We are living in dark and anxious times. While COVID-19 has most recently taken centre-stage, the following remain very much with us: division, hate, violence, rampant consumerism and greed, scandal, corruption, abuse of power, populist and divisive leaders, and the effects of global warming. The need for contemplative wisdom and consciousness is urgent. Without a change in consciousness, the future for humanity, and the whole of creation, looks bleak.
Only a change to a more contemplative consciousness, which has at its core what Anglican Solitary Maggie Ross calls “Deep Mind”, can offer a more hopeful future. In Christian terms Deep Mind is the Holy Spirit: the fount of love, grace, wisdom, care for others and all of creation, forgiveness and healing, unity and reconciliation, and life-giving creativity.
Living Water therefore aims to promote:
Contemplative wisdom and consciousness, both within the Church and also within the wider secular culture, and in particular the realms of politics/economics, the environment, the sciences and the arts.
Christian meditation, and more broadly, contemplative prayer and the Christian contemplative tradition.
Social justice and care for creation. (See ‘Prayer and Action for Justice and Healing’ under ‘Prayer For Our Time’)
Interfaith dialogue, understanding, peace and reconciliation.
‘Living Water’ is a biblical term which appears in both the Old and New Testaments. Jeremiah (2:13 and 17:13) describes God as “the spring of living water”, and in John’s Gospel Jesus says to the Samaritan woman at the well: “If you knew the Gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water… whoever drinks the water I give… will never thirst.” (John 4:10,13)
Roland Ashby is the founder and contributing editor of Living Water. He lives in Melbourne, Australia. He was Communications Director for the Anglican Diocese of Melbourne and Editor of The Melbourne Anglican Newspaper for over 23 years, until he retired from those roles in December 2018. He has been a member of the World Community for Christian Meditation since 2001 and is a Benedictine Oblate. He has also undertaken a 30 week program reflecting on and applying the spiritual exercises of St Ignatius in daily life.
He has a Master’s degree in theology, majoring in contemplative spirituality, and he is author of A faith to live by (Vol. 1) published by Darton Longman and Todd and Morning Star Publishing; and A faith to live by (Vol. II), published by Morning Star Publishing. He is also editor of Heroes of the Faith – men and women whose lives have proclaimed Christ and inspired the faith of others, and A Reckless God? – Currents and Challenges in the Christian Conversation with Science, both published by Garratt Publishing.
E-Mail: editor@thelivingwater.com.au
He would also like to thank Ivan Smith, of Communiqué Graphics, for assisting in the design and set-up of Living Water.