Wednesday, April 3, 2013

Meditation and Contemplation

by Timothy M. Gallagher, O.M.V.

Grade: 4 stars

Thoughts: A short, but very useful book about the Ignatian style of praying with Scripture. I appreciated the clear descriptions and practical suggestions. For someone like me, who is not yet at the point where I am following a steady schedule of deep prayer, it was a book I felt like I should buy and read over again more carefully. Perhaps the most helpful points were the analogies to a deep conversation with a close friend. I have been having quite a few of those recently, and I can see that many aspects of these could often apply to one's prayer as well.

The only part that was strange to me was the emphasis on imagination. NOT because I thought it was wrong in any way, but because that's something I'm not naturally good at or comfortable with. I feel suspicious of it. Which is one of the primary reasons why I am very glad I read this book--I really should learn to get over that.

2 comments:

Star said...

Ohh I would really like to read this book. Perhaps I could borrow it sometime?

RED said...

Unfortunately, I don't own it, and it isn't even available at the library. I got it through the inter library loan system. (Which means I only got it for a very limited time, and have already returned it.) So you could either try that too, or wait till I've managed to buy a copy for myself, and then borrow that.

He's written a few books about the spiritual life, and this is only one of them. I haven't yet read the others (only one other is available through inter library loans). I was planning to read at least a few more before buying one, to see which was most helpful. So I'll keep you updated, I guess.