How can ancient contemplative skills contribute to the needs of today’s world? In this teaching, Cynthia Bourgeault offers a compelling answer. In particular, she addresses the modern dilemma of how to end the cycles of violence between individuals, religions, and cultures without dishonouring or discounting those who have been victimized. Drawing on the seminal work of Connie Fitzgerald, Cynthia identifies memory and its relationship to selfhood as the key. She carefully guides us through Fitzgerald’s linking of the concepts of memory, the future, hope, belonging, and the prayer of no experience. As the self, anchored in contemplative practices, progresses through these connections, a new perspective arises that allows for healing and reconciliation: “There is a different sense of selfhood that emerges and on the basis of that emerging selfhood a whole set of actions are possible that are not possible for the egoic self.”
Recorded LIVE 2013 in Pender Island, BC Canada. Approximate running time: 8 hours, 35 minutes