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Tag Archives: answers

Once Again, A Reminder

30 Monday Jul 2018

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answers, beauty, Hearts on Fire, impatience, instability, listen, progress, questions, Rainer Maria Rilke, slow work of God, strength, Teilhard de Chardin, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, time, trust

afourtreesThere are two adjacent ranch-style houses on our road whose owners each planted four trees in a row across their front yard. I have watched them grow over the years and sometimes wonder if it was the desire of the owners to have a lot of shade, to hide from the road or just to satisfy their love of trees. They have seemed to me as they’ve grown like a line of sentinels from one yard to the other. Because I am always driving when I pass them, I really don’t know if they are the same kind of trees; I just admire their beauty and their strength.

On my drive home early yesterday evening I was luxuriating in the lush green all around me (not much traffic on our road at 7:00 on a Sunday) when I was brought up short by those trees! Suddenly, after years of tiny incremental growth, they are mammoth and have totally obscured the houses! Today I wonder if I need to pay more attention to the obvious lesson that I have been getting on our own land and now elsewhere about what Teilhard de Chardin calls “the slow work of God” and Rilke describes as living the questions rather than being impatient to find answers. Sometimes it seems as if they have conspired with God on the same message!

I was not surprised this morning on opening the Jesuit prayerbook, Hearts on Fire, to find Teilhard’s words on the page before me. So once again I will try to slow down and listen carefully.

Above all, trust in the slow work of God. We are quite naturally impatient in everything to reach the end without delay. We should like to skip the intermediate stages. We are impatient of being on the way to something unknown, something new. And yet it is the law of all progress that it is made by passing through some stages of instability – and that it may take a very long time…(p.102)

 

 

 

 

 

St. Louise de Marillac

15 Thursday Mar 2018

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answers, prayers, slow work of God, spiritual path, St. Louise de Marillac, St. Vincent de Paul, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

alouisedemarillacIt is said that behind every great man is a great woman and this is certainly obvious as one learns the story of Saint Louise de Marillac. Born on August 12, 1591 near the small town of Meux in the southwest of France, Louise had lost both her parents by the age of fifteen. Discouraged by her confessor from becoming a nun, she was married and had one son but soon became the longtime caregiver to her beloved husband until his death. Although she had wise council from two notable men – one a bishop and the other later declared a Saint (Francis de Sales), Louise’s vision of her spiritual path came from an “inner illumination.” In this way she understood that “she was to undertake a great work under the guidance of another person she had not yet met.” That person was St. Vincent de Paul. Vincent, busy with his “Confraternities of Charity” – aristocratic ladies who were helping him serve the poor and neglected children – was reluctant to become Louise’s confessor, but he soon realized that she, of the peasant class herself, could not only meet the poor as an equal but also was gifted in teaching and organizing helpers of their own class.

What stands out in the biography of Louise in “Saint of the Day” at http://www.franciscanmedia.org is what Teilhard de Chardin saw as the slow work of God. The long illness of her husband, the only periodic availability of counselors, the long time it took for Vincent DePaul to realize that she was the answer to his prayers and Vincent’s slowness in allowing the organization of what became the Daughters of Charity into a religious congregation all reads as a testament to the faith and trust and patience of this remarkable woman. Louise spent her life helping wherever needed and in her later years traveled throughout France, establishing her community members in hospitals, orphanages and other institutions. Louise died on March 15, 1660, and was finally named a saint of the Roman Catholic Church in 1934.

It has been my privilege to know and work with many of the Daughters of St. Louise de Marillac and I celebrate them today as a collective example of what one woman can accomplish and how her followers can change the world of needy people around the globe.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Deeper Meaning

20 Monday Nov 2017

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Alan Cohen, answers, blind, enlightenment, faith, God, inner work, inspiration, Jesus, light, Luke, Peace, quiet, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, vision

aseethelightThe gospel this morning tells Luke’s version of the encounter Jesus had with a blind man. I am always struck in the healing stories when Jesus asks the desire of the person he meets who is in need. I never doubt that he can see that condition in the person, so either he is looking for a statement of faith or he wants to be sure of the depth of the person’s intention or desire to be healed. Although life might be easier for the man if he gets his sight, there may be new responsibilities attached to the healing as well. Maybe he will have to find a job, rather than sitting by the side of the road begging. Certainly he will need to become attentive to people who are in need of help with certain life tasks because of infirmities. Who better since he has been there himself?

My wondering when I hear Jesus ask “What do you want me to do for you?” is whether there are nuances to the question – as well as to the answer, especially in this case of: “Please let me see.” My train of thought about all that this morning was verified by a great example of synchronicity in Alan Cohen’s reflection for today. In speaking about enlightenment he writes the following prayer: Give me inspiration to look within for my answers. Help me to take the time to be with myself and find the peace I seek. Then, as an affirmation, he ends with: In quiet I look within and discover the light I am.

So it’s not only a question of seeing with our physical eyes. It seems we must be willing to do the deeper inner work in order to truly see the light that God offers us if we have the courage to ask for it.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Rilke’s Wisdom

21 Sunday Aug 2016

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answers, intention, Letters to a Young Poet, live, patient, perspective, Rainer Maria Rilke, Rilke's Book of Hours, Sunday, the Lord's Day, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, unfinished business, unsolved

arilke.jpgIt has become my practice every morning to consider each day a clean slate for my living. Of course there are on-going concerns or projects and I have my lists of “unfinished business” from the previous day (or week or month…) but my intention is to look at everything from the perspective of this day and leave yesterday to the history books. Even more important does that intention become on Sundays for two reasons. It is, after all, the first day of the week, the beginning of a new cycle of events. Additionally it is for Christians the Lord’s Day, the day of Resurrection, thereby giving impetus to thoughts of God and my own sense of hope for myself and the world.

My desire to catapult myself from sleep into newness this morning led me to Rilke’s Book of Hours. As I leafed through the pages, out fell a small sheet of notebook paper that I’ve kept for almost 50 years. A little yellowed by the years, it is otherwise in good shape, having been passed from one book to another from time to time. On it my friend Jan had printed a famous quote from Rilke’s work, Letters to a Young Poet, that was probably encouragement for me during a moment of uncertainty in the novitiate. It was the first time I had encountered Rilke and that text but it has stayed with me and been shared countless times with others. I am fairly certain I have even shared it here. Sometimes, though, repetition is good for the soul – and even the mind. Such is the case for me this morning so I offer it as a new beginning for a new week. May we all be blessed in our seeking!

Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves. Do not now seek the answers that cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will gladly, without even noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Open the Door

08 Thursday Oct 2015

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answers, ask and receive, faith, friendshi[, Jesus, Judy Collins, Luke, open the door, perseverance, prayer, rainbow, seek and find, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, welcome

dooropenJudy Collins – who has one of the purest voices I have ever heard – sang a song on one of her albums years ago that (to my surprise) did not become one of her “greatest hits.” The chorus goes something like this: Open the door and come on in; I’m so glad to see you, my friend. You’re like a rainbow coming around the bend. And when I see you happy, well, it sets my heart free. I’d like to be the kind of friend to you that you are to me. After the last verse, she pluralizes the word “friend” and says, “you’re all like rainbows coming…” I’m reminded of that song this morning and of a famous image of Jesus knocking on a door that has no doorknob so the person on the inside must open it. The message is clear, we must invite Christ into our lives.

In this morning’s gospel (LK 11:5-13) Jesus begins by suggesting a scenario to his disciples of someone going to a friend’s house at midnight asking for three loaves of bread for out-of-town guests who have just arrived. The friend tells him to go away as his household is already locked up for the night. I know the truth of the next line. It says, I tell you, if he does not get up to give him the loaves because of their friendship, he will get up to give him whatever he needs because of his perseverance. Sometimes it’s easier to answer the door when you don’t want to, rather than continuing to hear the knocking. More than just giving in when frustrated, however, I think this is a call to welcome.

The more familiar part of this text follows as Jesus says, And I tell you, ask and you will receive; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. This is a comforting thought but there is a catch for persons of faith. Prayer/faith cannot be tied to outcome. When we “storm the gates of heaven” for something – often when people ask us for prayer – we need to remember that God’s vision is clearer than ours and the answer to prayer comes from a heart wiser than ours. We need to pray and to believe that God will always answer. The difficult part is continuing to believe when the “answer” is not the one we would have chosen. This is a hard saying when we are emotionally involved in outcome for ourselves or those we love. It takes practice to acknowledge that God knows better than we do what should happen in a particular case. Opening the door of our hearts to God’s choices for us and our lives is one of the ways that we become like Jesus, who emptied himself to become free enough to do all that was asked of him, knowing that God’s ways are not our ways and that God is always at the door of our hearts, waiting to enter in with a presence that is the answer to all our needs.

 

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