It is a stressful time for university students who are in the middle of writing final exams but now a little relief can be found on campus.

Staff at the University of Calgary’s Wellness Centre say students are all feeling the pressure of finals and dealing with the holiday season.

To help students cope, they have converted a dance studio in the Kinesiology Department on campus into a stress free zone.

The overhead lights are turned off and soothing music is played and a labyrinth is laid out in the middle of the floor for walking meditation.

“Sometimes they don’t even need …

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Sally Quinn: When I tell people I have a labyrinth and that I walk it regularly, most have no idea what I’m talking about.

They think a labyrinth is a maze, a place you walk into and then have trouble finding your way out.

In fact it is just the opposite. A labyrinth is a place you go to get found.

For many, walking the labyrinth is a religious experience. There are many famous labyrinths in churches, the most famous being the one on the floor of Chartres Cathedral in France, which dates to the 13th century.

Others see it as more spiritual. Some…

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Last week, I had a profoundly spiritual experience that you might want to try for yourself. I walked the labyrinth at the Brecksville United Methodist Church.
Labyrinths are a series of winding paths that you walk. They lead to a center where you pause to contemplate or pray or rest, and then you walk back out to the beginning. A labyrinth is meant to be a walking meditation.
I went with no expectations; I just wanted to see what it was all about. But when I began to walk the labyrinth, I couldn’t help but think about the journey of my life: where have I been, where am I now, where …

In many Eastern traditions, and growing in popularity in the Western world, more and more is being written about meditation. And some of us are at least thinking about meditating – especially as we hear Western medicine voicing its value with some physicians even writing prescriptions for meditation. The practice is being given credit for better health, relaxation and even lowering blood pressure.

Similarly, there is a discipline called Centering Prayer, a method of silent prayer that prepares us to receive the gift of contemplative prayer, prayer in which we experience God’s presence within us, closer than breathing, closer than thinking, closer than consciousness itself. This method of prayer is both a relationship with God and a discipline to foster that …

Although Elizabethtown [Pennsylvania] College is a Brethren-affiliated college, the religious identity of students and faculty has become more diverse in recent years; the religions on campus vary from Christian faiths to Jewish to Muslim and everything in between. In light of this diversity, there have been more attempts by student organizations to reach out and invite people of various faiths through different activities.

The Labyrinth, hosted by the Chaplain’s Office, is one of these new interfaith activities. Most students are unaware of what a labyrinth is and what the experience at Etown offers them. “Labyrinths are a kind of walking meditation and they are like mazes, but there is only one path …

Contrary to popular belief, labyrinths are not used to get one lost and confused – rather, their purpose is to find answers and to meditate on religious issues. Two of the 109’s churches, St. Stephen Presbyterian Church and the University Christian Church, use labyrinths as methods of worship.

That fact is, according to Mark Scott of St. Stephen, the labyrinth is an extremely ancient form of meditation that has roots in paganism and is used as a form of worship in many historically aware churches. The design of labyrinths at St. Stephen and the University Church can both be traced back to the famous Notre Dame Chapel in Chartres, France.

Scott, St, Stephen’s minister of music and organist, is a fierce proponent …

You’ve heard of meditation labyrinths, where people mindfully walk along complex pathways. These are increasing in popularity, according to the Sydney Morning Herald, which says there are now more than 1000 labyrinths across the US, including at least 170 in hospitals. Somewhat less mainstream are meditation pyramids, which apparently help us retrieve “positive cosmic energy.” I’m skeptical. On the other hand the meditation pond being built by students from the University of Tampa sounds like a lovely idea.

If you go to the meditation pond you may wish to leave your iPhone behind, but if you do take it there’s been a whole bunch of recent news stories about meditation apps, including a Mental Workout, a …