I was reading the Complete Mystical Works of Meister Echart this morning, in addition to the Cherubinic Wanderer by Angelus Silesius, the Messenger of the Heart, when I found passages in both that I thought might be pertinent to this thread and so I have decided to share them:
"...Joy and sorrow both come from love. A man should not fear God, for he who fears Him, flees Him. Such a fear is harmful fear. The right sort of fear is the fear of losing God. Man should not fear Him, he should love Him, for God loves man to the highest perfection...The earth can never flee so low but heaven flows into her and impresses his power on her and fructifies her, whether she wishes it or not. It is just the same with man: he thinks he can get away from God, but he cannot escape Him, for every nook and cranny reveals Him. He thinks he is fleeing from God, and runs into his arms...That man who is thus established in God's love must be dead to self...I ask, 'What is the prayer of a detached heart?' My answer is that detachment and purity cannot pray, for whoever prays wants God to grant him something, or else wants God to take something from him. But a detached heart desires nothing at all, nor has it anything it wants to get rid of. Therefore it is free of all prayers, or its prayer consists of nothing but being uniform with God. That is all its prayer...Those who pray for anything but God or to do with God, pray wrongly: when I pray for nothing, then I pray rightly, and that prayer is proper and powerful. But if anyone prays for anything else, he is praying to a false God...I never pray so well as when I pray for nothing and for nobody, not for Heinrich or Konrad. Those who pray truly pray to God in truth and spirit, that is to say, in the Holy Spirit..."
- Meister Eckhart (1260-1328), German Catholic mystic and Dominican priest
"...The deepest prayer
which I could ever say
is that which makes me One
with That to which I pray.
God is such as He is,
I am as I must be.
And yet no two-ness
do I see.
There is nothing
that disturbs your meditation
but your own wandering mind
in its vain agitation.
Give me all Your bounty,
give me eternal bliss -
as long as You withhold yourself
all things I miss.
So far beyond all words.
is He,
I know no other way
than not to speak.
Thus without words
I pray.
In the depth of his Abyss
God is pure contemplation.
The deepest ground
of all that is
dwells in perpetual adoration.
We keep so busy talking,
we are so keen to act
that we forget
that in the heart
lies all we need
untapped, intact.
He who turns the senses
to the Light that is his center
hears what no ear can hear,
sees where no light can enter.
Prayer is neither word nor gesture,
chant nor sound.
It is to be in still communication
with our Ground..."
- Angelus Silesius (1624 – 1677), German Catholic mystic and poet