICH CONTAINS NO THOUGHTS,
is being advocated....
"We aren't talking about the silence of an empty mind ... But the thought takes place against a background and nonthought. Our writer equates it with KNOWING SOMETHING THAT DOESN'T HAVE TO BE STUDIED. The mind is full of a kind of knowing that could speak to us about anything, yet it has no words; therefore we seek this knowingness in the background" (Chopra, How to Know God, 2000, pp. 94, 95, 98).
In this same book, Chopra says, "I believe that God has to be known by looking in the mirror" (p. 9). Thus Chopra is describing meditative methods whereby the individual can allegedly come into contact with his "higher self" or divinity, yet he is using Catholic mysticism to get
there! And the same manual, The Cloud of Unknowing, is one of the most popular manuals among contemplative evangelicals. Chopra says that mantra-induced mind-emptying centering prayer techniques result in non-verbal revelation.
This is a loud warning to those who have ears to hear.
Richard Foster says repetitious prayers such as "breath prayers" "BIND THE MIND" (Prayer: Finding the Heart's True Home, p. 124). Tricia Rhodes, in her book The Soul at Rest, which is "a step-by-stepjourney of learning contemplative prayer, suggests: "Make every effort to stop the flow of talking going on within you--to slow it down until it comes to a halt" (The Soul at Rest, 1996, p. 28).
The third step is to return one's mind to the sacred word when
distractions come. Manning suggests ending the session by quoting the Lord's Prayer in a rote manner. He recommends two 20-minute centering sessions per day.
The result of centering prayer is supposed to be mystical knowledge obtained through communion with God in one's being.
"For in this darkness we experience an intuitive understanding of everything material and spiritual without giving special attention to anything in particular" (The Cloud of Unknowing, chapter 68)."To know God in this way is to perceive a new dimension to all reality"
(Finding Grace at the Center, p. 60)...."
And to think this is what is finding its way into the Adventist church is very troubling...