S
SalarsNet
← Back to Comparative Perspectives

Christian vs. Buddhist Meditation

Silence Meets Silence: Profound Similarities, Fundamental Differences

Christian and Buddhist meditation both cultivate silence, stillness, and focused attention, leading some to see them as essentially similar. However, they operate within radically different worldviews: Christian contemplation seeks loving union with a personal God through grace, while Buddhist meditation aims at liberation from suffering through insight into the nature of reality (sunyata, non-self). These different goals shape every aspect of practice, making comparison illuminating but syncretism problematic.

The Encounter of Two Traditions

Few interfaith encounters have been as fruitful—and as fraught—as the dialogue between Christian and Buddhist contemplatives. When Thomas Merton met the Dalai Lama in 1968, both recognized in the other a kindred practitioner of deep inner work. Yet Merton remained a Catholic monk, and the Dalai Lama remained a Buddhist; their encounter deepened rather than dissolved their respective commitments.

This pattern characterizes authentic Christian-Buddhist dialogue: genuine appreciation of similarity combined with honest acknowledgment of difference. Both traditions have developed sophisticated technologies of consciousness—methods for training attention, cultivating stillness, and transcending ordinary mental states. Both prize silence, simplicity, and detachment from worldly concerns. Both produce practitioners of extraordinary depth and compassion.

Yet the similarity of practices should not obscure the fundamental difference of goals. Christian contemplation and Buddhist meditation are not two paths up the same mountain; they are oriented toward different summits altogether.

Surface Similarities

At the level of technique and phenomenology, Christian and Buddhist practices share striking features:

Silence and Stillness

Both traditions value extended periods of silence and physical stillness as contexts for spiritual deepening. Monastic life in both East and West structures time around contemplative practice.

Attention Training

Both develop concentrated attention as a foundation for deeper states. The Buddhist "shamatha" (calm abiding) parallels Christian "recollection" in gathering scattered attention.

Letting Go of Thoughts

Both teach practitioners not to follow discursive thinking during meditation. Christian contemplatives "let thoughts pass like clouds"; Buddhist meditators note thoughts without attachment.

Breath Awareness

Many practices in both traditions use breath as an anchor for attention—the Jesus Prayer coordinated with breathing, anapanasati (mindfulness of breathing) in Buddhism.

Detachment

Both prize freedom from excessive attachment to material things, ego concerns, and worldly success. Both see such freedom as essential for spiritual progress.

Compassion as Fruit

Both traditions expect genuine contemplative depth to manifest as increased compassion and loving service to others. Inner transformation yields outward fruit.

These similarities are real and significant. They explain why Christians and Buddhists can meditate side by side, why contemplatives from both traditions often feel mutual kinship, and why some have found cross-traditional learning fruitful.

Fundamental Differences

Yet beneath these surface similarities lie profound differences that shape the entire meaning of practice:

1. Personal God vs. Non-Theism

Christian contemplation is relational—a loving encounter with the personal God revealed in Jesus Christ. Even in the most apophatic (imageless) Christian prayer, the contemplative relates to a Thou, not an It. The goal is union with God, not absorption into an impersonal absolute.

Buddhism is non-theistic; the question of God is generally considered irrelevant to liberation. The goal is insight into the nature of reality and release from suffering, not relationship with a divine Person. Some Buddhist schools speak of "Buddha-nature" or "emptiness" in ways that can sound theistic, but these concepts function very differently from the Christian God.

2. Grace vs. Effort

Christian contemplation depends fundamentally on grace—God's initiative and gift. While Christians prepare through ascetical practice and faithful waiting, they cannot cause contemplative union; it is received. The Carmelite tradition says God "infuses" contemplation when He wills.

Buddhist meditation is more technique-based; proper practice leads to predictable results according to natural laws of mind. While some forms of Buddhism (Pure Land, for instance) emphasize "other-power," mainstream Buddhist teaching emphasizes that liberation comes through one's own efforts following the Dharma.

3. Self and Non-Self

Buddhism teaches anatta (non-self)—the insight that there is no permanent, unchanging self. The sense of a separate self is considered a delusion that causes suffering. Liberation involves seeing through this delusion.

Christianity affirms the soul—a spiritual center of personal identity that relates to God, survives death, and is destined for eternal communion with the Trinity. Contemplation does not dissolve the self but transforms it through divine love. Even in the deepest mystical union, the distinction between creature and Creator remains.

4. Salvation History vs. Cyclic Time

Christianity is rooted in salvation history—God's action in time through Israel, culminating in Christ's Incarnation, death, and Resurrection. These historical events are not just teaching stories but the actual means of redemption.

Buddhism sees history as cyclic (samsara) with no beginning and no teleological end. The Buddha is an exemplar and teacher, not a savior who redeems through historical action. What matters is the timeless truth of the Dharma, not unique historical events.

5. Goal: Union vs. Liberation

Christian contemplation aims at theosis—divinization, transformation into the likeness of God through participation in divine life while remaining distinct as creature. This is eternal, relational bliss.

Buddhist meditation aims at nirvana—cessation of suffering, release from the cycle of rebirth, extinguishing of craving. While Mahayana Buddhism adds the bodhisattva ideal of universal liberation, the fundamental goal remains freedom from dukkha (suffering/unsatisfactoriness), not union with God.

Thomas Merton and Christian-Buddhist Dialogue

No figure has shaped modern Christian-Buddhist dialogue more than Thomas Merton (1915–1968), the Trappist monk whose journey led him from the silence of Gethsemani Abbey to encounter with Zen masters and Tibetan Buddhist teachers.

"I believe that by openness to Buddhism, to Hinduism, and to these great Asian traditions, we stand a wonderful chance of learning more about the potentiality of our own traditions." — Thomas Merton

Merton's approach models fruitful encounter:

  • Deep rootedness: Merton's engagement with Buddhism came from the security of his Christian monastic identity, not spiritual seeking or dissatisfaction with his own tradition.
  • Experiential focus: Rather than getting lost in doctrinal comparison, Merton sought to understand Buddhist practice from the inside, finding points of experiential resonance.
  • Honest difference: Merton never suggested the traditions were the same; he acknowledged fundamental differences while finding genuine kinship at the level of contemplative experience.
  • Mutual enrichment: He believed encounter could deepen understanding of one's own tradition as much as teaching about the other.

Others have followed this path—Bede Griffiths, William Johnston, Robert Kennedy (a Jesuit authorized as a Zen teacher)—each navigating the tension between genuine openness and Christian integrity in different ways.

Mindfulness: Secular, Buddhist, or Christian?

Modern "mindfulness" has exploded in popularity, often presented as a secular technique stripped of its Buddhist origins. This raises questions for Christians:

The Secular Claim

Programs like Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) claim to extract the technique of present-moment awareness from its Buddhist context, making it accessible to anyone regardless of belief. Proponents point to neuroscience validating the benefits of attention training.

The Buddhist Roots

Critics note that "mindfulness" translates the Pali term sati, which is the seventh factor of the Noble Eightfold Path leading to Buddhist liberation. Can a practice so central to one tradition's salvific path really be extracted as a neutral technique? Buddhist teachers themselves are divided on this question.

Christian Discernment

Christians can certainly cultivate attention and presence—these are human capacities, not Buddhist inventions. The question is: how and toward what end? Rather than importing a practice with ambiguous Buddhist heritage, Christians might better develop attention within explicitly Christian frameworks:

  • The Jesus Prayer cultivates attention and presence within Christological prayer
  • Centering Prayer uses a sacred word as an anchor for attention
  • Lectio Divina trains attention on Scripture as living encounter with God
  • Recollection (as taught by Teresa of Ávila) gathers scattered attention Godward

The goal is not to reject all attention training but to practice it within a Christian theological framework, directed toward Christian ends, under Christian spiritual guidance.

What Christians Can Learn

Without syncretism, Christians may find Buddhist dialogue illuminating in several ways:

  • Attention to technique: Buddhist traditions have developed sophisticated methods for training attention that may help Christians understand their own practices more precisely.
  • Detachment: Buddhist emphasis on non-attachment can illuminate Christian teaching on detachment and holy indifference (Ignatian spirituality).
  • Apophatic rigor: Buddhist deconstruction of concepts can sharpen Christian apophatic theology's insistence that God transcends all our images and ideas.
  • Compassion practices: Buddhist "metta" (loving-kindness) meditation has parallels with Christian prayer for enemies and universal charity.
  • Simplicity: Buddhist monastic simplicity can challenge Christian communities to examine whether we live by our own teachings on detachment.

The key is learning from Buddhist dialogue to deepen Christian practice, not blending the two into something that is neither fully Christian nor fully Buddhist.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can I attend a Buddhist meditation session as a Christian?

This requires discernment. Observing a meditation session to learn or understand may be acceptable, but regularly practicing Buddhist meditation under Buddhist instruction risks spiritual confusion. The issue isn't the techniques themselves but the worldview and goal that shapes them. If you want to learn attention practices, seek Christian teachers and frameworks.

Are Buddhism and Christianity saying the same thing in different words?

No. While both traditions value compassion, detachment, and inner transformation, their core claims are incompatible. Christianity proclaims a personal God who creates, redeems, and will bring history to fulfillment; Buddhism teaches non-theistic liberation from cyclic existence. Christians believe in an eternal soul; Buddhists deny the self. These are not translation differences but fundamental disagreements about reality.

What about Buddhists who seem very holy and loving?

Many Buddhists exhibit remarkable virtue, compassion, and spiritual depth. Christians can recognize genuine goodness wherever it appears while maintaining that Christ is the unique Way, Truth, and Life. The Church has always taught that God's grace works in ways beyond our understanding; acknowledging goodness in Buddhist practitioners does not require accepting Buddhist doctrine.

Is Zen compatible with Christianity?

Zen, with its emphasis on direct experience beyond concepts, has attracted some Christians seeking to strip away intellectual clutter from prayer. A few Christians have been authorized as Zen teachers. However, Zen is thoroughly Buddhist in its worldview, and its methods are designed to produce Buddhist insights (e.g., the experience of sunyata). "Christian Zen" remains controversial; proceed with great caution and ecclesial guidance.

How should I respond if someone says all meditation is the same?

Gently explain that techniques may look similar but goals differ radically. A Christian meditating on Christ's presence and a Buddhist meditating to realize non-self are doing fundamentally different things, even if both sit in silence. Context and intention shape the meaning of practice. Invite them to explore what makes Christian contemplation distinctively Christian.

Related Articles

Christian vs. Buddhist Meditation | Contemplative Prayer | Salars