A Common Temptation

'We should never postpone a good work, no matter how small it may be, with the thought of later doing something greater. It is a very common temptation of the enemy to be always placing before us the perfection of things to come, and bringing us to make little of the present.'  St. Ignatius of Loyola

Painting at top: St.Joan of Arc

Painting of mother and child: Henri Lebasque

Painting of woman carrying hay: Camille Pissarro

Our Lenten Habit

'Be strong in the Lord and in His mighty power. Put on the full armor of God, so that you can take your stand against the devil's schemes. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realm.

Therefore, put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand.
Stand firm, then, with the belt of truth buckled around your waist,
with the breastplate of righteousness in place,
and with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel  of peace.
In addition to this, take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one.
Take the helmet of salvation
and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.'

Ephesians 6:10-17



Painting: Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn

Rx: This Name

'Does one of us feel sad? Let the Name of Jesus come into his heart...
And where is that man who, terrified and trembling before impending peril, has not been suddenly filled with courage and rid of fear by calling on the strength of that Name?
Where is the man who, tossed on the rolling seas of doubt, did not quickly find certitude by recourse to the clarity of Jesus's Name?
Was ever a man so discouraged, so beaten down by afflictions, to whom the sound of this Name did not bring new resolve?
In short, for all the ills and disorders to which flesh is heir, this Name is medicine.' 

St. Bernard of Clairvaux

Painting: Wilhelm Bernatzik, Vision of St. Bernard (detail)

The Decisive Issue

Run Towards the Roar of the Lion!

'Let us stand fast in what is right and prepare ourselves for trial. 

Let us neither be dogs that do not bark, nor silent onlookers, 

nor paid servants who run away before the wolf. 

Instead, where the battle rages, let us find ourselves. 

Run towards the roar of the lion! 

Run towards the roar of battle! 

That is where Christ's most glorious victories shall be won!'

St. Boniface

1,000 Darts

'As soon as worldly people see that you wish to follow a devout life, they aim a thousand darts of mockery and even detraction at you. The most malicious of them will slander your conversion as hypocrisy, bigotry, and trickery. They will say that the world has turned against you and being rebuffed by it you have turned to God. Your friends will raise a host of objections which they consider very prudent and charitable. They will tell you that you will become depressed, lose your reputation in the world, be unbearable, and grow old before your time, and that your affairs at home will suffer and you must live in the world like one in the world. They will say that you can save your soul without going to such extremes, and a thousand similar trivialities.' 

St. Francis de Sales

Painting: Stefano Novo, The Gossips

No Wicked Thing

"He who does not wish the enemy to force 

his way into the fortress must keep the gate closed."

St Francis de Sales

"I will set no wicked thing before my eyes." (Psalm 101:3) 

"Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things." (Philippians 4:8)

Revisiting 5 Smooth Stones

Armed with only his little bag of five smooth stones, young David went into battle against the powerful warrior Goliath. David took one of his stones, hurled it with a sling, and struck Goliath.  The stone hit the giant and Goliath fell on the ground. Thus was seen the truth of David's words declaring that 'it is not by sword or spear that the Lord saves. For the battle is the Lord's...'

We may feel spiritually 'young,' we may feel powerless, we may feel anything but able to combat forces coming against ourselves, the world, and those we love. The truth, however, is that we have been given the weapon - the 'stone' - of prayer. Even a simple aspiration, prayed from the heart and in effect hurled against the giants, has much more power than we can imagine.

We each have our little pouch of stones. Simple aspirations, the Mass, prayer with Scripture, the Liturgy of the Hours, songs of praise, the rosary, adoration, chaplets, fasting and sacrifice; yes, each of us has our own little bag of stones...

I pray that God will gather together our prayers, blending their fragrance as incense before Him.  There are so many stones in our pouches, possibly more than we realize. 

I pray we will uncover and practice using our 'stones...'

This is a repost from our achives. It is linked to Reconciled to You and Theology is a Verb for 'It's Worth Revisiting Wednesday.'

Text not in quotes © 2012 N Shuman
thecloisteredheart.org     
Photo from Pixabay

Refiners of the World

'When once Christ is given full sway in the soul, there is no limit to the means He will take to transform and sanctify it.  God's mystical Gift of Himself to such a soul, His mystical Indwelling in it, is effected in such a way that God, Who is omnipresent, manifests Himself to the faithful soul with an ever-clearly and more penetrating spiritual presence.  God and this soul have more and more frequent converse with each other, and together live the supernatural life in greater and greater fullness.

'In the end, the chosen soul no longer lives on earth, save for the purpose of sharing with the Holy Trinity that supernatural life which God, as the Absolute Ruler, wishes to live in the soul here below.  It lives its life with Christ.... Souls such as this become the refiners of the world, for the fire of their charity burns away much dross, and imparts warmth to the cold of heart.

'Never shall we know in this life how far the influence of our humble acts of kindness reaches beyond the margin of our own narrow sphere....

'Hidden, lowly souls in the cloister, the hospital ward, the classroom, the home and the factory, are winning many a battle on fields they never tread.  When God bestows His rewards for missionary service we shall see some of the most glorious crowns going to those who, like the consumptive young nun of Lisieux, were missionaries by prayer and loving self-denial....

'Let us, then, not let slip the golden opportunities that Our Lord puts into our path each day.'

 (from Fervorinos From Galilee's Hills, compiled by a Religious, Pelligrini, Australia, 1936, pp. 116-119)

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Skreeeeeechzztzsh!

The battle continues.  The struggle intensifies.  My battle for a living, disciplined, vital life of prayer goes on, and today there has been a new skirmish. 

I suppose I could envision it as an arrow stuck in my back, right below my neck, for that is where I injured myself today while (of all things) talking on the phone.  It's what I get for trying to multi-task, attempting to use both hands while holding the phone with my shoulder.  Got a call in the midst of doing something... we all know how this goes.... and before long I felt one of those cramps that feels like the muscles are crying "skreeeeeezzzzzitsjsh!!"  Uh oh.  A chink in my armor?

I can still pray, of course; nothing should be able to stop that.   Nothing SHOULD be able to stop that.  But oh, what a struggle.  I'd really like to sit in front of a mindless "happy" movie and hold really still and be, well:  pampered.

There is nothing wrong with decent happy movies, certainly.  Nothing wrong with caring for oneself when injured - in fact, that's good stewardship.  But guess what?  I can sit really still and apply heat and pray at the same time.  The happy movie can come later.

Could it be (the thought occurs to me) that Our Lord Himself would like to "pamper" me?  To draw me close in prayer and soothe me spiritually?  Perhaps even to soothe the screeching muscle as well - who knows...

So I shall go to Him.  Stiff in neck and sore in back and listless in spirit, I go.  If I don't, THAT is when the chink in my armor widens, lets in REAL arrows, wounds my life of prayer.

Stay tuned.  I'll let you know how things go.


Painting: Nicolaes Maes, Christ Blessing the Children (detail) 


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Battling

So.  She sleeps in armor now (I can hear you saying after my last post). 

If I don't, I definitely should.  We all should.  We really must sleep, awaken, work, play, eat, rest, go through all of life in the armor of God.  After all, this life is a battleground, and if we don't believe that, we haven't read enough Scripture or Church teaching or lives of the saints.

I have spent most of today on the battlefield.  I've been battling intensely for my life of prayer.  Paying close attention to this, I've realized it's kind of a revolving door.  I must remain armored in prayer, and the only way to do that is to pray, which strengthens the armor and helps me ward off attacks on my prayer.

And the door swings backward as well.  I give up some prayer-ground, off falls a bit of my armor, I am less likely to pray, I get more easily sidetracked... and 'clank.'  Another piece hits the ground.

Going through a day without prayer is going into battle without weapons.  It is facing the enemy unarmored, unprotected, vulnerable.  It only follows, then, that a main tactic of the enemy is to convince us that we don't need to pray. ('pssst: it doesn't change anything, God knows the world's needs already, you're too busy right now, you need to relax and surf the web, yada yada yada ..').

I spent a lot of time today just paying attention.  If I got sidetracked while in prayer, I noted what distracted me.  My distractions at this time of life are largely of my own making.  I no longer have the responsibilities of a young mommy.  Funny.  I used to imagine that at this stage, I would be floating seamlessly through St. Teresa's "Interior Castle."  It hasn't exactly worked out that way.  Once the arrows of busy-ness lessened, ones of laziness whooshed right in to take their place.

I managed to pray Morning Prayer (by God's grace) as soon as the day began.  It was tough - I mean really tough - not to check e-mail beforehand.  The struggle helped me identify a compulsion:  I can feel a "need" to check e-mail first thing, not intending to answer any of it right then, but still - it takes my mind into all sorts of directions.  Hopefully I will be aware of that lurking compulsion tomorrow... this time in advance.   

I could go through the whole day, but I will spare you.  It was a time of checking armor, a day of noticing what distracted me, and when, and why.  And thanks be to God, it was a day of prayer. 

Prayer is the weapon, the armor, the lifeline, the prize.  It is worth every battle.  May we never give up the fight.

The Great Secret of Sanctity

'Sanctity consists essentially in union with God, 

and in the love with which we perform daily actions.  

The great secret of sanctity consists in loving much,

but this love presupposes an interior and daily warfare - 

a warfare against our unruly appetites and our self-will, 

a warfare waged by prayer which softens the heart, 

and by its sweetness, compensates for the bitterness

inseparable from mortification.'

(from Sheltering the Divine Outcast, compiled by A Religious, The Peter Reilly Co, Philadelphia, 1952, p. 99)

William Paxton painting  

Stay Sober and Alert

 

 

'Stay sober and alert.  

Your opponent the devil is prowling like a roaring lion 

looking for someone to devour.  

Resist him, solid in your faith, 

realizing that the brotherhood of believers 

is undergoing the same sufferings throughout the world. 

The God of all grace, 

Who called you to His everlasting glory in Christ, will Himself 

restore, confirm, strengthen, and establish those who have suffered a little while.  

Dominion be His throughout the ages!  Amen.'

1 Peter 5:8-11

Painting: Benedito Calixto Evangelho nas Selvas 1893

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