Contemplation IV

I marvel at how contemplation, practiced faithfully, can, like nearly anything that is practiced faithfully, become routine. It used to be that each morning I would try to remain is a state of quiet prayer for 20-30 minutes before going to work. The hardest part was leaving that perfect moment to go busily about preparing to depart for work.

Not that God wasn't with me in the preparation. Of course, He was, and I felt His presence. It was just somehow different and somewhat less satisfying than spending lazy minutes together with Him. Being lazy with God is my favorite activity, yet one that find myself doing less often than more active activities. I do believe that God likes just as well those active activities that minister to His children and their needs as well as those moments of intense companionship for they glorify Him as well.

So, every morning I would try to allow enough time between waking and leaving to begin my day being lazy with God, and every evening before returning I would do the same. Day after day, even when traveling, although I have to admit that, especially when in travel status, there were days I would miss. ("Miss" I mean in all senses of that word.)

Then something extraordinary happened. I don't know when the change came, I just noticed it rather recently. I no longer had to plan this time or to remind myself to take the time. It just happened. It had become habit. At least, that's what my detail-oblivious mind first thought. Then I paid closer attention to what was happening.

The contemplative periods had moved away from my control. They were more than habitualized, autonomous responses to the ticking of a clock or the perception of a biorhythm. They were -- and are -- out of my control and under the control of God. For weeks now, I have been waking up a half-hour or more before the alarm is set to ring in a contemplative state, in the presence of God, and I have no real idea how long we have been being lazy together as morning takes over what might have been an all-night joint adventure for I do not remember my dreams or even the sense of having any since the night several years ago after being attacked by evil nightmares I begged God to stay with me as I slept and drive away all evil and protect me from these nightmares.

I still spend time in contemplation before retiring, but I have moved from chair to bed. I know the common wisdom is to stay in the chair so as not to fall asleep, but since I can fall asleep in any position, even standing, if tired, that advice helps me little. So, I go to bed while not tired so that I can spend time in contemplation and then fall asleep in the arms of God. I like to think those arms hold me all night, protecting me from the nightmares that have never returned and gently rock me awake in the morning to the joy of being in the presence of God. If so, to spend the entire night with a fraidy cat -- what remarkable patience, what incredible love!

Whatever the explanation -- I don't need to know why things happen anymore -- such a marvelous beginning to the day brings light and happiness to the rest of my day -- well, until some highly stressful, distressing event over which I have no control sends me to the nearest prayer place, i.e. any place I can be alone again with God, not to be lazy (I wish!) but to turn over matters I cannot manage to his control.

This condition I find myself in -- this walking with God, relaxing with God, and desperately looking for God when I stray -- became clear to me during a recent retreat. We were given specific instructions and time for contemplation, early morning and late evening not being among them, but God maintained the routine that He has established of greeting me in the morning and tucking me into bed at night. How much more blessed can anyone be, I wonder with gratitude so deep I don't know how to express it. The thing that makes the gratitude even sweeter and deeper is that I don't have to know how to express it. I don't have to be able to find all the right words and actions. God knows fully that which I can express only in part. Ah, yes, that is how much more one can be blessed. God's blessings are depthless, boundless, and, oh, so fortunately, endless. And they do not even have to be deserved.

Voice VIII

A discussion of locutions came up at our prayer group recently. This is a topic I rarely discuss with anyone except a couple of priests I truly trust and to whom I go running for help in determining authenticity, and, of course, Sr. Maria. I do not remember whether the discussion developed as an outgrowth of something I had said or something that Fr. Kevin had said at the monthly contemplative prayer group meeting in Campbell. In any event, our entire evening discussion between our prayers that began the meeting and our prayers that ended it focused on locutions, mainly mine, and I shared far more deeply than ever in the past, including even with Sr. Maria.
I have actually experienced less than a dozen locutions. However, each remains seared into my memory because of the element of surprise and the message, almost always something I have not wanted to hear or do. (Mostly “doing” has been associated with these locutions).

Getting Sr. Maria’s insights on my more unusual and intimate experiences made the discussion valuable. I assumed that it was okay with God if I were to share with others who love Him the kinds of locutions that I occasionally get. (I am pretty certain that if it were not okay, I would soon find out.)

From my blogging and occasional mention of my experiences to others, I have learned that people rarely accept locutions, let alone understand them or receive them. For that reason, I am grateful for the people in my prayer group and the people who read this blog.

From our discussion at prayer group, I gained an understanding of the rarity of locutions (and both respect and gratitude for my experiences). It has taken a considerable amount of time for me to understand why and how others react to my talk of locutions and really to know that they are a rare gift. For me, everything in my conversion came along topsy-turvy. I did not run begging to God for help at any time before conversion because I was a chronically happy atheist. My world did not shatter, and God did not lift me from among the shards. My world was a place of joy. God simply one day entered it. Definitively and vocally. Because I did not come to God through the church but rather to the church through God, contemplative prayer, which was my starting point for believing, is to this day much easier for me than the formulaic prayers that most Catholics have known by heart since childhood. I am still trying to learn some of the more beautiful ones and have given up on ever knowing all those that cradle Catholics know. (For that matter, I still have trouble with the mysteries part of the rosary and need a cheat sheet or someone to prompt me.) Talking to God, on the other hand, comes easy, and listening to and hearing God comes even easier.

I know I am making judgments based on a very backward “journey” from communication and contemplation into formal ritual. Nonetheless, my intuition rightly (or wrongly) tells me that I should not be unique among my peers. I know I share experiences common to a group of people spread around the universe and most closely with my dear Sufi friend, Omar the poet. In fact, there is an Arabic word used by the Sufis, the mystical side of Islam, for what I experience: zikr. I just have to wonder, it being my nature to wonder, if there would not be many more people who receive locutions if they truly believed that God wants to communicate with His people. Just as most people find that a difficult thing to believe, I find the opposite difficult to believe, not only based upon my experience but also upon what seems to me to be logic. Why would God make people and then go silent?

Doah, my rather severely retarded adult son, clearly hears locutions. For many years now, he has said to me “God told me” this or that. I used to tell him, “that’s nice, sweetheart,” and change the topic. Now I listen when he prefaces a comment with these words.

Motivation

I admit it. When it comes to ambition, I am a poorly motivated person. If something needs to be done, I do it. That is my motivation. Once done, I move on to the next thing in front of me. I've always been that way. A dying child artist from Siberia needs to come to the USA for medical care. I bring him. A young couple from a far away state runs out of gas 30 miles from their destination. I fill their tank. Cleaning crews fail to show for their 2-hour shifts at the church fiesta. I work as a crew of one for nine hours. The local retreat center needs $50K for a kitchen. I find it. God says, "Bring him to me." I bring the person to God. My boss says, "Here's your 51st program." I accept it and manage it even though my span of control is already stretched razor thin. The vice chair of the national board, hearing my abbreviated overview of my work, says, "I am speechless."

Yes, indeed, that is how I am motivated. Have task -- see task -- do task. And that's the end of it. I don't know why I am that way. I just am.

As I began to write this post, I had to stop. I felt that God had sat beside me and filled all the space around me, in me, above me, below me. There was nothing I could sense but God. At those times, I stop working. Why would I want to do anything else when I have the Presence -- and even sometimes the touch -- of God to enjoy. It is as if God is gracing me with permission to be lazy with Him. Is there anything more enjoyable?

Beyond the tasks, I suppose it is the Presence and the touches that keep me motivated. God clearly knows that. What motives Him to care enough about an unremarkable, unambitious, unmotivated person like me to task and to touch is a puzzle, enigma, riddle that I will not soon solve -- but then I have not been tasked with solving it.

Trust

The fourth letter of FRATERNITY is T. It stands for trust.

In 2009, when I was teaching a course at Lithuania International University, I gave several Chapel speeches. After one, a student asked, "Do you think we can trust God?" So, when I returned last January, I knew the topic I had to address when the chaplain asked for a repeat performance: trust.

Among other examples, I told the students how I lost a credit card on a business trip. I called the bank to cancel it, but Muslim colleagues with me stopped me. "Allah always takes care of you," they pointed out, correctly predicting my card would be in my hotel room. It was. I had forgotten that I had used it on the plane as a bookmark. The title of the book? Ruthless Trust: The Ragamuffin's Path to God. A divine lesson on trust?

No matter how great our faith, we all need that lesson occasionally not only for developing greater trust in God but also greater trust of each other. For what do members of a fraternity trust each other? For a helping hand, not a turned back, when we are weak. For love, not criticism, when we have transgressed. For acceptance of our spiritual experiences and mutual sharing of the ways in which God works in our lives.

As I told the college kids, when we lack trust, we can always ask God to help us trust Him more. Similarly, when we lack trust of each other, we can ask God to help us be the kind of people that He would like us to be: loving, trusting, caring. I believe that God delights in answering such prayers.

Reprinted from an article I wrote for our SFO newsletter, Footprints, in which each of the letters of fraternity is being defined, one newsletter at a time.

Choice

I mentioned in my 7 Quick Takes post this week on my 100th Lamb blog that I had learned earlier this year that there is a chapel only five minutes away from my office that offers Mass at noon on Wednesdays and Fridays. (Otherwise, I can attend daily Mass only when I am off work because our little chapel here at Old Mission is a half-hour from my office and celebrates Mass at noon.) Although I have known about the near-by chapel and Mass for a while, unfortunately, I have always been tied up at those hours and have been unable to attend Mass (except once about a month ago). Then, I realized something very simple. I have a choice of whether or not I am too busy to make the trip around the corner and down the road. One thing I do not want for sure is to be "too busy" for God. After all, God is never "too busy" for me; how awful would that be if He were to forget about me as often as I forget about Him!

This week I marked "do not schedule" in the 11:30-1:00 blocks on my calendar, so that my admin assistant would not fill them in, either with people wanting to talk to me or people wanting to lunch with me on those two days. It worked like a charm. I walked out of my office both days at 11:30, and while it took me as much as 20 minutes to get to my car because of people catching me in the hallway -- and on Friday, even one employee who walked me to my car in order to talk to me (not the first time that has happened), I did make it to Mass both days. On Friday, I was the lector because the regular lector was not there. I have to say that both days were my best days at work: calm, quiet, productive, pleasant. Perhaps that is because on those days I had my priorities straight.

Although I do start and end the day in prayer (and often cry out for help in between), having the opportunity to worship God together with others is a special gift, one that I have decided not to miss claiming in the future. I have marked those times on my calendar now as "do not schedule" ad infinitum. I have a previous and more important engagement that I have chosen to honor.

Selfishness

I did something on Sunday which shames me to share, but since I did it, there must an admitting of it. At the end of our contemplative retreat, each person took turns sharing what was uppermost in his or her mind, particularly in connection with experiences, thoughts, and emotions emanating from the retreat itself. Personally, I felt quite blessed that I was able to be there. There was some doubt about that initially. (See post, Spoiled.) I needed that extra time with God to reach quietude about a pending work assignment.

During the retreat, I thought a lot about that assignment. It is considered dangerous, more than just moderately so, and considerably higher than simply risky. (We actually have a rating scale for our more unusual assignments if you can believe that!) I am having to acquire a new skill, which will be the only protection I have; it is coming far more rapidly than it should. That leads me to believe that God either wants me to follow through on this assignment or is giving me an unusual ability to acquire this skill in order to protect me. (In my better moments, I am fully confident that He will indeed protect me and I have no fear; in my weaker moments, I do have fear. I know that this does not come from God, but I have it anyway.)

It is troubling that the assignment comes from my higher ups (beyond my immediate supervisor) and that I, in essence, volunteered for it but don't know what God's will might be in the matter. I usually have a good sense of that. God spoils me that way. This time I do not, and I do not know how to handle it, except to keep going in the direction and I am going, assuming that God will steer me where He wants me to go. I have asked Him to close the door if He does not want me to do this. I have also asked Him to close all others and open wide this door if it is the one He wants me to walk through. God is good with using those doors to push me in the right direction. (See post, The Jobs God Would Not Let Me Have, And The One He Made Me Take And Keep.)

At the end of the retreat, then, as we were sharing with each other, I told the group something about my new, hopefully one-time, assignment (which I am reluctant to describe here because the Internet is a very open place -- I will give details when done), described my worry that God just might want me to do the most dangerous part of it and how I just might not want to follow His will in this (but, of course, I will). I asked for their prayers.

How selfish! There are four other groups involved in this assignment, not just me. There will be one colleague at each juncture (a different one), another group of colleagues, a group of uninvolved people who could be innocently hurt but probably won't be, and a group opposed known for their violence. We will all be together in one location. I will be involved only for three weeks; my colleagues will be involved for a year. I, however, am the only one who will have no protection except for the grace of God. (Oh, wait a minute; there is no better protection!) The shameful part of my sharing on Sunday is that I did not ask for prayers for all those others, including the "enemies." I, who have lived in the lands of enemies literally off and on for 25 years, forgot to ask for prayers for my enemies! And for my colleagues/friends/acquaintances!

How small and mean is man, even that man who loves and tries to serve the Lord! No matter how we try, in a crisis those of us who are merely ordinary people still put our own needs first. May God have mercy on us -- and on our enemies!

I have since reconciled this weakness of mine with God, at least for now, for surely I will sin again. I have asked God to convert every prayer He receives on my behalf to two prayers each for my colleagues and enemies. Would you pray for them? As for me, God will take care of me even without the asking. God always does.

Touch II

At a contemplative retreat on Franciscan spirituality that I attended this weekend, during a period of contemplative prayer I felt a touch, strong and affectionate. (This occurs from time to time -- see post Touch. I tried to describe it, unsuccessfully, to a fellow retreatant, so I am not sure I will do a good job in describing it in this post; hopefully, others who are reading this blog have had some experience with this phenomenon.)

This brought me immediately out of my contemplative state. Although it probably was not particularly what God wanted, I am sure He knows me well enough to know what would happen. It always does when I feel a touch from Him other than a pat on the head. The pats come frequently enough that I am used to them although the first few times they as well startled me.

Over time, I will likely get used to the touches. While I accept them philosophically and emotionally, the reaction is exclusively and most likely a result of years of childhood sexual molestation. I have been told that I am an emotional fortress, and that is likely true as I have never as an adult received unwanted sexual advances -- and I do think I am so ugly as to terrify all men. On the other hand, I am simply not interested in extramarital sex. I have plenty of other things with which to occupy my time and plenty of other ways to complicate my life. That attitude probably exudes in ways of which I am unaware.

Still, it is sad (or so it seems to me) to think that my grandfather (if you really want the gory details, see my post, Pop, on Mahlou Musings) could taint my relationship with God. Any way in which he tainted my worldly life represents but a bump in the road, and I have long ago forgiven him that bump. Worldly things matter little to me. A spiritual taint, on the other hand, means everything to me.

Fortunately, God understands. Even more fortunately, I do not have to overcome my unwarranted reaction by myself. God will help. I know that, and so when it happens that God's touch startles me from a contemplative state, I note that it has happened again -- sigh! -- and return to prayer, turning myself over to God as absolutely as possible. I know that God is patient and with time will bring me into a more perfect union with Him. SO, too, can I be patient, looking forward to that end with joy in the waiting.