Category Archives: dry, dark, distracted prayer
Walking and loving in darkness
Catherine Doherty writes about the love that finds us in the darkness: Through faith we are able to turn our faces to God and meet his gaze. Each day becomes more and more luminous. The veil between God and man becomes less and less until it seems as if we can almost reach out and …
“It is easy, nonetheless, to run for the shade.”
I thought I might entice you by a quote or two from Contemplative Provocations by Fr. Donald Haggerty. (I’d really like to quote the whole book!) Contemplative prayer is initiated undramatically–one might say in a concealed, subtle, confusing manner. One symptom is a dry discomfort in prayer like the bodily ache of a fever that does …
The deaf musician
St. Francis de Sales, whose feast we celebrate today, has so many wonderful stories. Here is one of my favorites: “One of the world’s finest musicians, who played the lute to perfection, in a brief time became so extremely deaf that he completely lost the use of hearing. However, in spite of that he did …
Be it understood
“Be it understood and remembered that the darkness of trials is not evil, that dryness of spirit is not sin, and that confusion of mind is not malice. They are invitations to patience, calls to resignation, beckonings to the healing Cross, and admonitions to be humble and obedient to the will of God.” William Ullathorne …
An even greater fullness of His love
These days my prayer is FULL of distractions. I remember two things to help me. One is advice from St. Francis de Sales. He says that when we encounter distractions, the best thing to do is to gently bring our minds back to the Lord. I think often our temptation when we find ourselves thinking …
“Strengthened by Faith”
It may happen that for a certain time a man is illumined and refreshed by God’s grace, and then this grace is withdrawn. This makes him inwardly confused and he starts to grumble; instead of seeking through steadfast prayer to recover his assurance of salvation, he loses patience and gives up. He is like a …
The dry places
Ps 105.41 He opened the rock, and water gushed forth; it flowed through the desert like a river. Have any of us any dry places? They may be out of sight of even loving eyes. We may be ashamed to think there are such places when we have so much to fill our lives with …
“But I do not know how to love the Lord any more!”
Dipping into my past journals, I am finding many quotes on prayer. Here’s one by Fr. Gabriel of St. Mary Magdalene: It [the soul] should learn to be content to remain int he presence of the Lord, attending to Him simply with a regard full of love. It should remain there to keep Him company, …
“You don’t see Him, but He is there.”
You know, most of the time–as I freely admit in the sidebar–I am writing these posts mainly for myself. This is a post I actually wrote quite awhile ago, but somehow never posted. Again, we hear from Amy Carmichael. This seems to be taken from a letter she wrote in response to someone else’s, someone …
“Our wound is the place where God dwells”
I did a series of posts on Fr. Iain Matthew’s writing back in July. I have been re-reading him again. He’s one of the people I go back to regularly–especially if I’m experiencing some kind of pain. Because pain is precisely where, Fr. Iain says, Christ is waiting to meet us. “The place of poverty …
