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Medjugorje
Message: August 25, 2012 |
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Published
by the Marian Center of San Antonio / A Catholic Evangelization Ministry This month, Our Lady’s teaching has a rhythm of reciprocity and a
movement of mutuality—as if we are riding a see-saw or hitting a tennis
ball back and forth with Our Blessed Mother, and above all, perhaps, like the
rhythmic beating of a heart as she uses the word “heart(s)” five times in three sentences. The words of the message
alternate between declarations of her own experience, and statements that “put the ball in our court” by
indicating how our experience should mirror hers. One of Our Lady’s themes this month
is “hope in the heart”—both her heart and ours. She gives equal time to her own “Immaculate Heart” and to our hearts. Similarly, she mentions gratitude twice, first
declaring her own thanksgiving to God, and then calling us to “Give thanks to God’s love.” In this message Our Lady repeatedly
shows herself to be our model for prayer, thankfulness to God,
openness of heart, hope, and deciding for holiness. All of these things, as we mirror
Our Lady’s example, lead us to conversion—the centerpiece of the Medjugorje message. Our Lady begins by saying she
comes to us today “with hope in the heart” and ends by showing us
how “hope will give birth to joy in our hearts.” Next she
prays and thanks God for us living
the messages, then tells us to pray and thank God for her
giving
the messages. Her final reciprocal statement is filled with vital
spiritual teaching: “Open your
hearts and decide for holiness, and hope will give birth to joy
in your hearts.” Like an algebraic equation, we can follow this
important syllogism of Our Lady’s logic by connecting the first terms and the
second terms of each clause: to “open
your hearts” results in “hope” ….and to “decide for holiness”
results in “joy in the heart.” Can
we validate this logic from our own experience? What happens when I “open my heart”?
To open
is to make room or create space for something (or someone) to enter.
There is a new spaciousness within me when I open my heart; all that I
had previously shut out or walled off from affecting me (for good or
ill) now has access and space to exist within me, without the struggle,
rejection, or obstacles that I had placed through emotional denial or the use
of addictive substances. This means a new flexibility, in which things
are no longer “my way or the highway,”
but life is lived according to God’s will, from moment to moment, with
“my” plans and projects sometimes put on hold or scrapped entirely, in light
of the Divine Will. To “open my heart” invites a fresh experience of the Holy
Spirit, the Divine Indwelling presence of God, alive and active
within me, at the center or core of my being. With this inevitable consequence of
an open heart, “Hope springs
eternal!” And, as St. Paul writes, “Hope does not disappoint, because the love of
God has been poured out into our hearts through the holy Spirit that has been
given to us.” (Rom 5:5) To “open our hearts” is to live
in the love of God that always produces a hope-filled and confident
attitude toward the future (eternal life in heaven), as well
as the present and the coming next moment—all
pregnant with
infinite possibility, as God’s will unfolds. We find ourselves with a
“new lease on life” once we have opened our hearts and turned over the
control and power steering to “the Most High,” who offers adventurous
blessings beyond anything we could orchestrate for ourselves. Our
formerly narrow, limited, and circumscribed view of the world (with heart
closed) is now blown open to a vast horizon. As the poet Emily Dickinson
wrote, “I dwell in possibility,” and “Hope is the thing with feathers that perches in the soul and sings the
tune without the words and never stops at all.” Just as open-heartedness is
co-terminous with hope, Our Lady indicates
that “deciding for holiness” is co-terminous
with “joy,” empowering hope to “give birth to joy in your
hearts.” Again, can we validate Our
Lady’s logic from our own lived experience? What happens when I “decide for
holiness”? To “decide for” anything
means to set my intention, to take a definite stand within my own
thinking, and to adopt a purposeful way of doing or being, at least in some
aspect of my life. In Medjugorje, many times Our Lady has said, “Decide for God.” This time she says, “Decide for holiness.” To take this
stance in my life will be the active “flipside” of the more passive “opening
my heart” to God’s holy will. In firm and deliberate ways, I now “decide for
holiness” by intending to discern and follow Divine Providence in
every action and moment of my day, increasingly sensitive to the subtle
inspirations of the Holy Spirit as the hours unfold. With an “open heart”
that is now spacious enough to admit experiences and follow paths outside of
my own pet plans and cherished ideas, I set my intention to do
what I am doing for the love of God—not for my own
self-aggrandizement or egoic satisfaction. As soon as I “decide for holiness,”
all of my emotional programs for happiness (that will never work) rise up to
the surface in protest, as I become painfully aware that I would rather do “my”
will for many reasons: a sense of
safety and security, affection, esteem or pleasure, and for power and
control. These false-self programs are the motivating factors I have chased
throughout my life, looking for “happiness.” Laying them all aside when I
“decide for holiness,” I now purify my motives and discover something
far deeper and more enduring than the fleeting “happiness” of the false-self
programs: “joy.” There is a
joy
of soul, a joy of spirit that is far more
fulfilling and complete than the momentary happiness produced by the
fleeting victories of the false self. One small example is the inner joy,
peace, freedom and wholeness that an addict feels when (s)he is sober or
abstinent, experiencing life on life’s terms (the Divine Will), in contrast
to the transitory “happiness” felt while intoxicated, high, or bingeing, in
bondage to some substance. There is no comparison! In Medjugorje,
Our Lady calls us to the contemplative dimension of the Gospel. She trains
us, painstakingly, in her “School of
Prayer,” to both pray and live in a contemplative way. In prayer, she
teaches us to “open the heart,” and in daily living, she teaches us to “decide
for holiness.” These two keys unlock a new life—a life of hope
and joy. September
Musings . . .
Supreme Importance of Silent Prayer/Meditation Practice . . . “Attention”
& “Intention” Purifying our Motives . . . & “Christology” vs. “Christophany” Every great spiritual
tradition has known that in profound stillness the human spirit begins
to be aware of its own Source. In the Hindu tradition, for example, the
Upanishads speak of the spirit of the One who created the universe as
dwelling in our hearts. The same spirit is described as the one who in
silence is loving to all. In our own
Christian tradition Jesus tells us of the Spirit who dwells in our hearts as
the Spirit of love. This interior contact with the Life Source is
vital for us, because without it we can hardly begin to suspect the
potential that our life has for us. The potential is that we
should grow, mature, come to fullness of life, love
and wisdom. The knowledge of that potential is of supreme
importance for each of us. Each of us is invited to begin to understand
the mystery of our own being as the mystery of life itself. In the vision
proclaimed by Jesus, each one of us is invited to understand
the sacredness of our being and life. That is why it is of such great
importance that we should allow our spirit the space within
which to expand. In the tradition of meditation this space for
expansion of spirit is found in silence, and meditation is both a way of and
a commitment to silence. It is the infinite silence of God, the
eternal silence. And it is in this silence that we begin to find the humility,
compassion, and understanding that we need for our expansion of spirit.
Thoughtful men and women everywhere in the world today are beginning to see
that spiritual growth and awareness is the highest priority of our time.
But how do we enter on this path? That is where the
tradition of meditation is of supreme importance. The only thing that is
necessary is that we begin the practice. We have
to put time aside to make ourselves available for this work of making contact
with the Source of all life and making space available in our lives for
the expansion of spirit. The deepening of faith and practice of
meditation are both very simple. – Fr. John Main, OSB “When you are in deep
meditation, you feel a great serenity, a joy that is unknown to you, a watchfulness that is a new guest. Soon this watchfulness
will become the host. The day the watchfulness becomes the host, it remains
twenty-four hours with you. And out of this watchfulness, whatever you do has
a wisdom in it. Whatever you do shows a clarity, a purity, a spontaneity, a grace.” -- Osho What Happens When We Return from
Silent Meditation to Ordinary Life? When you emerge from
[silent] prayer, the present moment is what happens when you open your
eyes. You have been in the present moment of prayer when you were completely
open to the divine life and action within you. Now you get up
out of the chair and you continue daily life. This is where attentiveness
to the content of the present moment is a way of putting order into
the myriad occupations, thoughts, and events of daily life. Attention
simply means to do what you are doing.
This was one of the principal recommendations of the Desert Fathers
and Mothers of the fourth century…. “Do what you’re doing.” Which means, “Bring your attention to the present moment
and to whatever is its immediate content and keep it there.” For instance, it is
time for supper. Well, put the food on the table. This is true virtue.
Turning on the television at that time or making a needless phone call might
not be. Attending to the present moment means that our mind is on what we are
doing as we go through the day. Thus, we are united to God in the
present moment instead of wondering about what we are going to do next or
tomorrow. A practice, then, of just paying attention to what you are doing
for a certain part of the day for the love of God, and disregarding every
other thought, is a practical way of opening ourselves to a deeper level
of contemplation. The spiritual level is
also healed of the false self by the why of what you are doing.
Your intention to do what you are doing for the love of God connects you
with the divine presence in a powerful way. The power of intention is immense.
The will willing God actually enters into union with God although you may not
consciously experience the effects of this union right away. My intention
is why I am doing what I am doing. Here is the practice: Choose
a certain time when you deliberately establish and renew your intention of
doing some particular work for the love of God. Our minds are generally
so scattered that we keep forgetting. To have a time or one particular
activity when you do this deliberately as a daily practice will quickly show
you the influence of your intentionality on the false self. Nobody
does anything without a motive. You don’t know why you are doing something
unless you know both your conscious and unconscious motivation ….The
galaxy of bad intentions (jealousy, revenge, selfish, cutthroat ambition)
motivated by the false self emerges when for a few minutes you try to
maintain pure intention. The great insight of the early Desert Fathers and
Mothers was that a pure intention leads to purity of heart; selfish motivation
is gradually evacuated and the habit of pure intention is firmly established.
You begin to enter into God’s intentionality, which is to manifest infinite
compassion in the present circumstances, however painful, joyful, or
seemingly bereft of the divine presence. As soon as you focus
your intention—why you are doing this particular action—your unconscious
motivation arises. The unconscious motivation might be that in my service,
however devout I may appear outwardly, I am really looking for praise. Our
secret desires begin to emerge into consciousness when we deliberately focus
our intention on loving God in all that we do. How to
work—“attention.” Why I am working—
“intention.” Awareness of these two aspects leads to the third
quality of contemplative service—who is doing the work. Having uncovered the
spiritual obstacles of pride, envy, and whatever else might be hidden in the
unconscious, we are now approaching our true self, our inmost center,
Love loving itself. Without your intending or doing anything special, people
begin to find God in you as you humbly do what you are supposed to be doing.
Complete
submission to God allows the divine energy to radiate, and others seeing you
have a sense of being in touch with God or divine love. This is what
a Christian community is supposed to be….This is the atmosphere in which
people can grow and become fully alive. One needs to feel loved as a human
being to come alive. And the greatest love is divine love, especially
when it becomes transparent in another person.– Fr. Thomas Keating, OCSO “Christology”
is a “right brain” function of making doctrinal and dogmatic statements based
on the life and sayings of Jesus Christ. As a division of theology, it often
misses deeper meanings which lead to transformation of being and
consciousness. “Christophany” accepts Christology but is deeper and goes beyond it, to experience what the
doctrines refer to. Christophany presupposes that we can not only experience
Christ ourselves, but can have the experience that Jesus claimed with
the Ultimate Mystery He called “Abba”
and “OUR” Father. Christophany,
unlike Christology, deals with the mystical experience of Jesus Christ,
going beyond critical reason to the language of symbol and metaphor. It is a
“middle-brain” consciousness where the “right” brain and “left” brain
converge in the “heart”—the seat of contemplative practice.
--
teachings of Fr. Raimon Panikkar
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Mark Your Calendar!
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September 3 |
Labor Day |
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4 4
& 11 |
School of Prayer: “Lectio Divina”; 7-9 pm, Oblate Renewal
Center, Blanco at Oblate Dr.; $10; call (210) 341-1366, x 212 “Compassionate Eating: Exploring How Our Food Choices Define Our
Relationship to God, the Earth and Each Other”—a Dialogue between Jews,
Christians and Muslims with presenters from each tradition; 6:30-8:30 pm; SoL Center, 300 Bushnell Ave.; $20; call (210) 732-9927 |
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The
Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary 3-Year Program of Monthly
Classes: “Portraits of World
Mysticism—Learning from Christians, Jews, Buddhists, Sufis and Hindus”;
Saturdays 9 am-12pm, Oblate School of Theology Whitley Theological Center;
285 Oblate Dr., $40 per session or $325/year; call (210) 341-1366, x 212 |
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11 |
School of Prayer:
“Centering Prayer”; 7-9 pm, Oblate School of Theology Whitley Theological Center,
285 Oblate Dr., $10; call (210) 341-1366, x 212 |
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13 |
Public Lecture: “Martyrdom in the 20th Century:
Naďve Folly or Heroic Faith? The Dynamic Example of Young Spanish Oblates”
with Fr. Vincent Louwagie, OMI; 7-9 pm, Oblate
School of Theology Whitley Theological Center, $10; call (210) 341-1366, x
212 |
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14 |
The
Exaltation of the Cross |
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15 |
Our
Lady of Sorrows |
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18 |
School of Prayer: “Ignatian Contemplation”; 7-9 pm, Oblate School of Theology
Whitley Theological Center, 285 Oblate Dr., $10; call (210) 341-1366, x 212 |
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21 21-22 |
St. Matthew, Apostle Catholic Women’s
Conference: “Come to Me”; Norris
Conference Center; speakers, music, Mass with Bishop Cantu, confessions,
Eucharistic adoration; $55 includes lunch; call Pilgrim Center of Hope:
521-3377 |
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23 |
Rosary
Making: 2-5:30 pm, St. Mary’s Church, 202 N. St. Mary’s; free parking and
materials |
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24 |
Public Lecture: “The Pope Who Quit” with Jon M. Sweeney;
7-9 pm, Oblate School of Theology Whitley Theological Center; 285 Oblate Dr.,
$10; call 341-1366, x 212 |
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25 |
School of Prayer: “Body
Prayer/Taize”; 7-9 pm, Oblate School of Theology
Whitley Theological Center, 285 Oblate Dr., $10; call (210) 341-1366, x 212 |
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Sts. Michael, Gabriel, and Raphael,
Archangels PEACE
MASS: 12 pm, St. Mary’s Church, 202 N. St. Mary’s; Rosary at 11:30 am |
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Drill, Baby, Drill! “Chase two rabbits, catch neither.” It is
better to dig one well deeply into the Underground River (that is God underlying everything),
than to dig 20 shallow wells (different paths that don’t go deep or tap into
living water). Stay with your own
familiar well (religious tradition)—whether Judaism, Islam, Christianity,
Buddhism, or Hinduism—and DRILL DEEP.
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