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Prayer

Today’s Word: Immanuel

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Pieta at St. John Vianney Church, Sedona, Arizona. SJG photo.

Immanuel, as one of those words that scripture (both the old and new testaments) gives us for Jesus, gets pretty short shrift in our prayer life. We sing about Immanuel during advent, “ransoming captive Israel” and all that. We hear the name a few times during the Christmas season. But by the New Year the word seemingly disappears and gets put away in the attic with the rest of the Christmas decorations, stuffed in between the three wise men and the inflatable Santa.

Immanuel deserves better. In fact, Jesus can be best defined by this one word, Paul Coutinho said this past weekend. Immanuel means “God with us,” and we would be hard pressed to think of a better way to address Jesus in prayer than with this name that reminds us that God is not “up there, somewhere,” but rather right here, with us and in us. It’s a beautiful, prayerful name that flows easily from our lips, reminding us that God is as close to us as our breath itself. It’s time to bring Immanuel out of the attic, dust off the tinsel, and make him a part of our everyday prayer life.

Ask yourself in silence: Where do I picture God when I pray — off in the distance or nearer than my own breath?

Today’s Word: Commingle

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I just returned from a short two-day retreat led by Paul Coutinho, an internationally recognized Ignatian scholar, author and speaker who brings an Eastern influence to Western Christian spirituality. Suffice it to say I took enough notes that I have plenty of “Today’s Words” already lined up for next week or so. Thanks to Paul Coutinho and the Bridges Foundation for putting on the retreat at the beautiful and historic St. Joseph Sisters of Carondelet Motherhouse in South St. Louis.

Commingled Light. Captured as the rays of the sun came through the stained-glass windows of the chapel at the CSJ Motherhouse in South St. Louis and projected on a nearby wall. SJG photo.

Today’s Word: Commingle

The ultimate goal of prayer, according to Ignatius, is to “commingle with the divine.” What a beautiful way to think about prayer. Prayer is not, with this understanding, about talking to God or praising God or even placing ourselves in the presence of God. It is about being so intertwined with God that you can’t tell us apart, so to speak. This commingling is love, and this love is a mutual exchange between the lover (God) and the beloved (that’s us!) In this exchange we empty ourselves to make room for God, and then God fills us back up with his presence.

Our commingling with God, Coutinho explained, is like looking at the rays of the sun and the sun itself. There is no way to tell the difference because it is all one. In this sense we echo St. Paul’s words to the Galatians: “It is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me.” (Galatians 2:20) The challenge for us, of course, is whether we are willing to leave ourselves open to such an exchange.

Ask yourself in silence: Am I willing to give up all I hold dear in order to make room for God? Can I pray, “Take, Lord, receive, all I have and possess?”

Today’s Word: Patience

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Waiting, on Lamma Island, near Hong Kong, 2008. SJG photo.

Pierre Teilhard de Chardin once wrote:

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.

(to read the entire poem, visit IgnatianSpirituality.com)

When I was young, I was not a patient person. If I had an idea, I wanted to act on it. If a gift was coming I wanted it as soon as possible. And I couldn’t possibly see into the future to the time when I could do all the things I knew I wanted to do — meet the perfect girl, graduate from high school, go to college, start a family and career…

But time and faith have shown me over and over, as Robert Frost reminds us, that “way leads on to way.” Our job is to get up every day and pay attention, watching for the directional signs and fellow travelers that God puts into our lives. For inherent in this idea of being patient with God and with our lives is the idea of trust. If we’re going to wait, if we’re going to place our lives and our futures in the hands of someone we cannot see, we have to trust that, in fact, that someone is present in our lives, caring and moving and working in us and through us. God is there pointing the way, if we are quiet and still enough to notice.

Ask yourself in silence:  What am I waiting for in my life? Do I trust enough to be patient in God’s “slow work?”

Today’s Word: Morning

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"Morning Calls," by b. burk

I remember being a young adult on retreat in the late ‘70s at the Marianist retreat center just outside of St. Louis. Each morning we were awakened to the sound of Dan Fogelberg singing through the speakers in our rooms: “And it’s going to be a day/there is really no way to say ‘no’ to the morning…” But we tried (to say no)! I’m still not a morning person, and it was only in the past year or so that my wife and I committed to getting up (most) mornings to attend daily mass at 7. It’s still not easy to pry myself out of bed, but once I’m up I’m good to go for the day. It’s a blessing, however bleary-eyed.

That engagement with the morning is exactly the reason that Deacon Bruce Burk published his book: “Morning Calls.” Published by Railroad Street Press and available for sale online, the book is a simple, eloquent, seven-day retreat leading to greater awareness of self and God. Bruce’s short reflections for each day embrace the daily cycle of sunrises as an opportunity for a fresh restart – a chance to begin again. Each day’s reflection is accompanied by one of his sunrise photos, each seemingly more dazzling than the last. The photos capture the warm welcome of the sun while the text guides the reader into an introspective approach to the day. He writes in the book’s introduction:

Morning allows one to start fresh, a new start, after yesterday’s missed opportunities. It’s a gift that many miss. It is the time to smile and say, “Today I can do it.” It’s a time to reflect and start anew, a time to make a mental list or plan. Morning is that opportunity to put our reflections into action. It is the time to celebrate what went right the day before and perhaps do it again. It is the perfect time to “be.”

Indeed, there’s no way to say “no” to the morning, but there is a way to embrace it and welcome it. This little book is a nice introduction to doing just that.

Ask yourself in silence: How do I welcome each day?

Today’s Word: Prayer

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Angel in prayer, St. Louis Basilica Cathedral. SJG photo.

Prayer is a big word with a myriad of meanings. St. Ignatius Loyola wrote that, “everything that turns a person in the direction of God is prayer.” So what turns me toward God? Let me count the ways: Silence, of course, but also great music, which is just about opposite of silence (although there’s lots of silence in a great piece of music). Good spiritual reading, whether scripture or something more contemporary. A walk in the woods. Staring at the night sky. Going to church. Both being alone and being with good friends. Quietly contemplating my life and God’s movement in it. Singing at the top of my lungs. Holding my wife or children or grandchild. Reciting prayers I have known for years and which have been prayed for hundreds or even thousands of years. Or just talking to God as if he was an old friend sitting beside me on the couch — someone who knows me better than I know myself.

I’ve talked to people who tell me they do not know how to pray or that they “can’t pray.” But that is perhaps because they think there is some way that they are “supposed” to pray. To that I say (one of my favorite words): Balderdash. Prayer, to play off Ignatius’ thought, is turning your attention to God while doing something that you probably already enjoy doing — walking, listening to music, writing in your journal, sitting quietly. That part’s up to you. God doesn’t care. Perhaps the best piece of advice on prayer I ever heard came from the English priest and writer, John Chapman. He wrote (and oh, how this makes sense): “Pray as you can, not as you can’t.”

Ask yourself in silence: What am I doing when I feel closest to God? How can I pray?

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