Charles "Chuck" Colson

Charles W. "Chuck" Colson

Founder, Prison Fellowship ministry

Charles W. "Chuck" Colson is founder of Prison Fellowship, a Christian outreach ministry to the prison population of this country, as well as to ex-prisoners and crime victims. The "On Faith" panelist's daily radio commentary, BreakPoint, is aired daily on over a 1,000 radio outlets nationwide. Colson also is a syndicated columnist, lawyer, and author of 25 books, most recently The Faith (2008). He served as special counsel to the late President Richard M. Nixon (1969-73). After pleading guilty to a Watergate-related charge of obstruction of justice in 1974, Colson served seven months of a one to three-year federal prison sentence. His 1973 Christian conversion was documented in the internationally best-selling book and film, Born Again. He founded Prison Fellowship in 1976. In 1993, Colson was awarded the Templeton Prize for Progress in Religion and donated the $1 million prize to Prison Fellowship. In the last 28 years, Colson has visited more than 600 prisons in 40 countries and, with the help of nearly 50,000 volunteers, has built Prison Fellowship into the world's largest prison outreach, serving the spiritual and practical needs of prisoners in 93 countries including the U.S. Close.

Charles W. "Chuck" Colson

Founder, Prison Fellowship ministry

Charles W. "Chuck" Colson is founder of Prison Fellowship, a Christian outreach ministry to the prison population of this country, as well as to ex-prisoners and crime victims. The "On Faith" panelist's daily radio commentary, BreakPoint, is aired daily on over a 1,000 radio outlets nationwide. more »

Main Page | Charles W. "Chuck" Colson Archives | On Faith Archives


« Previous Post | Next Post »

Focus Must Be on God, Not Self

A Christian, and I would assume a Muslim and Jew as well, can engage in certain practices common to Eastern religions.

Meditation is, of course, one good example. It is, in many cases, part of a Christian’s spiritual discipline. So is fasting. But in the case of the Christian, it is to focus his every thought and affection on his love for the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the God made flesh in Jesus.

My understanding of Eastern religions is that religious practices are designed to attain higher states of personal perfection and awareness.

The issue is not techniques used for spiritual attainment; the issue is the object of those practices. For the Christian, at least, the total aim of prayer, fasting, meditation, solitude, reflection, and even self-mortification is to draw closer to the Creator God of the universe, the one true God. It is to focus not on self but on Him.

The Christian lives not by mysticism, but by God’s revealed truth. In this sense, therefore, Eastern practices would be wholly contrary to Christian spiritual exercises.

Please e-mail On Faith if you'd like to receive an email notification when On Faith sends out a new question.

Email Me | Del.icio.us | Digg | Facebook

Posted by Charles "Chuck" Colson on April 12, 2007 7:28 AM

Reader Response

ALL COMMENTS (47)

Post a comment

We encourage users to analyze, comment on and even challenge washingtonpost.com's articles, blogs, reviews and multimedia features.

User reviews and comments that include profanity or personal attacks or other inappropriate comments or material will be removed from the site. Additionally, entries that are unsigned or contain "signatures" by someone other than the actual author will be removed. Finally, we will take steps to block users who violate any of our posting standards, terms of use or privacy policies or any other policies governing this site. Please review the full rules governing commentaries and discussions.

Top Local Global

What Islam Really Says About Violence, Rights and Other Religions

Gomaa, Fadlallah, Mubarak, Khan, Siddiqi, Ellison, others | On Faith

On Faith is an interactive conversation on religion moderated by Newsweek Editor Jon Meacham and Sally Quinn of The Washington Post. It is produced jointly by Newsweek and washingtonpost.com, as is PostGlobal, a conversation on international affairs. Please send your comments, questions and suggestions for On Faith to editor and producer David Waters.