For the past five months, Uniting Church in the City, Ross Memorial West Perth, has kept its doors closed while undergoing restoration and renovation works. This beautiful, heritage-listed building has had a wonderful facelift, carefully done to enable its retention of ancient inheritance without losing ambience and mood.
Doors were opened wide on Friday 3 July for a wedding, and the worshipping community is now in the process of ‘bringing back’ all its former outreach services, whilst encouraging new experiences. On Mondays from 12.10– 12.40, the Christian Meditation Group meets in the church. Numbers are small, but the congregation would dearly love to see more people experience Christian meditation and reap the benefits it gives.
In this world of rapid change, turmoil, violence and stress, many of us yearn for a closer walk with God. Christian meditation is learning to be quiet and to experience God’s peace within us. Christian meditation is not some modern, newage invention; rather, it is an ancient prayer practice, which involves sitting still, alert and quiet, gently repeating internally a sacred word, termed a ‘mantra’. The mind concentrates and focuses on the word, turning away from the ‘chatter’ that, in turn, allows God’s inner peace within to be experienced. To be truly effective, it is recommended that this be done 20 minutes both morning and evening.
Made up of workers within the West Perth area and members of Ross Memorial Worshipping Community, the Christian Meditation Group meets weekly at Uniting Church in the City, Ross Memorial West Perth. Feedback of the small group makes no secret of the fact that this quiet time is extremely important to them, very beneficial and a useful tool for setting them up for the working week.
For more information contact Maureen Black at maurn@aapt.net.au.
Maureen Black