Looking Ahead

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Book of Hours, dusk, Entering the Silence, eyes, grace, hearts, holy expectation, joy, light, love, Peace, reflections, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, Thomas Merton, trial, truth

This morning I found a quote in Thomas Merton’s Book of Hours that I hope to remember as the day progresses. It is in his Wednesday reflections at dusk, so I thought that if I kept it in my heart and consciousness all day, maybe I could say the same as life unfolds and I arrive at evening.  It’s a new way to pay attention to the events of the day, a “holy expectation” perhaps – at least worth a try. Here is what he says:

Today, in a moment of trial, I rediscovered Jesus, or perhaps discovered him for the first time. I came closer than ever to fully realizing how true it is that our relations with Jesus are something utterly beyond the level of imagination and emotion. His eyes, which are the eyes of Truth, are fixed upon my heart. Where his glance falls, there is peace; for the light of His Face, which is the Truth, produces truth wherever it is found. There too is joy: and he says to those he loves, I will fix my eyes upon you. His eyes are always on us everywhere and in all times. No grace comes to us from heaven except He looks upon our hearts. (Entering the Silence) 

May our travels through this day be suffused with the joy of seeking Truth and recognizing it when it is found. Safe travels, everyone!

 

 

 

 

 

The Whole Truth

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Book of Hours, death, divine values, falsity, God's truth, hypocrisy, integrity, let go, lies, life, love, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, Thomas Merton, Tower of Babel

Today after reading about the tower of Babel I was reminded of the newly-coined phrase in our culture of “fake news” and turned for solace to Thomas Merton’s Book of Hours. In the Friday reflections, I found a worthy reminder for the day, actually a composite from two of Merton’s texts. I believe it is appropriate and is “enough said.”

No matter what happens, I feel myself more and more closely united with those who, everywhere, devote themselves to the glory of God’s truth, to the search for divine values hidden among the poor and outcast, to the love of that cultural heritage without which [man] cannot be healthy. The air of the world is foul with lies, hypocrisy, falsity, and life is short, death approaches. We must devote ourselves with generosity and integrity to the real values: there is no time for falsity and compromise. But on the other hand we do not have to be greatly successful or even well known. It is enough for our integrity to be known to God. What we do that is pure in His sight will avail for the liberty, the enlightenment, and the salvation of His children everywhere. (The Courage for Truth 188)

Let go of all that seems to suggest getting somewhere, being someone, having a name or a voice, following a policy and directing people in “my ways.” What matters is to love. (Learning to Love, 15)

 

 

 

 

 

 

Music Is Power!

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Alleluia, ancient songs, balm, cosmic dance, global consciousness, music, psalm 149, singing, singing for joy, spiritual power, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, Thomas Merton

Like many people in this rather dismal month – both meteorologically and politically – I haven’t spent much time “singing for joy,” as the psalms often say. I was reminded of that by Psalm 149 this morning. In fact, each of the last five psalms in the Psalter begins with the word Alleluia! (italicized here to remind us that it is impossible to say or sing that word in a manner grumpy or dull). The line that piqued my attention read (in alternative translation) “Never stop singing, for music is power.” (vs. 6) Reading the attached commentary pushed me even further toward reflection on the power of music to lift the spirits of those who sing. Here’s what I read:

…the spiritual power of music is able to accomplish things that appear impossible to the rational mind. Music has strange effects upon the minds and hearts of human beings…Has beauty ever “cut to the heart” of your own soul? Has music ever “stricken” you so that you simply cannot remain any longer in a particular state of being or consciousness? (Ancient Songs Sung Anew)

I grew up with music and singing in my home and my church. It is an integral part of all rituals, be they weddings, funerals or holiday events. When I’m driving, if I choose to break the silence that more and more becomes important when I am alone, my choice of CD is not random; I always opt for what will be of greatest benefit to my spirit. And it isn’t just for me. I remember the effect of the “We Are the World” concert many years ago that was so powerful to so many and brought us back to global consciousness whenever we heard the theme of the event and were motivated to join the “cosmic dance,” as Thomas Merton urges us.

So today I will urge myself and everyone to “sing praise to God with timbrel and harp” so as to remember that music can be a great balm to the soul.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Our Call Today

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actively participate, compassion, destiny, freedom, New Seeds of Contemplation, respect, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, Thomas Merton, truth, vocation

I return to this reflective task from an extraordinary outpouring of care that included not only family solidarity but also the prayer and compassion of two faith communities – one Roman Catholic and one Presbyterian – who embraced us because of their experience of my cousin, Paul, and his wife, Janice. Celebrating Paul’s earthly existence and his entry into new life in God, I was not surprised by welcome in two Christian denominations; I presumed hospitality at such an event. There was something deeper there, however. It seemed, rather than two, we were experiencing one seamless worship service because of the respect, compassion and real love that was palpable throughout the day.

Last evening I participated in an interfaith prayer service in anticipation of today’s national elections. Although it was held in a Catholic Church, the prayer and reflections were offered equally by a Jewish rabbi (a woman) and two Christian pastors of different denominations. Again I was struck by the deep sense of common purpose of the gathered community.

I take these experiences into this monumentally important day and carry as well the words of Thomas Merton whose reflections seem fitting for this moment.

 Our vocation is not simply to be, but to work together with God in the creation of our own life, our own identity, our own destiny. This means to say that we should not passively exist, but actively participate in His creative freedom, in our own lives, and in the lives of others by choosing the truth. (New Seeds of Contemplation, 32-33, excerpted)

Transient Sensitivity

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darkness, God, immensity, light, reality, sensitivity, Son, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, Thomas Merton, Thoughts In Solitude, transient expression, transient sensitivity

The first time I came out of sleep this morning into a still-dark world where ice crystals were bouncing off my window panes I was reminded of my dentist appointment three days ago. When he greeted me and asked me how I was upon entering the room, I just answered “transient sensitivity.” The hygienist who had just cleaned my teeth (read: picked and prodded) looked quizzical but the doc nodded and said, “Ahh, your sinuses…”

When I moved 45 years ago to this lovely valley located in the Southern Tier of New York State, I was told that it is known for the propensity of sinus conditions and I was warned that it would take about five years for me to join the ranks of those so “blessed.” I came to understand the condition but have only experienced it as mild discomfort when inclement weather is the order of the day. Lately, however, I know when storms are coming because my teeth begin to ache. Thinking I had a cavity recently, or more likely an exposed nerve in one of my teeth, I had an interesting visit to the dentist where he did everything he could to locate the difficulty, finally concluding that it was the above-mentioned transient sensitivity. In other words, my aging sinuses were talking to the aging nerves close by and predicting stormy weather.

That’s the long introduction to my thoughts this morning about my state of being. While it is true that my teeth are reminding me of what I see and hear outside my window, I was comparing the term to how I was feeling inside when I turned to Thomas Merton and read the following paragraph.

O great God, Father of all things, Whose infinite light is darkness to me, Whose immensity to me is as the void, You have called me forth out of Yourself because You love me in Yourself, and I am a transient expression of Your inexhaustible and eternal reality. I could not know You, I would be lost in this darkness, I would fall away from You into this void, if You did not hold me to Yourself in the Heart of Your only begotten Son. (Thoughts In Solitude, 71).

Call it synchronicity, call it a meaningless musing from a foggy mind, but for me this word from Merton will take me through the day in gratitude.

 

 

 

 

 

 

In the End Is the Beginning

Tags

infinite love, silence, simplicity, spiritual lives, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, Thomas Merton, visionary seeing, Wisdom School

As we prepare to end the extraordinary experience that has been our Visionary Seeing Wisdom School at noon today, I am grateful for the level of participation and the quality of the silence that has guided us through these days. The sharing has been deep and meaningful, allowing us to go beneath our words and actions in ways that give new insight and enthusiasm for our spiritual lives. What it feels like to me seems akin to what Thomas Merton offered me this morning when I read the following:

My only desire is to give myself completely to the action of this infinite love Who is God, Who demands to transform me into Himself secretly, darkly, in simplicity, in a way that has no drama about it and is infinitely beyond everything spectacular and astonishing, so is its significance and its power. (Entering the Silence, p. 48)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sorrowful Mother

Tags

childbirth, children, dolors, Jesus, motherhood, mothers, Our Lady of Sorrows, Peace, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, Thomas Merton

Although I have never birthed a child I have, in my years of teaching and then ministering in a parish, come to understand the joys and sorrows of motherhood. I have watched mothers love their children through celebratory days in church and school and family life. I have listened to mothers lament behaviors that they did not understand in the lives and loves of their adult children and on occasion I have suffered with them because I loved their children too. Love has a way of breaking us open both in joy and sorrow, taking us out of ourselves to a greater capacity than we could ever imagine in ourselves.

Today is the feast of Our Lady or Sorrows, formerly called by the Church “the Seven Sorrows (or Dolors) of the Blessed Mother.” No wonder so many mothers have devotion to Mary. Just think of what she went through with Jesus! I don’t often think of the everyday life of Mary: the immediate connection that she had when she first held Jesus in her arms, how she felt when he said his first word or took his first step, the pride she must have had as he grew and when she heard him preach…We only have what the gospels and Tradition have recorded for us and know few of her moments of fear for him or her intense grieving at his crucifixion. Can you even imagine her joy and the tenderness between them in their meetings after the Resurrection? There is a lot to imagine and we are able to do so because of our own experiences of such love as she had for her son.

So again today I find myself praying for mothers, in all their moments of light and dark, of peace and pressure to “give in,” in all their woe and willingness. I pray that they may know a certainty that I read this morning in a short prayer verse of Thomas Merton: O God of holiness, grant us to seek peace where it is truly found! In your will, O God, is our peace!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Love Incarnate

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all in, Angelic Mistakes: the Art of Thomas Merton, celebration, Christ, commentary, drawing, emptying Himself, God, happiness, Incarnation, life, marriage, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, Thomas Merton

One of the books on the “Merton shelf” of the bookcase that is directly to the left of my bedroom rocker is entitled Angelic Mistakes: the Art of Thomas Merton. The book really needs a deeper shelf to house it as it sticks out beyond its neighbors, begging to be noticed. It has a double value because it offers not only a large selection of what Merton himself called a collection of shapes, powers, flying beasts, cave animals, bloodstains, angelic mistakes, etc., that can perhaps have some visual effect on the local bisons…but also significant commentary and quotes to accompany each of the drawings. I have flagged some of those pages of quotes that are significant to me and was drawn again this morning to one of them that included the following:

In emptying Himself to come into the world, God has not simply kept in reserve, in a safe place, His reality and manifested a kind of shadow or symbol of Himself. He has emptied  Himself and is all in Christ…Christ is not simply the tip of the little finger of the Godhead, moving in the world, easily withdrawn, never threatened, never really risking anything. God has acted and given Himself totally, without division, in the Incarnation. He has become not only one of us but even our very selves.

Last night I had the privilege of gathering with 11 women, all of whom had worked together for all or part of the past 15 years. (I left my position but not my connection six years ago.) We have worked, prayed and played together and watched our lives and the lives of our families unfold together as women are in the habit of doing, more or less, in such a situation. Last night we were celebrating one of us, soon to be married, in a joyous, playful extravaganza of good food, good gifts and deep, deep happiness. I was reminded of the above quote as I reflected this morning on our party. There have been tragedies and illnesses and great sorrow in the lives of all of us over the years – some very recent and raw – but nothing was able to dampen the spirit of love for our sister, Theresa, and one another that was palpable throughout the evening. We were “all in” – God incarnate – as one single manifestation of divine love. Even in writing that last sentence I feel the shocking nature of it. How bold it is! How dangerous to talk like that…and yet I have come to understand, through such experiences as this, the possibility of total letting go of personal interest in the draw of love’s selflessness. There was nothing of ego in the room last night; we were all engaged in the purpose for which we were gathered and moved as a unit to make it happen. It was a glorious dance and will stand for me as a  touchstone of God’s love incarnate for a long time to come. And, as an old “folk Mass” song says, “And all we have to offer You is thanks. All we have to offer You is thanks.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

One More Wake Up Call

Tags

charity, contemplation, corruption, divisions, mystic, news, Peace, prophets, saints, sanctity, solace, spiritual maturity, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, Thomas Merton, violence

It is sometimes counter-productive to read the news in the morning. I don’t often do so before taking up this writing task. I should always move toward what I know to be my priorities. After twenty minutes or so this morning of breaking my own rule and falling deeper into distress, I moved away from stories of corruption, violence and division in the world and turned to Thomas Merton for solace. Here is what he gave me as a motivational word for today:

If the salvation of society depends, in the long run, on the moral and spiritual health of individuals, the subject of contemplation becomes a vastly important one, since contemplation is one of the indications of spiritual maturity. It is closely allied to sanctity. You cannot save the world merely with a system. You cannot have peace without charity. You cannot have social order without saints, mystics and prophets. (A Thomas Merton Reader, p. 375)

 

 

 

 

 

 

Finding Ourselves

Tags

God, identity, inner room, Kathleen Deignan, masks, Matthew, New Seeds of Contemplation, point vierge, praayer, salvation, secret, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, Thomas Merton

It happened again this morning! I read the gospel passage that instructs us on how to go about praying so as not to be swayed by the desire for approval. (MT 6:1-6, 16-18) It tells us to go to your inner room, close the door and pray to your Father in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will repay you. That reminded me of Thomas Merton’s reference to what he calls the point vierge, that space in us that no one (even we ourselves) can access – only God can. I knew the quote originally found in Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander appeared also in Kathleen Deignan’s book Thomas Merton: A Book of Hours, so I pulled the book as I did yesterday with Macrina Wiederkehr. Again I found what I didn’t know I was to read. This time the book jacket flap gave it to me. It wasn’t what I was looking for but it certainly was what answered my need for coherence of thought. Merton was talking about vocation, our identity in God, and among other things, he says this:

…we are even called to share with God the work of creating the truth of our identity. We can evade this responsibility by playing with masks, and this pleases us because it can appear at times to be a free and creative way of living. It is quite easy, it seems, to please everyone. But in the long run the cost and the sorrow come very high. To work out our own identity in God, which the Bible calls “working out our salvation,” is a labor that requires sacrifice and anguish, risk and many tears. It demands close attention to reality at every moment, and great fidelity to God as He reveals Himself, obscurely, in the mystery of each new situation.

We do not know clearly beforehand what the result of this work will be. The secret of my full identity is hidden in God. God alone can make me who I am, or rather who I will be when at last I fully begin to be. But unless I desire this identity and work to find it with God and in God, the work will never be done. The way of doing it is a secret I can learn from no one else but God. There is no way of attaining to the secret without faith. But contemplation is the greater and more precious gift, for it enables me to see and understand the work that God wants done. (New Seeds of Contemplation, p. 32-33, excerpted)