This Sweet Moment
Please enjoy an inspirational reflection on these times we’re living in from our executive director, Marc Thomas Shaw. Stay focused. This is our time!
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Author: Marc Thomas Shaw
Rohr’s Vision Of Nondual Reconstruction:The Wisdom Pattern Book Review
Richard Rohr has a superpower: the ability to clearly articulate what it means to live out a nondual perspective amidst the turbulent seas of modern life while remaining connected to the Christian tradition. Marc Thomas Shaw reviews Rohr’s latest book: The Wisdom Pattern: Order, Disorder, Reorder.
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A Message from Contemplative Light
We hope this message finds you safe during this time of collective upheaval. It’s been a turbulent time in our world: our streets, our homes, and our conversations with everyone from online acquaintances to close family. Marc addresses the current situation.
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Right Speech
One of the joys of the contemplative path is the awareness that we have agency and governance of so much of what used to be simply reactive. In this post, Marc explains how this applies to right speech.
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The Contemplative Path
The contemplative path is both ascent and descent. It is a movement of love in our inmost self allowing us to grow in awareness of our inner egoic tendencies that keep us from manifesting divine love in the world. We usually come to a place of accepting this process after what Franciscan author Richard Rohr calls necessary suffering.
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The Movie In The Mind
When I was a kid I loved going to the movies. Now that I have a son I’m actually surprised at the amount of movies I had seen by the time I was five. Star Wars. Karate Kid. Never Ending Story. Breakin’(!). The Black Cauldron (don’t get me started).
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4 Steps To Advancing on the Spiritual Journey
In college, I took a class called World Literature, without much expectation beyond the credits. Long books, archaic language. Instead the professor started the first class with this statement: “We’re lost. And we’re trying to get home. That’s the starting point of literature and the spiritual life.” He had me.
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Confessions of a Failing Mystic
Since roughly puberty, one of my life’s struggles has been intermittent bouts of depression. Maybe it’s inherited, maybe it’s just my portion, or maybe it’s connected with long-time sleep issues. Whatever its source, in daily life, I work hard to counterbalance the onset of periods of low energy, negative thoughts, and aimlessness with contemplative practices, spiritual readings, exercise, music, family, and meaningful work. Or as much meaningful work as I can muster.
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Contemplative Practice And Inner Agency
In 2005, after completing a Masters in Theology and the Arts, I took a job teaching High School in downtown Los Angeles. I learned a lot in teaching, growing and stretching in ways I never could have imagined.
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