Walking and loving in darkness

Sr. Dorcee, belovedLeave a comment

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 touch God.

Faith is a pulsating thing; a light, a sun that nothing can dim if it exists in the hearts of men.  That’s why it’s so beautiful.  God gives it to me saying, “I love you.  Do you love me back?  Come and follow me in the darkness.  I want to know if you are ready to go into the things that you do not see yet, on faith alone.”

Then you look at God, or at what you think is God in your mind, and you say, “Look, this is fine, but you’re inviting me to what?  An emptiness?  A nothingness?  There is nothing to see.  I cannot touch you.  I cannot feel you.”  Then God goes on to say, “I invite you to a relationship of love: your love of me, my love of you.”  Yes, God comes to us as an invitation to love. . . .

At this moment love surges in our heart like a tremendous sea that takes us in and lays us in the arms of God whom we haven’t seen but in whom we believe.  Across the waves we hear, “Blessed are they who have not seen and yet believe” (John 20.29).  Now I walk in the darkness of faith and I see.  I see more clearly than is possible with my fleshly eyes.

(Catherine Doherty, Re-entry into Faith: “Courage–be not afraid!”)

“It is easy, nonetheless, to run for the shade.”

Sr. Dorcee, belovedLeave a comment

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 not subside.  The aridity contrast with the prior experience of prayer, when a consoling sense of God’s presence was enjoyed.  Now there is little felt contact with God, nothing savored in emotion.  God seems to disappear more and more into hiding.  Other symptoms as well seem incongruous as signs of growth in prayer.  A focused attention on Our Lord becomes difficult. Noisy distractions disturb prayer.  Petty concerns interfere with prayer and replace quiet reflections about God.  The gospel pages no long offer vivid attraction.  Anxious thoughts and unwelcome memories intrude, and the mind is unable to settle down.  The struggle for an attentive silence and some serenity can burden an entire period of prayer.  The sense of being alone, somehow separated from God, unable to prayer, does not let up.

The return each day to silent prayer in this condition means to face the discomfort of silence.  There can be a strong temptation to give up prayer or to find some activity in silent prayer to counter frustration.  A more superficial prayer can be adopted which discards the effort of listening in silence to God.  One might opt, for instance, to spend time in prayer simply reading.  In that case the dryness and distraction may lift to a degree because they are less noticed.  This may seem to restore relations with God.  It would be a poor exchange, however, a step backward.  The soul would forfeit a grace it was beginning to taste of a deeper thirst for God.  The thirst of the soul for God is stronger in the desert.  It is easy, nonetheless, to run for the shade.

Cast your anchor deep

Sr. Dorcee, belovedLeave a comment

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Keep up good courage.  Evil thoughts have come?  Then let them come and let them go.  Be at peace; think no more about it, but turn your heart straight to God.  Make no parley with your temptation, but just let it alone.  By debating about it in your mind, you shall suffer more misery than the demon itself has caused you.  All this trouble comes from excessive despondency, which may end by his suggesting despair, and saying: Everything you do is vain and useless–you are lost forever.

The thing to do in such a case is to cast “all care upon God” and rest in him.  Turn to the eternal God with unshaken trust in his goodness and mercy.  Do as mariners do when threatened with shipwreck -cast your anchor deep down to the bottom of God’s love and grace.  Place your confidence firmly in God our Lord.  If it comes even to the end of life, and a man in deep distress shall but anchor all his hopes in God and die in that mind, it is truly a happy and a holy death.

Children, be well assured that a really godly man must dwell in the practice of divine hope just as much as in any other of the divine virtues; and that is a great help to him when at last he comes to meet death.  But this must not be a false and deceitful confidence in God, trusting in which a man presumes to lead a sinful life; for whosoever trusts in God and on the strength of that lives wickedly, sins against the Holy Spirit.  The confidence in God that I mean springs from the depths of true humility and love.  It is based on consciousness of one’s helplessness; it is a most reasonable recognition of the need of God’s help; it is part of a true and full and joyful conversion to God; for whosoever gives himself up to God loves and trusts God sincerely.

(John Tauler)