Praying Alone

Often in my life I have bemoaned that I pray the Liturgy of the Hours, alone. In the last year a solitary dimension of my soul has developed. For the first time in my life I am finding joy in the "recitation of one alone." When I attend any of the hours at Gethsemani, the experience is the borderline of overwhelming. The music, the length and height of the Abbey church, monks in late medieval clothing, chanting; all of it is deeply moving. Without doubt it contributes to the mountain top experience so many retreatants experience while visiting the Abbey. It is part of the experience we try to take home with us.

Alas, it fades. We cannot take home with us the reality of an experience that is comparable to an extended stay at the Abbey Retreat House. Life is a noisy thing, many voices louder than the voice of God, compete for our attention. They broadcast over the voice of God within the soul. The result is that we forget about the voice of God, which for all intents and purposes, is now buried under the rubble pile that is the psyche.

The most important voice to hear is God's voice. Other people's needs and voices, our own voices, we already know how to listen to them. It is remembering to go back and listen to God's voice again that makes intimacy with God possible. The remembering is good, but in itself is not enough. I have to become an expert at making etudes, or
exercises to develop a virtuosity in an intimacy of prayer I did not ever suspect was possible in this body.

Something is happening in my desire to sin. Every time I approach an 'area' of sin with a firm intention of doing 'it', something says 'no, don't do it.' Almost certainly this will not be permanent. Yet, it is achievable.

I do not possess this new and more intimate prayer, but it has been shown to me. I have seen that not only is it possible, it is possible in my own life. It is not yet of perfection, my job is to seek it. It has drawn me to risk, and I have done. This is a grace which will leave me profoundly changed.

Which leads to a discernment. Can an eremitic lifestyle be lived with an active apostolate. With deep regret I affirm that I was not meant to live in community. However, I now see that this life of solitude is a community! So it is upon God and the Church that I must depend.

The bottom line: can I live into this new way of prayer and being, while giving myself to a corporate work of mercy.

* To feed the hungry;
* To give drink to the thirsty;
* To clothe the naked;
* To harbour the harbourless;
* To visit the sick;
* To ransom the captive;
* To bury the dead.

The spiritual works of mercy are:

* To instruct the ignorant;
* To counsel the doubtful;
* To admonish sinners;
* To bear wrongs patiently;
* To forgive offences willingly;
* To comfort the afflicted;
* To pray for the living and the dead.

My spiritual history is almost entirely centered in the ransom of the captive, and the praying for the living and the dead. To the situation I see, ransoming the captives would be helping those who cannot buy medications connect with the drug companies with programs that will indeed help them. The need is overwhelming, but I am only one person. It could easily become a paper work empire, and at the same time a nightmare?

What does it mean to be willing to place myself in the spot for all these people? Wouldn't that much involvement destroy a centered mind?

The most wonderful part of this is that I don't have to find the answers. I only have to wait, and keep my attention squarely on God and off of myself. God will provide.