Fr. Thomas entered Our Lady of the Valley in Rhode Island in January 1944. Following a fire that destroyed the monastery in March, 1950, the community moved to Spencer, Massachusetts, and founded St. Joseph's Abbey there. In 1961 Fr. Thomas was elected abbot, and he led the community through the post-conciliar renewal called for by Vatican II. He resigned as abbot in 1981 and moved to St. Benedict's Monastery where he now resides. In 1984 he formed a support network for Centering Prayer called Contemplative Outreach, Ltd., an international organization dedicated to reclaiming the Christian tradition of contemplative prayer and the mystical theology that supports it. He continues to write and lecture on the contemplative life and to support the worldwide work of Contemplative Outreach.

Quotes from Thomas Keatings' Open Mind, Open Heart

On Contemplative Prayer

[Contemplative prayer is the world in which] . . . our private, self-made worlds come to an end; a new world appears within and around us and the impossible becomes an everyday experience. Yet the world that prayer reveals is barely noticeable in the ordinary course of events. (Page 13)

On Centering Prayer

[Centering prayer] is . . . a journey into the unknown. It is a call to follow Jesus out of all the structures, security blankets, and even spiritual practices that serve as props. They are all left behind insofar as they are part of the false self system . . . The false self is an illusion. Humility is the forgetfulness of self . . . (Page 72)

Centering prayer is a method of refining one's intuitive faculties so that one can enter more easily into contemplative prayer. It is not the only path to contemplation, but it is a good one. As a method, it is a kind of extract of monastic spirituality . . . you have to keep up a certain level of silence in the psyche and nervous system if you want to obtain the benefits of contemplative prayer. (Page 34)

Click here to view Thomas Keatings' bibliography.