Joke - Confession

Now for some light-hearted religious humour ;Þ

Penitent : "Bless me Father for I have sinned, I had dirty thoughts."
Confessor : "Did you entertain the dirty thoughts?"
Penitent : "No Father, the dirty thoughts entertained me."

Retreat - The Dark Night

Retreat has started, and it has certainly been fruitful. Especially since it is continuing along the same line as what I've been sharing in my last few posts - the doubts that I had been having. One thing that I realise I forgot to blog about was the cause of my current state. After reading the book When The Well Runs Dry, I started to question myself.

Which stage of my prayer life am I in?

Is my dryness in prayer due to slackness?

Or is God testing me?

Or is He trying to teach me that consolation is not by my own effort?

Must I really go through the dark night?

Is it the only way?

Do I really love God that much?

Do I really desire to grow closer to Him?

Can't I just keep drawing water from the well?

Like I shared previously of the period of time where I doubted God's existence, did not feel His presence in my life. It was not a feeling that I would want to go through again. And now to tell me that it is waiting for me again, and even worst this time. The first analogy that came to mind was a girl telling the boyfriend, I think we need some time apart, so that our love can deepen. It doesn't make sense. But after thinking about it, that's a bad analogy, because the dark night makes sense in terms of purifying our love and relationship with God, and deepening our faith, but that doesn't make it easier or something to be desired.

So this retreat looks like its going to be good, because in the first talk, our retreat master covered topics like the dark night, our human concept of God and His love differing from Jesus' understanding. How we have to lose God to find God. In one example, he used the story of Nicodemus, how he could not understand what Jesus was saying about being born again of the Spirit. And then we have the example of our Mother Mary, when the angel appeared to her, telling her that she was to conceive, she replied, "How can this be, since I have no relations with a man?". But after that through faith in God, she believed and accepted, and through the Holy Spirit, God was made flesh.

The reason why I say the retreat has been fruitful, is because it is almost spot on with what I'm struggling with. And the retreat master in his sharing of his own life experience, has kinda motivated me to press on, to trust that the Lord will lead me to the dark night, to purify me.

These are recorded so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing this you may have life through his name. - Jn 20:31

Finally, the above verse struck me, the last line from Sunday's Gospel. And this is the purpose for this blog, so that when I do go through that dark night, I hope that I can look back and draw strength from it, and persevere on this lifetime journey.

When The Well Runs Dry

This was supposed to be with the next post, but it became too long, so decided to seperate it.

I recently finished the book When The Well Runs Dry by Thomas Green. It is the follow up of the previous Thomas Green book I posted about - Opening to God. This book is about prayer beyond the beginning. In that post I quoted his example of the father and the baby, and how it is frustrating to crawl again after being carried. Well this book goes on to provide a "map" to what can be expected as a pray-er's prayer life grows.

The first part of the book uses an example from St Teresa of Avila's writings, about us being the gardener watering the garden. The water we use symbolises the joy of our prayer, and the flowers are the virtues in our lives. In the beginning, we draw water from the well with a simple rope and bucket. This is us in the beginning of our prayer life, where prayer is a tiring process and we don't get much water/joy for our efforts. Then as we progress, we are given a pump, which means less effort on our part and more water. The 3rd and 4th stages are water from a stream, and rain. Basically, as we grow in our prayer life and relationship with God. The effort and "labour" on our side decreases, and the joys and consolations increases.

All this is wonderful, and a wonderful motivation for me to continue in my prayer life, knowing that it will be easier and more fruitful as develop my "spiritual muscles". But as the title of the book hints, it does not end there. Thomas Green, calls that stage, moving from Knowing God, to Loving God. The next stage is to move towards Truly Loving God. And this is the part that provided me with much food for thought, leading to much doubt.

In the next stage, the joys we get from prayer are interspersed with times of dryness or desolation. And as we go on, the periods of dryness will get longer, until it becomes the norm. He uses the example of human courtship to parallel this process, we have the initial period, where we Discover more about each other, then the Loving and spending more time together, and then after committing to each other in marriage, comes the Truly Loving, through good times and bad, sickness and health... and living life together, no longer about the thrills and excitement, but just really two becoming one.

Thus this next stage is where our love is purified. The reason why this is necessary is that, our human minds and intellect cannot fully comprehend the love of God, and because of that we limit God and His love in our lives. And it will challenge us to lose our concepts of God and we would doubt His presence by our side. This is the dark night of the senses and soul that St John of the Cross talks about.

This will definitely be a trying time, and he uses very illustrative examples of the potter and the clay, and that of the small child who does not understand the necessity of the pain of surgery to save his life. And it is only when we truly embrace that dark night, and trust in God that our whole being can be transformed.

Lastly, he uses the example of floating to differentiate the different approaches to prayer that we take. While we are so used to being active in our prayer, judging our progress by our own efforts, as a swimmer, we still try to control the direction and the destination. But what we are called to do, is to float, and allow the Lord to guide and bring us to the destination that he chooses. To do nothing gracefully, totally surrendering our will to Him.

I Also Don't Believe

The readings of saturday and sunday keep bringing to mind the theme of unbelief. In Saturday's reading we see the priests, scribes, leaders who despite being amazed at Peter and John, and having no answer for the miracle performed on the crippled man, could not believe in the testimony of Peter and John. Saturday's Gospel strikes even harder, because this time, it is the eleven disciples who do not believe. First when Mary Magdalene said that the Lord was alive and she had seen him. Then the testimony of the two disciples on their way to Emmaus. And we see in Sunday's Gospel, Thomas, in the event which would make him forever associated with "Doubting".

I questioned myself, why am I caught up with the disbelief instead of focusing on the more positive aspects of the resurrection, the wonder of God's power in the healing of the crippled, or the peace and commission given by Jesus to the disciples. And I found the answer in my reflection on thursdays Gospel.

"Why are you so agitated, and why are these doubts rising in your heart?" Lk 24:38

Looking at my previous post put link here, I suddenly realise that there is a pattern. There is a questioning of my faith, my growth, or even my lack of questioning in my life now. Initiated by God, through inspiration by His Word. And I thank Him for that. Even this awareness of myself, I have to be grateful for his soft prompting and Spirit working in me.

Suddenly I recall the last time I went through this process, of doubt, and then of his being by side. On the night of 10 Aug 2002, while in KL, when I was in my "I don't believe that God exists" state. The irritating nagging of my Youthworks friends. Not allowing me to sleep until I talk and express it out. I still thank God for being there for me that night, acting thru them sacrificing their sleep. Thanks guys, really see God acting in you all that night. Of course that is viewed retrospectively, but definitely a big part of my salvation history. Love you all.

Anyway, just reflecting and typing our that last paragraph, has given me strength to carry on. Of course I also draw strength from the scriptures, where if the disciples who also doubted that much, and yet were the same ones who performed that miracle for the cripple, I trust that the Lord is still by my side, and that he will bring me through this, with an increase in my faith.

Talking about doubt and the scriptures, another topic would be the latest buzz around: The Gospel of Judas. It's not that big a thing here in the seminary, maybe because our foundation is so strong here that it is not shaking our faith ;Þ, or more likely it is because we don't have cable here, so did not watch the National Geographic documentary. What we can gather is from the newspapers, and from our scripture professor, but of cos he gives us the Catholic point of view. But what I really want to know is what the people out there are thinking, doubting, questioning on this topic. So if there are any questions that you have or your friends are asking, drop me a comment or email. Also if you know how I can watch the documentary please tell me. Thanks.

P.S. This post and the next few are going to be post-dated, mostly my reflections or things that struck me during the retreat. Hopefully I have time to do them. Now that retreat is over, means that back to studying...Greek and Latin await...

RSS Feeds

Kenneth posted about RSS before, but I recently discovered how it is making my life easier.

Firstly, with RSS, I have been able to keep updated with the different blogs. But I was only able to do this once a week, because we have no internet access in our rooms, and unlike some of the other brothers with laptop, mine is a desktop, so can't just bring it to the internet room to logon. So I check my feed updates during the off days when I go back home. This is a bit troublesome, and also means I read slightly out of date stuff.

But recently, I found out about bloglines from Kenneth, and its just amazing. An online RSS reader, where I can just put in all my feeds, and check it daily like my email. Warning, if you are planning to use it, some knowledge of what feeds are would be useful. The site does help make it easier to add feeds from popular blogsites like blogspot and easyjournal. But for other sites, you need to know the feed URL to add. Or the easiest way is if the blog you are interested in has a link, clicking on it will automatically add it to your bloglines list of feeds. My feed links are at the bottom right.

And my last great discovery, is this website : tapestrycomic.com. It provides feeds to so many comics. I can now get my daily dose of laughter from my favourite comics.

Acknowledging God's Presence

One common theme struck me in today's two readings, Acts 4:1-12 and Jn 21:1-14, the Acknowledging of the Lord Jesus Christ. Peter testified to Christ's in the miraculous healing of the cripple, and John said "It is the Lord" during the miraculous catch of fish.

This caused me to reflect on my own awareness of the Lord in my life. I identify with the disciples in today's readings and even in the rest of the readings this week. There is always the recognition of the Lord at miraculous events. Mary Magdala at the tomb, the breaking of bread at Emmaus, the appearance in the upper room. And yes in certain events in my life, especially when I need the Lord's help, like finishing an assignment or leading in a session, which is a miracle to me, I seek the Lord's help, and I realise His presence. But in my daily life, I am not that aware of His presence.

At the beginning of the term, I blogged about the examen that we do at night. At that time, there was that conscious effort and struggle, to be aware of the presence of the Lord in my life. But as time went on, I have slackened. And thus today is a real wake up call, to strive once more to be aware of His presence in my life. In here, where there are so many fixed times of prayer, it can be so mechanical and routine, that it is easy to take for granted and just go through the motions.

Then today at Salvation History class, we also covered the physical reminder of God's Covenant, circumcision. Abraham and all his descendants were to be circumcised as a sign of their covenant with God. A physical mark, reminder of God's promise and of their response to God. Well that is no longer necessary, but it got me thinking of a tangible reminder for me of my covenant with God, to help me remember His presence in my life. For me, it is my rosary ring, which I bought at Holy Spirit Church on palm sunday to replace the one I lost in IHM last year. And when I looked at my hand, it wasn't there. I had left it at the sink when I washed up this morning. And of all days for it to happen it had to be today. Maybe because I already had a reminder at mass, so I didn't need it to remind me today.

Anyway, that's my challenge today, this week, and hopefully next week during the retreat, to be aware of the Lord's presence in my life. I know I will slacken, but hopefully I will keep getting reminders, to start again, and strive on.

B.C.

I like the comic B.C. Every once in a while especially on Easter and Christmas it has some Christian message to it. Saw this one for this Easter. Enjoy.



Think this is my shortest post ;Þ