Cynthia Bourgeault

The Rev. Dr. Cynthia Bourgeault is the founder and principal teacher for the Aspen Wisdom School as well as a founding director and the principal teacher for the Contemplative Society. She also serves on the core faculty of the spiritual paths Institute in Aspen, Colorado. An Episcopal priest and international retreat and conference leader, Cynthia is passionately committed to recovering the Christian contemplative path and has worked closely with Fr. Thomas Keating, Fr. Bruno Barnhart, and other Christian contemplative masters, as well as in Sufism and the Christian inner traditions.

She is the author of five books: Chanting the Psalms, Mystical Hope, The Wisdom Way of Knowing, Centering Prayer and Inner Awakening, Mystical Hope: Trusting in the Mercy of God and Love is Stronger Than Death. She is also responsible for many articles and audiotapes on the Christian Spiritual Life, including a 6 CD set, Encountering the Wisdom Jesus, published by Sounds True.

In 2001 she was invited to become a charter participant in the “Deepening the American Dream Project,” sponsored by the Fetzer Institute, Kalamazoo, MI, joining a select group of other American spiritual writers including Kathleen Norris, Jacob Needleman, Elaine Pagels, Huston Smith, and Parker Palmer; Her third book is a revision and expansion of that original essay. She is a past Fellow of the Institute for Ecumenical and Cultural research at St. John’s Abbey in Collegeville, MN, and an oblate of New Camaldoli Monastery in Big Sur, California.