Hi, and welcome to day one. This is your first video of this course, as an introduction to contemplative Christianity designed for busy people. First of all, let me say welcome and thank you for joining me and joining us on this journey into the contemplative heart of the Christian tradition. As we begin today, I want to cover three quick topics. And I want to start with saying a word about who this course is designed for. The short answer to that question is that it's designed for anyone.

Certainly, practicing Christians who are interested in learning more about the contemplative forms of prayer in the Christian tradition, will find much to enrich your own spiritual and prayer life in this course. At the same time, however, I am a firm believer that we all can learn a great deal from dialogue and so Persons of other religious traditions, certainly of the great Abrahamic faiths of Judaism and Islam, can be learn and be inspired by the contemplative dimension of Christianity, and find a good amount of common ground in our worship of the one God. And at the same time, people of other faith traditions, I think can be enriched by this dialogue as well. Certainly, persons practicing in the Hindu tradition, or who practice Buddhist meditation, are going to find overlap in terms of contemplative practices and approaches to prayer and meditation. And finally, persons of no religious or spiritual background, I think can also gain and learn a good deal.

Certainly, if you're just curious to learn more about the Christian tradition and forms of prayer meditation, we will all learn a bit together. So this course is really awful. In a spirit of dialogue and enrichment, geared towards enriching your own spirituality and prayer life to the extent that you want to take it in and make some of these practices your own. So welcome again, thank you for being here. It is really my hope that whatever your background and wherever you come from, that in this course in these next two weeks together, that you really find a little bit of peace in learning about these practices, the history and the tradition, that perhaps you get a little touch of divinity, a little taste or experience of God, him or herself. So thanks again for being here.

The second thing I want to talk about in this first video, is what you can expect in terms of the format and the content and layout of the course. The first thing to note is that this course uses a method of learning called micro learning. And the idea here is that we are busy We have lots going on. And we can learn and digest material in small what they call nuggets. So every day, you will get a video or a PowerPoint narrated, or some kind of podcast or recording of approximately 10 minutes. So every day for two weeks, you'll get an email with your next micro learning nugget.

And this allows you to digest the main themes, the history, a little bit of the theology and most importantly, the practices that inform contemplative Christianity in small bits each day, so you're not making a huge time commitment. You show up you do it when you have time. And you get to learn as part of a community as well. Then, after that little proximately 10 minute nugget each day, there will be some opportunities to go deeper should you wish to. I try to explain words that might be unfamiliar or more technical in the theological Or the Christian tradition, I will often include handouts that give you definitions of some of those words, if I think they might be new to you, you'll have opportunities to go on to discussion boards and post your thoughts, maybe some of your practices or insights that emerge, and to engage in dialogue with other members of the community.

I really hope that that is an enriching part of this experience for you. And there's a whole new level of learning that can happen as we all digest this information in different ways, and bring it into our own lives in our own practice. And then there'll be some other little fun things here and there some, no pressure quizzes to test your knowledge and amaze your friends. So that's what you can expect about 10 minutes a day for two weeks, and you're going to get a full overview of the history, the theology, the scriptural background, and most importantly, the forms and practical tips about how to practice contemplative Christianity should you wish to do so in your own life. Third, and finally, on this first day, I want to say something about what I mean and what we mean when I use the term contemplative Christianity. And the first thing I want to say is that I think the term itself is actually redundant.

In other words, I think that Christianity as a whole isn't an inherently contemplative tradition. In fact, I would say that all great spiritual and religious traditions of the world have a contemplative core at their very heart, towards which the external practices and prayer forms and scriptural texts, and forms of worship and all of that are guiding one towards. Now, before you hear that statement and think that you've wasted your time and your money in this course. Let me qualify that I think it is possible to identify what we might think of as a contemplative strand of the Christian theological tradition and as We'll explore in this course, there are actually some rather complicated but easy to grasp reasons historically, why the contemplative dimension of the Christian tradition is not as well known and appreciated, I would say in general in the world today, but even by Christians themselves.

So one of my goals is to really highlight that aspect of the tradition so that more people can be informed and know about it. At its most basic level, I think the best description of contemplative prayer or contemplative strand of Christianity is provided by St. Gregory the Great in the sixth century, and he describes contemplation simply as resting in God. contemplative Christianity has developed certain practices, certain forms, of disciplining the mind and the body, and different theological backgrounds that support that, that lead one in To the interior silence and stillness within one's heart, where one is alone with God. Many of the great mystics call this the recollected soul or the recollected self. So we turn within the self to find God within the self. This is very much the way St. Agustin described his own journey towards God by searching within himself in his great autobiography, the confessions.

So, the contemplative dimension of Christianity is what we're going to explore. And what we'll do is we'll begin by looking at some of the scriptural roots of that tradition. And then the different classic ways and forms that contemplative prayer was developed different methods that help one to silence the mind and the heart to step into that stillness. And to really cultivate a deeper, intimate relationship that goes beyond words with God. That is really the ultimate purpose of contempt. of Christianity.

So that's what we're going to do together over these next two weeks. And again, you'll get one little nugget of about 10 minutes each day to take you into some aspect of the contemplative Christian tradition. To go a little bit deeper, you'll have opportunities to go with that a little bit further, if you wish, I'll make referenced outside resources that you can draw upon as well. And will engage in dialogue and discussion if you choose to use that. And just generally seek to learn about this tradition together. So thanks again for being here.

Really glad you're here. Really excited to share the fruits of this contemplative experience with you and appreciate your presence. And I hope that you really get a lot out of these next two weeks and these lessons. Thanks again.