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Benedictine finds dialogue with Buddhists, Muslims help his prayer life

By editorsub1 on September 28, 2012 4:32 am in Features / 6 comments

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Benedictine Father William Skudlarek said Buddhists have helped him learn to listen more when he prays, and Muslims have helped him show deeper reverence in prayer.

Father Skudlarek, a member of St. John’s Abbey in Collegeville, Minn., is secretary-general of the international Monastic Interreligious Dialogue, a project of Benedictine and Trappist monks and nuns that promotes dialogue with Buddhists, Hindus and Muslims in some version of monastic life.

He was in Rome Sept. 17-25 to lead a workshop for members of the Congress of Abbots of the Benedictine Confederation of Monastic Communities.

The monastic dialogue began in the 1970s, and Father Skudlarek began participating in the mid-1990s.

The Benedictine said his contact with Buddhists has led him, twice a day, to sit in silence like Buddhists do when they meditate.

“I don’t know if I can exactly describe what I’ve gotten from that, but I sense I’ve gotten something,” Father Skudlarek said.

“I think I’ve come to a much deeper understanding of prayer as simply pure receptivity,” he said. “I’m not there to tell God anything that God doesn’t already know. I’m simply there and I’m simply present.”

Father Skudlarek said he was also impressed by the committed celibacy of Buddhist monks, who don’t have the motivation of following Jesus’ example of total dedication to ministry.

In his more limited contact with Muslims, he has been struck by their dedication to praying five times a day.

Muslim prayer can seem very “formalistic” in its gestures and words, the Benedictine said, but he has come to recognize it as “a deeply spiritual path. It comes out of a sense of wanting to be totally faithful to God.”

Muslims at prayer express “an almost palpable reverence, an incredible reverence,” he said. “I look on my own prayer, and so much Christian prayer, and it seems sloppy by comparison. It just seems like it’s too informal.”

Exposure to Muslim prayer has increased his appreciation of the formal, communal prayers that mark his life as a Catholic monk, he said, teaching him to see them “not just as legalistic formalities, but as a way of heightening one’s sense of what one is doing.” [More]

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6 Comments

Ann says:

September 29, 2012 at 8:07 pm

What a wonderfully ecumenical monk: the offer of unity through prayer!

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davis byrd longsworth says:

September 28, 2012 at 7:53 pm

I am a Roman Catholic. I am sadden to know a R.C. priest doing this. Pray to our Lord and Blessed Mother,they will guide you to a good prayer life.YOU DON’T NEED TO LOOK FOR IT IN OTHER PLACES. GO TO YOUR ABBEY CHURCH AND SIT BEFORE THE LORD!!!

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- Tony says:
  
  September 29, 2012 at 8:17 pm
  
  Can anything good come out of Nazareth?
  Davis we fing God were we least expect Him.
  
  Reply
  - Catholic Lady says:
    
    October 1, 2012 at 8:22 am
    
    In a moment of divine illumination, Nathanael asks; “Can anything good come from Nazarreth (Branchville)? Yeshua stands before him and declares Nathanael on “in whom is no guile,” and Nathanael, the one who was “under the fig tree” suddenly sees the connection between all this and the prophetic passages in Isaiah and Zechariah. Nathanael’s knowledge of the scriptures is illuminated by a divine gift of faith, and he recognizes who ths “Yeshua” really is. Through his faith, Nathanael knows that the historical “Yeshua” of who Zechariah wrote was a type or foreshadowing of the promised Messiah- the very Jesus of Nazareth standing before him. Jn 1:44-
    
    Reply
Richard Andrew says:

September 28, 2012 at 12:06 pm

I find it very interesting that a Roman Catholic monk would go to Buddhists, Hindus, and Muslims in order to learn about monasticism and prayer, rather than to the Eastern Orthodox Christians, who themselves have a very long, very deep experience with monasticism and the prayer that Father William describes. It seems to me that Holy Mount Athos would be the logical first place to go for a Roman Catholic to learn more about Christian monasticism. Has he ever read the “Philokalia”, “The Art of Prayer”, “The Ladder of Divine Ascent” or any of the many Orthodox writings about monasticism or mysticism?

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john says:

September 28, 2012 at 6:58 am

Um the priest should be trying to comvert these people to the catholic faith. There’s something terribly wrong when false religions help your prayet life. Jesus Christ is truth and the catholic faith is the one true religion

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