Thought I would start a new thread to remedy the other one. To start, I am going to say one of the "jobs" we have as Catholics is to continually turn the faculty of attention to God. If we continually turn to the negative, it becomes a habit and everything gets way way harder. We also plant in the Garden of our being what we are attentive to. So we are either planting Christ or we are planting that which is not Christ. Weeds and thorns generate their own fruit too. The problem is that it is way way easier to turn to the negative than it is to the positive. One of the attributes Jesus tells us about God is that only He is Good. What is amazing, especially for those of us who love to garden, is that we can constantly tend to Christ within ourselves. Eventually Christ bears fruit too! Psalm 1, my favorite Psalm, talks all about this. So does the new testament, it even is spoken of in the old testament.
Psalm 123:2-4 2 Behold, as the eyes of servants look to the hand of their masters, As the eyes of a maid to the hand of her mistress, So our eyes look to the Lord our God, Until He has mercy on us. Yes we must be in a constant state of prayer. Praying without ceasing. Thessalonians 5:16-18 16 Rejoice always, 17 pray without ceasing, 18 give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you. This sounds humanly impossible, but the Holy Spirit makes it possible. Romans 8:15-17 The Spirit you received does not make you slaves, so that you live in fear again; rather, the Spirit you received brought about your adoption to sonship. And by him we cry, “ Abba, Father.” The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children. Now if we are children, then we are heirs—heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory. Basically it about being adopted back into the family of the Holy Trinity. The Orthodox talk about us becoming human again. All true happiness stems from this adoption into the family of the Trinity. All sadness from sin, from refusing this adoption.
I am currently doing another retreat, this one being something of a silent one. I gotta say that I much prefer retreats to destination vacations. In fact, I always have. We did do some lectio as a group last night on the beatitudes. And, it shocked me how the pure of heart will see God. It dawned on me how much Jesus is calling us to have a clean heart. No judgements, resentments, praying for enemies, blessing enemies, avoiding lust and so on. It's like we will never see God if we have dark eyes. Thorny thoughts/habits if you will. You guys probably all already know this, but it is incredible to me. Everything just keeps connecting. How wonderful to be Catholic.
I just got back from a silent retreat two weeks ago. Discalced Carmelites. We had over 150 Seculars from two states. So deep and prayerful. Our conference speaker was a Carmelite Friar from Washington DC. He is on YouTube, Br. John Mary of Christ Crucified. Our theme was Saint Elizabeth of the Trinity. It was truly a blessing and so many Graces.
\When I was young our Retreats were always silent. I thought that was the only kind there were. My life is kind of a non stop Retreat now. But I love doing pilgrimages at the minute. Little days out. I think it is good to do something different spiritually from time to time , to change the Script if you will. To shake things up a little. To toss the spiritual dice.
