TOXIC SHAME and CONTEMPLATIVE PRAYER: From Hiding to Healing

The great “slayer of the soul.” This is what Ray Leonardini aptly calls “toxic shame.” In this, his latest contribution, Leonardini has penned a precious gift: he gives voice to those who have no voice. By allowing prisoners to speak of their own shame we hear in their voices echoes of our own. These voices and echoes of voices reveals the one Great Silence whose voice rings out, ” My love is stronger than your shame.” – Martin Laird, O.S.A.

Finding God Within: Contemplative Prayer for Prisoners Paperback

For nearly a decade, Ray Leonardini has been visiting the incarcerated in Folsom State Prison and other correctional facilities, where he has been teaching and facilitating contemplative prayer―the contemporary manifestation of the ancient Christian meditative tradition. In Finding God Within, Leonardini demonstrates the extraordinary power of contemplative (or centering) prayer in transforming the lives of prisoners, and offers insightful analyses of biblical passages that show the power of prayer, faith, and surrender to ease addiction, stress, and despair. Filled with testimonies of prisoners who have been helped by centering prayer, Finding God Within is an essential introduction to contemplative prayer for people of all faiths engaged in prison ministry.

Going Inside: Learning to Teach Centering Prayer to Prisoners

In Going Inside, the companion volume to his Finding God Within, Ray Leonardini offers a practical manual for all those who are engaged, or are thinking of becoming engaged, with contemplative (or centering) prayer in prison. With advice from his own experience as well as that of prisoners themselves, Going Inside is an essential tool to enable your centering prayer groups to be effective and transformative for everyone involved.