Life is filled with distractions and one of the most critical decisions we make from moment to moment is choosing what to focus on. Brain scientists have studied for years how our eyes and ears, along with our brain, filter out lots of background data. If they didn’t, our stress levels would be overwhelming, as we sought to process every sound, image, movement, and change in our immediate surroundings. Focus is essential lest we be overwhelmed.
It is the same in the spiritual life. Setting our focus on the Lord and His Kingdom is essential for us, lest the burdens, distractions, and trivialities of this world stress and overwhelm us. Daily prayer, ever deeper immersion in the truths of God, and practicing the presence of God are essential practices that help filter out the less important things.
The Lord has a plan to simplify our lives. He tells us not to serve two masters and to “fear” Him above all others. If we fear the Lord, we don’t really have to fear anyone else. If we do not fear him, we will fear ten thousand other people and things. If we serve the Lord, our life is simpler; if we do not, ten thousand masters with differing demands assail us.
Set your focus and simplify. The rose window at the upper right (from my parish) is a picture of this. The petals of the rose represent the many aspects of your life: family, vocation, career, etc. But at the center is Jesus, who is to unite and organize everything else.
Enjoy this interesting video, which has a surprising lesson to teach us about focus.
One of the bigger mistakes people make in reading Scripture is that they read it as a spectator. For them Scripture is a collection of stories and events that took place thousands of years ago. True enough, we are reading historical accounts.
But, truth be told these ancient stories are our stories. We are in the narrative. You are Abraham, Sarah, Moses, Deborah, Jeremiah, Ruth, Peter, Paul, Magdalene, Mother Mary, and, if you are prepared to accept it, you are also Jesus. As the narrative we read unfolds, we are in the story. We cannot simply watch what others say or do or answer. For what Peter and Magdalene and others did, we do. Peter denied and ran. So do we. Magdalene loved and never gave up, should should we. Magdalene had a sinful past and a promising future, so do we. Peter was passionate and had a temper so do we. But Peter also loved the Lord and ultimately gave his life for the Lord. So can we. Jesus suffered and died but rose again and ascended to glory. So have we and so will we.
The scriptures are our own story. We are in it. To read scripture as a mere spectator looking on is to miss the keynote. Scripture is our story.
In the light of this keynote there emerges another very important and powerful key to unlocking the text. The key is simply this: Answer the Question! Among the many things Jesus did, he asked a lot of questions! And whenever you read the Gospels and Jesus asks a question, answer it! Do not wait to see what Peter or Magdalene, or the Pharisees or the crowd say for an answer. You answer the question, in your own words. This brings Scripture powerfully alive.
So twenty years ago Bishop John Marshall, Bishop of Burlington VT., and later Springfield Mass compiled a book: But Who Do You Say That I Am? In the book he collected and listed all the questions Jesus asked in the Gospels. And he encourages us to answer the question. Bishop Marshall, in listing the question, gives extra verses for context and adds brief commentaries. However, I would like to list just the raw questions.
I will give the verse reference so you can look it up. But, unless you really think it necessary, avoid looking it up at first. Just let the question meet you where you are right now. The question may mean something for you that is very different that its original context. But that is OK. Just pick a question, read it, consider it and answer it, by talking to the Lord.
Read the list slowly, perhaps over days or weeks, often taking just one question at a time. I have attached a PDF version of the List here: 100 Questions that Jesus asked and YOU must answer. Again, ponder each question. Answer each question prayerfully and reflectively. This is not the complete list of questions but it is surely food for thought. Now, answer the questions:
100 Questions that Jesus asked and YOU must answer:
And if you greet your brethren only, what is unusual about that? Do not the unbelievers do the same? (Matt 5:47)
Can any of you by worrying add a single moment to your lifespan? Matt 6:27
Why are you anxious about clothes? Matt 6:28
Why do you notice the splinter in your brother’s eye yet fail to perceive the wooden beam in your own eye? (Matt 7:2)
Do people pick grapes from thornbushes or figs from thistles? (Matt 7:16)
Why are you terrified? (Matt 8:26)
Why do you harbor evil thoughts? (Matt 9:4)
Can the wedding guests mourn so long as the Bridegroom is with them? (Matt 9:15)
Do you believe I can do this? (Matt 9:28)
What did you go out to the desert to see? (Matt 11:8)
To what shall I compare this generation? (Matt 11:6)
Which of you who has a sheep that falls into a pit on the Sabbath will not take hold of it and lift it out? (Matt 12:11)
How can anyone enter a strong man’s house and take hold of his possessions unless he first ties up the strong man? (Matt 12:29)
You brood of vipers! How can you say god things when you are evil? (Matt 12:34)
Who is my mother? Who are my brothers? (Matt 12:48)
Why did you doubt? (Matt 14:31)
And why do you break the commandments of God for the sake of your tradition? (Matt 15:3)
How many loaves do you have? (Matt 15:34)
Do you not yet understand? (Matt 16:8)
Who do people say the Son of Man is? (Matt 16:13)
But who do you say that I am? (Matt 16:15)
What profit would there be for one to gain the whole world and forfeit his life and what can one give in exchange for his life? (Matt 16:26)
O faithless and perverse generation how long must I endure you? (Matt 17:17)
Why do you ask me about what is good? (Matt 19:16)
Can you drink the cup that I am going to drink? (Matt 20:22)
What do you want me to do for you? (Matt 20:32)
Did you never read the scriptures? (Matt 21:42)
Why are you testing me? (Matt 22:18)
Blind fools, which is greater, the gold or the temple that makes the gold sacred….the gift of the altar that makes the gift sacred? (Matt 23:17-19)
How are you to avoid being sentenced to hell? (Matt 23:33)
Why do you make trouble for the woman? (Matt 26:10)
Could you not watch for me one brief hour? (Matt 26:40)
Do you think I cannot call upon my Father and he will not provide me at this moment with more than 12 legions of angels? (Matt 26:53)
Have you come out as against a robber with swords and clubs to seize me? (Matt 26:53)
My God, My God, Why have you forsaken me? (Matt 27:46)
Why are you thinking such things in your heart? (Mark 2:8)
Is a lamp brought to be put under a basket or under a bed rather than on a lamp stand? (Mark 4:21)
Who has touched my clothes? (Mark 5:30)
Why this commotion and weeping? (Mark 5:39)
Are even you likewise without understanding? (Mark 7:18)
Why does this generation seek a sign? (Mark 8:12)
Do you not yet understand or comprehend? Are your hearts hardened? Do you have eyes and still not see? Ears and not hear? (Mark 8:17-18)
How many wicker baskets full of leftover fragments did you pick up? (Mark 8:19)
[To the Blind man] Do you see anything? (Mark 8:23)
What were arguing about on the way? (Mark 9:33)
Salt is good, but what if salt becomes flat? (Mark 9:50)
What did Moses command you? (Mark 10:3)
Do you see these great buildings? They will all be thrown down. (Mark 13:2)
Simon, are you asleep? (Mark 14:37)
Why were you looking for me? (Luke 2:49)
What are you thinking in your hearts? (Luke 5:22)
Why do you call me ‘Lord, Lord’ and not do what I command? (Luke 6:46)
Where is your faith (Luke 8:25)
What is your name? (Luke 8:30)
Who touched me? (Luke 8:45)
Will you be exalted to heaven? (Luke 10:15)
What is written in the law? How do you read it? (Luke 10:26)
Which of these three in your opinion was neighbor to the robber’s victim? (Luke 10:36)
Did not the maker of the outside also make the inside? (Luke 11:40)
Friend, who appointed me as your judge and arbiter? (Luke 12:14)
If even the smallest things are beyond your control, why are you anxious about the rest? (Luke 12:26)
Why do you not judge for yourself what is right? (Luke 12:57)
What king, marching into battle would not first sit down and decide whether with ten thousand troops he can successfully oppose another king marching upon him with twenty thousand troops? (Luke 14:31)
If therefore you are not trustworthy with worldly wealth, who will trust you with true wealth? (Luke 16:11)
Has none but this foreigner returned to give thanks to God? (Luke 17:18)
Will not God then secure the rights of his chosen ones who call out to him day and night? (Luke 18:7)
But when the Son of Man comes, will he find any faith on earth? (Luke 18:8)
For who is greater, the one seated a table or the one who serves? (Luke 22:27)
Why are you sleeping? (Luke 22:46)
For if these things are done when the wood is green, what will happen when it is dry? (Luke 23:31)
What are you discussing as you walk along? (Luke 24:17)
Was it not necessary that the Messiah should suffer these things and then enter his glory? (Luke 24:26)
Have you anything here to eat? (Luke 24:41)
What are you looking for? (John 1:38)
How does this concern of your affect me? (John 2:4)
You are a teacher in Israel and you do not understand this? (John 3: 10)
If I tell you about earthly things and you will not believe, how will you believe when I tell you of heavenly things? (John 3: 12)
Do you want to be well? (John 5:6)
How is it that you seek praise from one another and not seek the praise that comes from God? (John 5:44)
If you do not believe Moses’ writings how will you believe me? (John 5:47)
Where can we buy enough food for them to eat? (John 6:5)
Does this (teaching of the Eucharist) shock you? (John 6:61)
Do you also want to leave me? (John 6:67)
Why are you trying to kill me? (John 7:19)
Woman where are they, has no one condemned you? (John 8:10)
Why do you not understand what I am saying? (John 8:43)
Can any of you charge me with sin? (John 8:46)
If I am telling you the truth, why do you not believe me? (John 8:46)
Are there not twelve hours in a day? (John 11:9)
Do you believe this? (John 11:26)
Do you realize what I have done for you? (John 13:12)
Have I been with you for so long and still you do not know me? (John 14:9)
Whom are you looking for? (John 18:4)
Shall I not drink the cup the Father gave me? (John 18:11)
If I have spoken rightly, why did you strike me? (John 18:23)
Do you say [what you say about me] on your own or have others been telling you about me? (John 18:34)
Have you come to believe because you have seen me? (John 20:29)
Do you love me? (John 21:16)
What if I want John to remain until I come? (John 21:22)
What concern is it of yours? (John 21:22)
After all this you might have a few questions for God:
More often than not, the average Catholic thinks of the Commandments and the Christian moral life, as well as the spiritual life as a task, or list of tasks they must accomplish out of their own flesh power, or else they will face some negative consequence. Hence the moral life is seen by many as a drudgery and is carried out with little enthusiasm. Hence many will hear that they must be less angry, more generous, less vengeful, more chaste etc., and they think rules, and rules though necessary are uninspiring.
Few see the moral life as a magnificent vision of transformation in Christ and a portrait of a soul set on fire with love. More see the moral and spiritual life as a painful prescription more than a delightful description of what happens to the human person when Jesus Christ begins to live his life in them. Most see the most life as something thy must achieve rather than receive.
Of course “achievement” is neither grace, nor the gospel. And if salvation, transformation and perfection can be achieved, then who needs Christ?
Therefore, we must come to see the moral vision of the New Testament, with all its lofty and seemingly impossible demands as a description of what God will do for us, rather than a prescription of what we must do by our unaided flesh.
Consider the first and greatest commandment that we should Love God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength (Deut 6:5). Frankly most people, (in their flesh), have a hard time loving God. They find prayer tedious, and are lukewarm at best in their affection for God. Mass, Scripture, prayer and so forth seem boring endeavors to them and, though they find time for everything else, God often gets no time, or, at best, the leftovers of the day.
On hearing that they should love God, some will attempt to rouse themselves to “do better.” But the results are usually pretty discouraging, since they are usually attempts made out of the flesh which is inimical to God (cf Rom 8:7).
How then shall we get there? How does the human person attain to the normal Christian life which is to have a tender and intense love for God?
Consider the following passage from one of the lesser known Eastern Fathers of the Church:
Anyone who loves God in the depths of his heart has already been loved by God. In fact, the measure of a man’s love for God depends upon how deeply aware he is of God’s love for him. When this awareness is keen it makes whoever possesses it long to be enlightened by the divine light, and this longing is so intense that it seems to penetrate his very bones. He loses all consciousness of himself and is entirely transformed by the love of God.
Such a man lives in this life and at the same time does not live in it, for although he still inhabits his body, he is constantly leaving it in spirit because of the love that draws him toward God. Once the love of God has released him from self-love, the flame of divine love never ceases to burn in his heart and he remains united to God by an irresistible longing.
From the treatise On Spiritual Perfection by St. Diadochus of Photice, bishop
(Cap. 12. 13. 14: PG 65, 1171-1172)
What St. Diadochus is describing here is the normal Christian life. Here the word “normal” is not used in the numerary sense that “most people attain this,” but in the sense of “what is to be expected.” How could it be that if Jesus Christ is living his life in us we would have anything less than a tender and longing love for God?
And note how Diadochus says this love begins in our experience of God’s love for us. Experience here means more than intellectual assent to the statement that “God loves me.” Rather, experience means just that, experience, to actually know, in a first hand way, and to witness the power and tenderness of God’s love for me. As it finally begins to dawn on us that the Son of God died for us, our hearts are steeped in God’s love. Yes, it finally begins to dawn on us that the Father’s providential love for us is unlimited and magnificent. Being filled with that love we now gain a joy, an affection, a serenity and an tender love of growing intensity for God.
More and more we delight to think of him, speak with him and simply sit quietly in contemplative union with God. And thus we journey, by stages to the normal Christian life, which is to have a deep affection and tender love and abiding desire for God.
Go to the Cross of Christ and ask this gift. Ask for the desire for this gift, if you don’t even have that. But ask, seek, knock. Our love for God is not, and cannot be our work. It is God’s work in us. And all He needs to get started is your “yes.” The door to your heart must be opened from the inside. Let God enter, and let him go to work filling you with his love.
Back in Seminary days we would often study the question of authorship when it came to books of the Bible. Especially in modern times there are extensive debates about such things. I remember being annoyed at the question in most cases since I didn’t really care who the Holy Spirit gave the text to, in the end, God was the author.
I was also annoyed at some of the premises used to reject authorship. For example, it was widely held by modern scholars that St. Paul couldn’t possibly be the author of the the Pastoral Epistles (1 & 2 Timothy, Titus) since the description of the Church was “far too developed” to have been written prior to 65 AD. Never mind that the Acts of the Apostles describes many of the “dubious” hierarchal elements (presbyters (e.5. Acts 14:23), deacons (e.g. acts 6:3), and apostles (bishops). Never mind any of that, for us moderns there is the tendency to consider as “primitive” early eras. So Paul’s authorship was questioned by many in those days.
John’s gospel too was considered far too lofty by modern scholars to have been written by a “simple fisherman.” Where could this “unlettered man” have gotten such profound and mystical insights? Again, never mind that he may have been as old as 90 when he authored the gospel, and may have pondered it for some 60 years. Never mind that he lived for at least part of that time with the sinless Virgin Mary, who knew her son as no one knew him and saw him with sinless eyes. No, never mind the power of grace and infused vision. No, it was too much for many modern and rationalistic scholars to accept that a simple fisherman could pull it off. It must have been by some other more lettered man like “John the Elder,” or it must have been other smarter types in the Johanine community, or school that authored this.
Here too I was just a simple 25 year old seminarian but it seemed to me that far too many modern interpreters stressed only the human dimension of Revelation. Something more mystical was missing from their view. That God could somehow give a profound vision to the early Apostles, and an infused mysticism was almost wholly absent in their analysis. Even as a 25 year old I knew better than to exclude that. I was young, but had already experienced aspects of the charismatic movement where inspiration and gifts were to be sought and expected.
And had not Jesus himself said to the Apostles, But the Paraclete, the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things, and bring all things to your mind, whatsoever I shall have said to you (Jn 14:26).
I recently came across a quote from Origen, the early 3rd Century Father, whose insight into John struck me as profound and telling, deeply faithful and challenging for every Christian. Pondering himself, where John “got all this” Origen says,
We may therefore make bold to say that the Gospels are the first fruits of all the Scriptures, but that of the Gospels that of John is the first fruits. No one can apprehend the meaning of it except he that has lain on Jesus’ breast and received from Jesus Mary to be his mother also. (Origen, Commentary on John, 6)
There is was, the lynchpin, the truest answer. John had mystical vision and saw the Lord in the loftiest way because he knew and experienced the heart of the Lord, and had Mary for his Mother. John was a brilliant theologian and possessed of deep insight, less because he knew books, and more because he knew the Lord, heart to heart.
And how surely and truly Mary’s role in this cannot be overlooked. Think of the conversations she and John must have had, the mystical prayer she must have enjoyed, and shared with John, the memories and the things that only the heart of a sinless mother could see and know. How John must have marveled at the gift of her. And how he too, who had known the heart of the Lord, and rested at his heart, at the Last Supper must have been able to pray and converse with her.
Speculation you say? Perhaps. But a vision I share with the great theologian Origen. It was love that gave John insight, it was relationship with Jesus, and with Mother Mary, by Jesus own gift, that his mystical gospel took flight.
And what of you and me? How will we gain insight into the Lord, and the truth of his Gospel? Books and learning? Studying Greek? Reading commentaries? Sure, all well and good. But these things are best at telling you what the text is saying. But it takes a deep relationship with the Lord to see Scripture’s mystical meaning.
Study? Sure. But don’t forget to pray! Scripture comes from the heart of the Lord and it is only there, by entering the heart of the Lord, and living there through prayer that Scripture’s truest meaning will ever be grasped.
Having trouble getting there? No one loves and understands Jesus like his Mother Mary. Ask her intercession and help, she will show you the heart of her Son.
Jesus gave John two gifts: the gift of his heart, and the gift of his mother. And John soared to such places that people could ask, “How did he get all this?” But you know how.
He offers you and me the same. Do you want vision, do you want to appreciate the depths of scripture and all God’s truth? Do you want the eyes of your heart opened to new mysteries and mystical experience? Accept the gifts Jesus offers: the gift of his heart, the gift of his mother.
Consider well the admonition of one of the most learned men who ever lived:No one can apprehend the meaning of it except he that has lain on Jesus’ breast and received from Jesus Mary to be his mother also.
Here is Fr. Thomas Luis de Victoria at his most mystical: O Magnum Mysterium (O Great mystery and wondrous sacrament, that animals would witness the birth of Christ. O Blessed Virgin whose womb merited to carry the Lord Jesus Christ, Alleluia!)
A long time ago, a popular magazine published a short test for people who were worried that they might be depressed. One of the questions was “Do you whistle?” And if yes, “Have you stopped whistling?” It seems that in general, people who whistle are happy people. Though at first , I thought this was a silly question, I have noticed in my own life, while not a big whistler, when I am stressed out, I do stop whistling and humming.
“Sing with Joy to God our Help” is today’s Psalm refrain and it got me thinking about Saint Augustine’s thought that singing is “praying twice.” I have always thought that the Negro Spirituals prove this point so well. Spirituals teach us that indeed song can most fully express the deepest sorrow of our soul and were the prayer of a people who believed that always in God there is hope—nothing that life throws at us will be greater than God’s love. Recently, a friend‘s comment about another song from the American Christian tradition brought this to life once more.
I gathered with some of the folks with whom I lived when I was a doctoral student in Rome. One friend, Lynda is just a year past her final treatment for breast cancer. I had not seen Lynda for more than three years and so you can imagine how great it was to see her with a full head of hair, looking so healthy and feeling so good. We were gathered for a colloquium and retreat and the person coordinating music asked if we had any song requests for liturgy. I suggested How Can I Keep From Singing. Lynda leaned over and said “That is one of the songs I downloaded on my Ipod during treatment. As you might guess we shared a few tears as we sang “No fear can shake my inmost calm while to that rock I’m clinging…”
For a song I have always loved, it now has even more meaning knowing that it was part of Lynda’s prayer as she entrusted herself and her family to God’s care. Do you have a song that you sing with joy to God our Help?
Note: While this group of young people in the video may not be professional, they sound like the way a congregation would sing this at Mass!
On Sunday we heard a Gospel about two men, who finding a treasure and a pearl, went and sold all that they had to have those treasure. Of course the treasure and the pearl were images for the Kingdom of Heaven. Thus selling all they had was a sign of radical freedom from attachments to this world. For most of us, attachments are THE struggle that most hinders our spiritual growth.
But what are attachments, and what are they not? Are there ways we can distinguish attachments from ordinary and proper desires? What are the signs they we are too attached to some one or something? To address questions like these, I want to turn to a great teacher of mine in matters spiritual, Fr. Thomas Dubay. Father died a little over a year ago, but he left us a great legacy of teaching through his books, audio recordings and programs at EWTN. In addressing these questions I would like to summarize what he teaches in his spiritual classic Fire Within in which he expounds on the teachings of St. Teresa of Avila and St. John of the Cross.
Here then are some excerpts (pages 133-135). Father’s teaching is in bold, black italics. My own poor remarks are in plain text red. You may wish to read only Fr. Dubay’s text to begin with, and only read my additions it you think you want elaboration.
I. WHAT ATTACHMENT IS NOT – for sometimes it is easier to say what a thing is not prior to saying what it is. In this Fr. Dubay disabuses us of wrongful and sometimes puritanical notions that are neither biblical nor Catholic since they reject as bad what God has made as good, and as a blessing. Scripture says, God created [things] to be received with thanksgiving by those who believe and who know the truth. For everything God created is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with thanksgiving (1 Tim 4:3-4).
1. First of all, attachment is not the experiencing of pleasure in things, not even keen, intense pleasure. The complete avoidance of pleasure is neither possible nor advisable in human life…..There is no doubt that the pleasures of the five senses easily lead to a selfish clinging to them for their own sakes, but nonetheless, the pleasures themselves are not blameworthy. God made them, and they are good.
The remarks here are very balanced. Of itself, taking pleasure in what God has made is a kind of thanksgiving and surely an appreciation of what God has created and given.
Yet, due to our fallen nature, we must be sober that our experience of pleasure, like all our passions, can become unruly, improperly directed and take on a life of its own. Pleasures can divert our attention from the giver to the gift alone, if we are not mindful to look beyond the gift to the giver and the purpose He intends.
Consider that a husband properly enjoys intense pleasure in his intimate experiences with his wife. Properly understood, there is little way he can NOT enjoy this, other things being equal. But these intimate moments have a meaning beyond themselves. They summon him to greater intimacy, appreciation and love for his wife, and ultimately, for the God who created her. Further these moments draw him to share his love and appreciation through an openness to the fruit this love will bear in his children.
Hence the gift of intimacy is wonderful and to be enjoyed to the top, but it is not an end in itself. When it becomes its own end, and exists in our mind only for its own sake, we are on the way to attachment and idolatry.
2. Nor is possessing or using things an attachment to them. We must all make use of things in this world to accomplish what God has given us to do. God is surely pleased to equip us with what we need to do his will, to build the Kingdom, and to be of help to others.
3. Nor is being attracted, even mightily attracted, to a beautiful object or person an unhealthy attachment. As a matter of fact, we should be drawn to the splendors of creation, for that is a compliment to the supreme Artist. Saints were and are strongly attracted to the glories of the divine handiwork and especially to holy men and women, the pinnacles of visible creation.
A gift to pray for is the gift of wonder and awe, wherein we appreciate and are joyful in God’s glory displayed in the smallest and hidden things, as well as the greatest and most visible things. We are also summoned to a deep love, appreciation and attraction to the beauty, humor and even quirkiness displayed in one another.
But here too these things are meant to point to God, they are not ends in themselves. And it sometimes happens that we fail to connect the dots, as St. Augustine classically describes: Late have I love you, O Beauty, so ancient, and yet so new! Too late did I love You! For behold, You were within, and I without, and there did I seek You; I, unlovely, rushed heedlessly among the things of beauty You made. You were with me, but I was not with You. Those things kept me far from You, which, unless they were in You, would not exist. (Confessions 10.27)
So, once again, to be attracted by beauty is, of itself, good. But it is not an end. It is a sign pointing to the even greater beauty of God and his higher gifts.
II. WHAT ATTACHMENT IS – St John of the Cross [observes] that if anyone is serious about loving God totally, he must willingly entertain no self-centered pursuit of finite things sought for themselves, that is, devoid of honest direction to God, our sole end and purpose. St. Paul makes exactly the same point when he tells the Corinthians that whatever they eat or drink, or whatever else they do they are to do all for the glory of God….. (1 Cor 10:31)
St John of the Cross explicitly states that he is speaking of voluntary desires and not natural ones‚ for the latter are, little or no hindrance‚ to advanced prayer as long as the will does not intervene with a selfish clinging. By natural desires the saint has in mind, for example, a felt need for water when we are thirsty, for food when hungry, for rest when fatigued. There is no necessary disorder in experiencing these needs….to eradicate these natural inclinations and, to mortify them entirely is impossible in this life.
Of course even natural desires can become unruly and exaggerated wherein we seek to overly satisfy them and they become ends in themselves. Fr. Dubay makes this point later. St. Paul also had to lament that there were some whose god was their belly and who had their mind set only on worldly things (cf Phil 3:19)
[More problematic and] especially damaging to normal development are what John calls, “habitual appetites,” that is, repeated and willed clingings to things less than God for their own sake. And here we come to some critical distinctions.
[W]e may ask when a desire becomes inordinate and therefore harmful. I would offer three clear signs.
1. The first is that the activity or thing is diverted from the purpose God intends for it. And this is very common today with sex and with many matters related to the body.
2. The second sign is excess in use. As soon as we go too far in eating, drinking, recreating, speaking or working, we show that there is something disordered in our activity. We cannot honestly direct to the glory of God what is in excess of what He wills. Hence, a person who buys more clothes than needed is attached to clothing. One who overeats is clinging selfishly to food.
Yes, beer, for example, is a sign that God loves us and wants us to be happy. A couple of beers is gratitude, ten beers is a betrayal. God gives in abundance to be sure, but more so that we can share with the needy and the poor, than that we should selfishly cling to it our self as though it existed as its own end.
Sharing spreads God’s glory, as St Paul says, All this is for your benefit, so that the grace that is reaching more and more people may cause thanksgiving to overflow to the glory of God. (2 Cor 4:15) And again, You will be made rich in every way so that you can be generous on every occasion, and through us your generosity will result in thanksgiving to God (2 Cor 9:11). Thus the abundance of God is directed to the spreading of his glory and to the widening of thanksgiving, NOT as an end itself, that we should hoard it. God’s gifts point back to Him not to themselves.
3. The third sign of attachment is making means into ends. We have one sole purpose in life: the ultimate, enthralling vision of the Trinity in glory, in our risen body. Everything else is meant in the divine plan to bring us and others to this final embrace with Beauty and Love. …As soon as honesty requires us to admit that this eating or that travel, this television viewing or that purchase is not directly or indirectly aimed at Father, Son and Spirit, we have made ourselves into an idol. We are clearly clinging to something created for our own self-centered sake.
This is often the hardest of the three to discern but I think the heart of the difference between a thing becoming an end rather than a means, is the question of gratitude. How consciously grateful are we to God for the things and pleasures we enjoy? Do they intensify our gratitude or do they merely distract us from thinking about God?
Further, do they help me in my journey upward to God or do they merely root me more deeply in this passing world?
Another (scary) question is, “How easily could I give this up if I discovered that it was hindering me from God or that God no longer wanted it in my life?” This is hard, because we really enjoy certain things. But the key question is not that we enjoy them, but whether they honestly lead us to God. And we must be honest about this, avoiding puritanical notions, but also avoiding self justifying ones.
Here too, an important thing to seek from God is not that we merely give up things with a sour face and bad attitude, but that we actually start to prefer good things in moderation over distracting things in excess. If we let God go to work, the good begins to crowd out the bad in an incremental, growing way.
[Therefore:] an attachment is a willed seeking of something finite for its own sake. It is an unreal pursuit, an illusory desire. Nothing exists except for the sake of God who made all things for Himself. Any other use is a distortion.
Here’s a short excerpt by Fr. Dubay. Please be careful with this clip. It is not a critique of liturgy (new or old) per se. It is about interiority and integrity in the spiritual life.
Years ago, in seminary, one of my brother-seminarians from North Dakota gave me an image of prayer. It occurs to me to tell this winter story in the midst of the heat wave that has most of the U.S. in its grip.
Imagine yourself in those years, some 25 years ago or before. Cell phones were not yet common.
Now imagine the deep winter months in rural North Dakota. The temperature can dip to 30 below and blizzards and snow-squalls can set in quickly. What if you are driving from one town to another and you car breaks down? Sometimes it is forty miles to the next town. If it’s 30 below with wind or blowing snow, walking even a short distance can kill you.
All you can do is wait for help to drive by. Remember there are no cell phones, this is rural North Dakota, and, especially in bad weather, help might not come for a long time. With a broken down car, no heat, and the temperature so cold, death could come soon.
How will you survive?
Candles.
My North Dakota friend told me that his mother often asked him in winter as he would leave in the car, “Do you have candles with you?!”
People in that region, in those years, and I suppose some today as well, used to carry a box of votive candles with them in the car, and some matches too. On frigid day, if the car broke down, or got stuck in the snow, lighting even one candle and cracking the window just slightly (for ventilation), could mean the difference between life and death.
Just one candle, maybe two, could warm the car enough to stave off death. And Catholic votive candles were the perfect choice.
What are votive candles if not a symbol of our prayer, our hope in God. They also are a burnt offering, and an memorare of our prayer burning before God.
And if one candle can save a life, how about one prayer?
In most cases the full power of prayer is hid from us here. But I suspect one of the joys of heaven will be that we will see what a remarkable difference our prayer really made, even our distracted and poorly executed prayers. Perhaps someone in heaven will come to us and say, “I am here because you prayed.” Perhaps we will see how our prayers helped avert war, turn back violence, save children from abortion, and convert hearts. We will know that our prayers helped open doors, brought blessings, and contained damage.
Just one prayer. Just one candle.
Do you have candles with you? Have you prayed? You never know, you might save a life in this cold world.
Here is a sermon I preached at the White House about five years ago on the power of prayer.
One of the great spiritual battles and journeys is to get beyond, and outside our self. St. Augustine described one of the chief effects of sin was that man was curvatus in se (turned in on himself, i.e. turned inward). Forgetful of God we loose our way. Called to look outward and upward, to behold the Lord and his glory, instead we focus inward and downward, on things that are passing, noisy, troubling, and far less noble. No longer seeing our Father’s face and experiencing joyful confidence, we cower with fear, foolishly thinking things depend on us. Yes, we are turned inward, and I would add, downward. Scripture bids us, If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. (Col 3:1)
One of the graces of deeper prayer, if we persevere through the years, is that the Lord to turn us upward and outward. And, gradually our prayer turns more toward God and is less anxious about our own aches and pains. For now, it is enough to give them to God and trust his providence. Gradually, we simply prefer to experience the Lord quietly, in increasingly wordless contemplation. God draws us to a kind of silence in prayer as we advance along its ways. But that silence is more than an absence of sound, but instead results from us being turned more toward God. An old monastic tale from, I know not where, says:
Sometimes there would be a rush of noisy visitors and the silence of the monastery would be shattered. This would upset the disciples; but not the Abbot, who seemed just as content with the noise as with the silence. To his protesting disciples he said one day, “Silence is not the absence of sound, but the absence of self.”
Yes, as prayer deepens and becomes more contemplative the human person is turned more to God and a kind of holy silence becomes private prayer’s more common pattern. This does not mean nothing is happening, the soul has communion with God, but it is deeper than words or images. It is heart speaking to heart (cor ad cor loquitur). This is a deep communion with God that results from our being turned outward again to God. And the gift of silence comes from resting in God, from being less focused on ourselves, more and more on God: Let all mortal flesh keep silence, and with (holy) fear and trembling stand, ponder nothing earthly minded….. Yes, there is a time for intercessory prayer, but not now. Don’t just do something, stand there. Don’t rush to express, rest to experience. Be still, know that He is God. An old spiritual says, Hush….Somebody’s callin’ my name. Yes, pray for and desire holy silence, praying beyond words and images. Here are the beginnings of contemplative prayer.
Another gift that is given to those who are experiencing deeper prayer is a sense of spaciousness and openness. As the soul is less turned inward and increasingly turned outward, it makes sense that one would experience a kind of spaciousness. Those who have attained to deeper prayer often speak of this. Scripture does as well. Consider some of the following passages:
For the Lord has brought me out to a wide-open place. He rescued me because he was pleased with me. (Ps 18:19)
I called on the LORD in distress: the LORD answered me, and set me in a large place. (Ps 118:5)
The Lord brought me out into a spacious place; he rescued me because he delighted in me. (2 Sam 22:20)
You have not handed me over to the enemy but have set my feet in a spacious place. (Psalm 31:8)
Hear me when I call, O God of my righteousness: you have enlarged me when I was in distress; have mercy on me, and hear my prayer (Ps 4:1)
And I shall walk in a wide place, for I have sought your precepts. (Psalm 119:45)
And he moved from there and dug another well, and they did not quarrel over it. So he called its name Rehoboth (which means latitude or width), saying, “For now the LORD has made room for us, and we shall be fruitful in the land.” (Gen 26:22)
Yes, as we are turned outward and upward to God we soon enough experience the spaciousness, and latitude of knowing God. No longer pressed and confined by the experience of being turned inward (curvatus in se), the soul has room to breathe. Many people who begin to experience contemplative prayer, though not able to reduce the experience to words, express an experience of the the spaciousness of God. But this spaciousness is more than a physical sense of space. It is a sense of openness, of lightness, of freedom from burden and from being pressed down, it is an experience of relief. But again, all who experience it agree, words cannot really express it well.
St. Paul speaks of the unspeakable quality of deep prayer as well, though his experience likely goes beyond what we call contemplative prayer:
I know a man in Christ who fourteen years ago was caught up to the third heaven. Whether it was in the body or out of the body I do not know—God knows. And I know that this man—whether in the body or apart from the body I do not know, but God knows— was caught up to paradise. He heard inexpressible things, things that man is not permitted to tell. (2 Cor 12:2-4)
Yes, it is “un-sayable,” words fail. St. Augustine was said to remark of the Christian mysteries: If you don’t ask me I know. If you ask me, I don’t know.
But here too is a gift of deepening prayer to be sought: spaciousness, and that openness that comes from being turned outward and upward by God. An old Spiritual says, My God is so high, you can’t get over him, He’s so low, you can’t get under him, he so wide, you can’t get round him. You must come IN, by and through the Lamb.
Two gifts of the deeper prayer we call contemplative prayer, prayer which moves beyond words and images, beyond the self to God Himself.
