Wellbeing through Meditation Techniques:
Will the Catholic Church Market its Hidden Treasure?
Last month, as part of my present doctoral research project in the psychology of religion I attended a workshop on ‘Mindfulness’. The one-day workshop that was held at the Maudsley Hospital, London, was led by a renowned American scholar and practitioner of Indo-Tibetan Buddhism, Dr. Allan Wallace. The day’s events consisted of practice sessions, and discussions on the possible use of Mindfulness techniques in maintaining and restoring health – physical and mental. The small hall was crowded with Mindfulness-enthusiasts including medical doctors from the Maudsley Hospital and researchers from the psychiatry research department of King’s College. As the only Asian in that hall, given my previous background in Buddhism and training in the Vipassana technique of meditation, I could not help asking myself: why all this enthusiasm about an Oriental tradition among Western scholars? What has become of all the Christian techniques of mental and contemplative prayer? Incidentally, in my research project I am studying the possibility of recovery from addictive behaviour through the practice of ‘Jesus Prayer’!
Early January this year the Mental Health Foundation (MHF), a leading Charity based in London and Glasgow, has published a research report on the use of Mindfulness in physical and mental health in the UK. This research involved extensive surveys and interviews of GPs and adult public across the UK. Out of the 250 GPs surveyed, 72% think it would be helpful for their patients with mental health problems to learn Mindfulness meditation skills. In a representative sampling of 2,007 British adults, 26% say they practise meditation, although under half (12%) of these do so rarely. However, 51% of those surveyed would be interested in attending free meditation classes to help them deal with stress and thus look after their health. Further, citing several case-studies and summarising other research findings, the report claims that there is increasing scientific support to illustrate that meditation can improve mental and physical health.
Already in 2004, the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) had recommended Mindfulness-based cognitive therapy for people who had experienced depression. Gauging from the increase in popularity and the repeated recommendations of research institutes, it is not difficult to predict that this ‘third wave therapy’ is going to become part of the government health policy in this country. Soon there might be a new health slogan promoted by the NHS: “Five-Minute-Mindfulness a day”! In a sense, this suggests a rediscovery of religion, albeit in terms of spirituality rather than religiosity, in this so called ‘Post-Christian’ society. Underpinning these interests is also the reiteration of the spirit-mind-body unity.
What is Mindfulness, anyway? In popular understanding often Mindfulness is referred to as “emptying of the mind.” It may not be possible to empty the human mind, so, techniques such as breathing and body sensation are used as anchors to relax the body while keeping the mind attentive. In the words of the MHF report, “Mindfulness is a way of paying attention to the present moment by using meditation, yoga and breathing techniques. It involves consciously bringing awareness to our thoughts and feelings, without making judgments….” (To some Catholic readers the word, ‘awareness’ might ring a bell. It was popularised in the West by the Indian Jesuit, Tony de Mello, through his books and courses in what he had adopted as, ‘Sadhana’ – which literally means, ‘the way’.)
Though Mindfulness is often used in therapy without any religious connotation, its roots in religious traditions cannot be denied. The MHF document further states, “Mindfulness is most commonly linked with Buddhist practices, although similar ideas and techniques are found in ancient Greek philosophy, contemplative Christianity, Judaism and Islam, Gestalt and humanistic psychologies and today’s “slow” movement.” It is interesting to note that in the press-launch version of the report, the word, ‘Buddhist’ occurs five times, ‘yoga’, six times, and ‘Christianity’, just once. Out of the six existing providers of Mindfulness sessions cited in the document as “Good practice models,” at least two are explicitly Buddhist. Why has the document ignored the existence of Christian meditation techniques in spite of contemporary initiatives like that of the World Community of Christian Meditation (WCCM), which co-ordinates no less than 300 meditation groups in the UK? Is there perhaps a deeper background to this? Or, is it because Christian meditation techniques are not scientifically researched enough?
Despite some recent efforts, perhaps contemplative prayer is a lost treasure in Western Christianity. Even attempts at its revival are advertised with some link to Eastern religious traditions: WCCM’s website, for instance, has in its homepage a photo of Laurence Freeman meeting the Dalai Lama at the Parliament of World Religions! Dr Wallace made a passing remark during his one day workshop at the Maudsley Hospital: meditation as a skill has been lost in Europe due to the protestant theology of ‘by grace alone’ – if I am saved by grace why learn a skill in prayer; the choice to pray itself is grace! The theological validity of this statement could perhaps be debated.
Nevertheless, more than a hundred years ago sociologists Durkheim and Weber saw individualism and capitalism as products of the Protestant Reformation in Europe. Today as the MHF report points out, the psychological stress caused by capitalism forces people to seek relief in Mindfulness. And perhaps it is individualism that attracts the Westerners to the individualistic meditation techniques of the East. As for the Catholic traditions, the historical events of Modern Europe, like the invention of printing press, might have contributed to reducing lectio divina to exegetic preaching, and mental prayer to spiritual reading. As a non-European, I think that the Catholic Church in Europe currently finds itself caught up in a no man’s land between the guilt for its exaggerated political domination of the past and the regret for the minimized socio-cultural influence on the present. It could do well, however, focusing on offering a wholesome spirituality, including skills in meditation and prayer.
The recommendation of the Mental Health Foundation is simple and straight: “we need more Mindfulness courses”! Will the Catholic Church in the UK take this up only as another point for worthless debate, or will it consider creative ways of marketing its own rich traditions of mental and contemplative prayer? This increasing interest in Mindfulness approach to spirituality could be seen as reductionism – ‘salvation’ without grace. But the eagerness to learn meditation techniques could also be perceived as kairos – a moment of grace!