Contemplative Prayer

Definition

Contemplative prayer is prayer that quietly gazes upon God rather than offering many words of petition. It comes from the monastic tradition. Its forms include lectio divina (sacred reading), in which one reads and meditates on Scripture slowly before moving into silence, and centering prayer, in which one focuses the heart on a short word. It was introduced to Korean Protestantism from the 1990s onward through spiritual formation programs and translated books.

Proponents

• "Be still, and know that I am God" (Psalm 46:10); Jesus prayed in a solitary place (Mark 1:35).
• It is prayer rooted in meditation on the Word and reflects a long-standing tradition reaching back to the early church and running through church history.
• It adds listening, abiding prayer to Korean churches, which tend to emphasize petitionary prayer and tongsung kido (simultaneous audible prayer).

Some Presbyterian, Methodist, and Anglican seminaries and spiritual formation institutions teach it.

Critics

• Its practice of emptying the mind resembles the meditation of Eastern religions, whereas the prayer taught in Scripture is a personal address to God grounded in the Word.
• It derives from medieval Roman Catholic mysticism and is incompatible with the Reformation tradition.
• It risks placing subjective experience above the Word.

Some conservative Presbyterian denominations have passed resolutions at their general assemblies warning against the contemplative prayer movement or advising members to refrain from involvement with it.

Summary

Proponents themselves stress that contemplative prayer is "not emptying the mind but filling it with the Word," and they distance themselves from technique-centered training detached from meditation on Scripture. Critics, for their part, do not oppose meditation on the Word or silence as such. The debate centers on the origins of the method and on the criteria by which experience is to be discerned. Some observers note that the Protestant practice of quiet time resembles contemplative prayer in that both involve meditation on the Word.