Q: According to what You said, is meditation the only way to see Buddha or to reach enlightenment?
M: Yes. Did you see Buddha meditate? Did you see Jesus meditate? Yes? He meditated and the last time lasted forty days in the desert. Now if someone never meditated before, could he just go suddenly into the desert and meditate for forty days? No, no, no. This is a very experienced practitioner who could do such a thing. So from this, even with so little information, we know Jesus had been meditating all along and that was the last, final time, before He went out and taught the world.
Buddha meditated all the time for six years. But then, the last, final time, it was forty-nine days. Then, He went out to teach the world. So no one reaches nirvana or the Kingdom of God without meditation. Why meditation? To still our mind in order to receive the teachings from heaven or from the Kingdom of God, or from the Buddhas in the higher world. If we always keep praying and asking, "Please give me wisdom. Please give me that. Please give me ...," and whenever Buddha wants to speak, He has no chance any more, because we are busy all the time (audience laughs): we talk, we ask, and we talk and we don't listen. So meditation is a listening time.
Just like when you ask me a question and then you have to be still for a while, quiet, then I have a chance to tell you what I want to say or what you need to know. So meditation is like that - sit still and receive the message. Otherwise, God wants to tell you hundreds of dozens things and you have no time to hear it. You're too busy talking, praying, singing, prostrating, bowing, and counting the rosary. (Audience laughs.) It's all right to do these. I don't mean this is no good. This is very good. But then, we must be still for some time so that God has a chance to communicate. That is called meditation. Too easy, very easy to understand.