Retreats: a small cell to meet with God

By Carlos X.

 

 

 

Christ’s prayer in the Garden of Gethsemane on the eve of His crucifixion is poignant because of its devastating description of the agony of the Lord as He was about to make His ultimate sacrifice.  His fleeting fancy, “If it is possible, let this cup pass” and subsequent, solemn affirmation, “If this cup cannot pass by me, but I must drink it, your will be done” (St. Matthew 26:42), is a powerful testament to Christ’s love for humanity and obedience to the will of God.  It is also an important illustration of the value of the spiritual retreat as a source of fortitude in Christian life.

Archbishop Óscar A. Romero of El Salvador is said to have had his moment in the Garden during a spiritual retreat just weeks before his March 1980 assassination.  “I want this retreat to join me more closely to His will,” Romero wrote in his notes for that retreat.  Romero was an enthusiastic advocate of spiritual retreats.  “In everyone’s heart there is, as it were, a small intimate cell where God is able to speak with everyone individually,” he had preached to his flock upon taking up his ministry three years before.  “If every one of us who are so concerned about so many different problems and situations were to enter this ‘small cell’ and from there listen to the voice of the Lord who speaks to us in our conscience, how much more would we be able to do to better our situation and the situation of our society and family,” he said.

 

Continue reading at Carlos' blog Super Martyrio.

Vacation meditation

By Carlos X.

St. Damien, before he set off for Hawaii (Wikipedia).

Staring intently at the sun setting behind Molokai, from Maui, where I was on vacation with my family this summer, was, for me, a religious experience (the two Hawaiian islands are only 7.5 miles apart).  The sunset has since time immemorial been a spiritual hour for Christians: the Vespers have been recited at this time since at least the 4th century; the glorious refraction of the sun’s light across the sky creates a natural stained glass window, and the fall of darkness recalls the hour of the death on the Cross.  Going on vacation can take us out of our normal schedule, threatening to disrupt our prayer life.<  But powerful moments such as the sunset—which happens every day, and being on vacation may leave us more at liberty to observe—can provide an opportunity to keep up our prayer life and indeed enrich it.

One way to seize upon such unplanned and unexpected moments is meditation—that “freestyle” form of conversation with God, which differs from regular prayer in that prayer attempts to articulate in words our needs and praise, while meditation “engages thought, imagination, emotion, and desire.” 

[Catechism of the Catholic Church, §2708.]  It is often said that meditation in the Christian sense involves an active process—engaging the mind through thought, imagery, reflection, etc.—whereas “eastern” forms of meditation often involve “emptying” oneself of these.  Catholics may turn to these other techniques for “a path to interior peace and psychic balance,” but they are not effective substitutes for prayer. [Letter to the Bishops on Some Aspects of Christian Meditation, Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, J. Ratzinger, Prefect, 1989.]  “Christian prayer should go further: to the knowledge of the love of the Lord Jesus, to union with Him.”  [Catechism, supra.]

Continue reading at Carlos' blog Super Martyrio.

Overcoming distractions during prayer

By Carlos X.

St. Peter in Tears by Murillo (Wikimedia Commons).

"That labor of the intellect which we call meditation," wrote the Venerable Fr. Luis De La Puente (1554-1624), “is among the most difficult things about mental prayer.” We all know the reasons: “It is easy to have several things in mind at once, and to dash from one thing to another without order or concert, but it is very difficult to think about a single thing with concentration, with fixed memory and understanding of God, without diverting to or spilling over to other things; even the great Saints have this trouble sometimes, and they complain about it.”

Fr. La Puente prescribes four potent tools to avoid distractions during prayer:

• Profound humility
• Prayer itself
• Faith
• Spiritual fortitude

Fr. La Puente was the subject of Archbishop Óscar A. Romero’s thesis for his doctorate studies in theology.  Romero never obtained the degree but he put Fr. La Puente’s methods into practice. Fr. La Puente spurred the young Romero to strive to perfect his devotion.  “In recent days the Lord has inspired in me a great desire for holiness, after I had read some of Father La Puente,” Romero wrote in his diary in February 1943."I have been thinking of how far a soul can ascend if it lets itself be possessed entirely by God." But, like the saints that Fr. La Puente tells us had trouble concentrating during prayer, Archbishop Romero sometimes felt distracted.


Continue reading at Carlos' blog Super Martyrio.

Archbishop Romero and the Angelus

By Carlos X.

The Angelus by Millet

Archbishop Óscar A. Romero told his brother Tiberio that the secret to being happy in life was to pray the “Angelus.”  Tiberio recalled that his brother told him that he should make praying three Hail Marys in the morning and three again in the evening the axis around which to ground his day. Tiberio also attested to the efficacy of the practice, saying that he has lived to see old age and developed a strong Marian devotion, thanks to the wise spiritual counsel he received from his brother. Archbishop Romero gave the same advice he gave his own brother to all the faithful on May 7, 1978, when he announced that he was instituting the recitation of the “Angelus” in the archdiocese of San Salvador.

"With joy I want to announce that beginning this Sunday,” Archbishop Romero said, “at twelve noon we will pray the Angelus on our radio program.” Archbishop Romero would be glad to hear that the advice he gave his brother Tiberio led to his developing a Marian devotion because, Romero told the faithful, “True Catholics ought to be characterized by this devotion to the Mother of the Church.” 

We can think of three reasons Romero was devoted to the Angelus.

The first is its status as an authentic expression of the sensus fidei: it has a natural internal logic about it that suggests itself. In fact, the prayer arose just as Archbishop Romero prescribed it to his brother—as three Hail Marys, unadorned and unembellished, liturgically or theologically. This practice is first recorded in monasteries during the 11th Century—the monks would pray three Hail Marys during the evening bell. The three Hail Marys invoke the Three Persons of the Trinity, and immediately focus our thoughts, as do all Marian devotions, properly on God. Later, the practice became more widespread, and the custom arose of saying the Angelus in the morning, at noon, and in the evening—also, helping to naturally break up the day. One can see the practicality of doing this before the advent of clocks and watches. Jean-François Millet’s famous painting (shown) depicts peasants praying the Angelus out on a field. The Angelus as a staple of popular piety, of the simple wisdom of the people of God, and as a perennial spiritual practice in the history of Christianity, would have been enormously appealing to Archbishop Romero.


Continue reading at Carlos' blog Super Martyrio.