The Prayer of Descent

In the practice of centering prayer, there comes a moment Thomas Merton called "the point of nothingness" — that raw, undefended place where every title, every accomplishment, every carefully constructed identity falls away like leaves from a winter oak. You sit in silence, and the silence strips you. Philippians 2:3-4 invites us into this very descent: "Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility regard others as better than yourselves.…