The Canadian Christian Meditation Community (CCMC) is part of the

World Community for Christian Meditation The World Community for Christian Meditation (WCCM) is a registered charity founded in 1991 that promotes a form of Christian meditation developed by Benedictine monk and priest John Main, OSB. The current director of the WCCM is Fr. Laurenc ...

(WCCM), which was founded in 1991 to foster the teachings of

Benedictine The Benedictines, officially the Order of Saint Benedict (, abbreviated as O.S.B. or OSB), are a mainly contemplative monastic order of the Catholic Church for men and for women who follow the Rule of Saint Benedict. Initiated in 529, th ...

monk and priest, Fr.

John Main John Douglas Main OSB (21 January 1926 – 30 December 1982) was a Roman Catholic priest and Benedictine monk who presented a way of Christian meditation which used a prayer-phrase or mantra. In 1975, Main began Christian meditation groups wh ...

O.S.B. The Benedictines, officially the Order of Saint Benedict (, abbreviated as O.S.B. or OSB), are a mainly contemplative monastic order of the Catholic Church for men and for women who follow the Rule of Saint Benedict. Initiated in 529, they ...

(1926–1982). Fr. Main taught a way of

Christian meditation Christian meditation is a form of prayer in which a structured attempt is made to become aware of and reflect upon the revelations of God. The word meditation comes from the Latin word ''meditārī'', which has a range of meanings including to re ...

which he based on parallels he saw between the spiritual practice taught by

Desert Father The Desert Fathers were early Christian hermits and ascetics, who lived primarily in the Wadi El Natrun, then known as ''Skete'', in Roman Egypt, beginning around the third century. The '' Sayings of the Desert Fathers'' is a collection of the w ...

John Cassian John Cassian, also known as John the Ascetic and John Cassian the Roman (, ''Ioannes Cassianus'', or ''Ioannes Massiliensis''; Greek: Ίωάννης Κασσιανός ό Ερημίτης; – ), was a Christian monk and theologian celebrated ...

and the meditative practice he had been taught by the

Swami Swami (; ; sometimes abbreviated sw.) in Hinduism is an honorific title given to an Asceticism#Hinduism, ascetic who has chosen the Sannyasa, path of renunciation (''sanyāsa''), or has been initiated into a religious monastic order of Vaishnavas ...

Satyanandain in

Kuala Lumpur Kuala Lumpur (KL), officially the Federal Territory of Kuala Lumpur, is the capital city and a Federal Territories of Malaysia, federal territory of Malaysia. It is the largest city in the country, covering an area of with a census population ...

. In 1977, Fr. John started a small Benedictine community in

Montreal Montreal is the List of towns in Quebec, largest city in the Provinces and territories of Canada, province of Quebec, the List of the largest municipalities in Canada by population, second-largest in Canada, and the List of North American cit ...

Quebec Quebec is Canada's List of Canadian provinces and territories by area, largest province by area. Located in Central Canada, the province shares borders with the provinces of Ontario to the west, Newfoundland and Labrador to the northeast, ...

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its Provinces and territories of Canada, ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, making it the world's List of coun ...

, thus bringing this form of contemplative prayer to Canada. The Canadian Community's national office is located in Montreal. The current director of the WCCM is Fr.

Laurence Freeman Laurence Freeman OSB (born 17 July 1951) is an English Benedictine monk and Catholic priest. He belongs to the Monastery of Sta Maria di Pilastrello, in Italy, of the Congregation of Monte Oliveto Maggiore. He is the director of the World C ...

, O.C., a student of John Main and a Benedictine monk of the Olivetan Congregation. On July 1, 2009,

Michaëlle Jean Michaëlle Jean (; born September 6, 1957) is a Canadian former journalist who served as the 27th governor general of Canada from 2005 to 2010. She is the first Haitian Canadian and black person to hold this office. Jean was the Organisation i ...

Governor General of Canada The governor general of Canada () is the federal representative of the . The monarch of Canada is also sovereign and head of state of 14 other Commonwealth realms and resides in the United Kingdom. The monarch, on the Advice (constitutional la ...

, announced the appointment of Fr. Freeman as an Officer of the

Order of Canada The Order of Canada () is a Canadian state order, national order and the second-highest Award, honour for merit in the system of orders, decorations, and medals of Canada, after the Order of Merit. To coincide with the Canadian Centennial, ce ...

. The Community is a "monastery without walls", a family of national communities and emerging communities in over a hundred countries. The foundation of the Community is the local meditation group, which meets weekly in homes, parishes, offices, hospitals, prisons, and colleges. The World and Canadian Communities work closely with many Christian denominations and other faiths. The Canadian Community sponsors retreats, schools for the training of teachers of meditation, lectures and other programs. A national quarterly spiritual and news publication of the Canadian Community is mailed to members and also available online. Information on current programs, connections to national coordinators and the location o
meditation groups
can be found on th
Community website
Medio Media is the communication and publishing arm of the World and Canadian Communities and offers a wide range of books, audio and videos to support the practice of meditation. The online bookstore is a
Medio Media
Fr.

Main Main may refer to: Geography *Main River (disambiguation), multiple rivers with the same name *Ma'in, an ancient kingdom in modern-day Yemen * Main, Iran, a village in Fars Province *Spanish Main, the Caribbean coasts of mainland Spanish territ ...

taught the practice and discipline of

as follows:

Sit down. Sit still and upright. Close your eyes lightly. Sit relaxed but alert. Silently, interiorly begin to say a single word. We recommend the prayer phrase
maranatha ''Maranatha'' (Aramaic: ') is an Aramaic phrase which occurs once in the New Testament (). It also appears in Didache 10:14. It is transliterated into Greek letters rather than translated and, given the nature of early manuscripts, the lexical ...
. Recite it as four syllables of equal length. Ma-ra-na-tha. Listen to it as you say it, gently but continuously. Do not think or imagine anything - spiritual or otherwise. If thoughts and images come, these are distractions at the time of meditation, so keep returning to simply saying the word. Meditate each morning and evening for twenty to thirty minutes.

Footnotes

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External links

Canadian Christian Meditation CommunityWorld Community for Christian MeditationCanadian Christian Meditation Community Facebook page
Christian mantra meditation Christian organizations based in Canada Catholic organizations established in the 20th century