Oh, Lord my God, You called me from the sleep of nothingness merely because in your tremendous love you want to make good and beautiful beings. You have called me by my name in my mother’s womb. You have given me breath and light and movement and walked with me every moment of my existence. I am amazed, Lord God of the universe, that you attend to me and, more, cherish me. Create in me […]
The Examen is part of our tradition. Usually thought of in terms of St. Ignatius’s Spiritual Exercises, it has emphasized watching sins and failings. That emphasis was deepened by our post-Enlightenment emphasis on rules and counting things. The whole thrust of discernment as a spirituality for the twenty-first century has parted from that. We have opened ourselves deliberately and boldly to finding how the Holy Spirit is leading us here and now. Before we get […]
I first encountered the term “God’s project” in an essay by Joseph Tetlow, SJ. I think it’s an idea worth considering further. Looking at the world as God’s project has some powerful implications. For example: 1. It emphasizes the radical human freedom with which God has created us, and the passion God brings to persuading us to help God create a kingdom of goodness, truth, and beauty. 2. It allows us to see human evil […]
Consolation begins deep in the self that is grateful to God in all things. As G. K. Chesterton once explained, gratitude is happiness magnified by wonder. Jesus’ act at Cana shows how practical gratitude is: in the first place, Jesus intended his friends to be happy and have a good time. He and his mother came to this wedding party to enjoy it. When that enjoyment was threatened, Jesus felt impelled (with a little help […]
About discerning our call or vocation, the first thing to say is that we all share in the greatest one. God “calls humankind to seek him, to know him, and to love him with all our strength.” This is God’s call to all, and it tells about God’s dream: an earth peopled with lovers—with those who let the Holy Spirit lead them to love God, love one another, and love themselves—passionately and well. How is […]
Joseph Tetlow, SJ, is one of the Jesuits’ leading authorities on spiritual direction. For years he worked in Rome as head of the Society’s Secretariat for Ignatian Spirituality. In this video he talks about Ignatian prayer and why someone might want to have a spiritual director. Tetlow says, “Prayer is as natural to us as breathing is. We don’t have to be taught how to pray. We have only to be invited to start praying […]
This post concludes the series “From Ashes to Glory.” The Word When the sabbath was over, Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James, and Salome bought spices, so that they might go and anoint him. And very early on the first day of the week, when the sun had risen, they went to the tomb. They had been saying to one another, “Who will roll away the stone for us from the entrance to […]
This post is a part of the series “From Ashes to Glory.” We have now reached “glory”—Jesus’ glory and our own. His is the glory the Father gave Him: to return alive to live forever. Our glory is what Jesus gives us: a share in His eternal, divine life. We live enjoying all of God’s earthly gifts as well as anyone can. All the while, we are graced to know that we are going to live […]
This post is a part of the Lenten series “From Ashes to Glory.” The Word While they were eating, he took a loaf of bread, and after blessing it he broke it, gave it to them, and said, “Take; this is my body.” Then he took a cup, and after giving thanks he gave it to them, and all of them drank from it. He said to them, “This is my blood of the covenant, which […]
This post is a part of the Lenten series “From Ashes to Glory.” The prayer of the Examen rests on a profound and perilous belief: the Father’s will is greater than my own. I accept the reality that His will, not mine, will decide what I must do and who I am to be in life. Hence, I will grow into my authentic self not by enacting the many desires that I absorb from the world […]
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