Symptoms of the Happy Affliction

I never expected to be writing another blog post today.  Yet after having trouble (again) with comments on here, I received a message from a friend.   

'I am curious as to how your other readers do this in their own lives as well,' she said.

Very simple.  Just one line.  And I began thinking....

I have letter excerpts from readers, dating back to 1993.   Obviously not blog readers, but people who wrote on paper they folded and put in envelopes and dropped in mailboxes.

Imagine doing such a thing!  They were letting me know they identified with the idea of the Cloistered Heart that I had just written of in an article. 

In the late 1990s, I obtained permission from some of these people to use a few of their writings in a little booklet, now long out of print.  Since those particular permissions still stand, I think it might be of help to us, and certainly to me (who's always in need of a 'refresher') to share some of these over the next few weeks.

I'm so looking forward to doing this that I just couldn't wait to come back and tell you about it!  We'll be keeping our same recent 'format' in days to come, and I will be using old and new writings of others (and myself) for the 'application' portion... where and as those fit.  For the most part, I will not include writers' names.  

Meanwhile, I hope you will leave comments sharing your own thoughts.

And now I will offer you excerpts from two of the earliest letters I received from article readers.  From waaaay back in 1993......

'Lay contemplatives must be the hidden gems of the Church these days.  It is time for them to stand up and make the hidden presence of their lives and prayers known...'  

'I am still in the baby stage when it comes to loving God's will.  Discernment of that will seems to me an incessant challenge, requiring utter humility.  But if I were to try to put the situation into words I would want to say that I am, in my better moments and by His grace, in love with my Creator and Redeemer, and that my loving His will is the inevitable corollary of that.  It is a symptom of the Happy Affliction!  It's in this sense that I respond to your touching image of the Cloistered Heart...'  

Stay tuned!  There is definitely more to come.....

Painting:  Marcus Stone, in US public domain due to age 


To return to the 'Monastic Adventure in Sequence' post, click here

You are the Refuge

'You are 
yourself 
the refuge 
where He takes shelter, 
the dwelling place 
in which He hides Himself.  
Your Beloved, 
your Treasure, 
your one Hope 
is so close to you 
as to live within you.'

St. John of the Cross, Spiritual Canticle






Painting:  Thomas Dewing, Portrait de femme, in US public domain due to age




To continue our spiritual monastery, click here

Scripture Speaks of Your Monastery

'You must know that your body

is a temple of the Holy Spirit, Who is within - 

the Spirit you have received 

from God.'  

1 Corinthians 6:19

To continue our spiritual monastery, click here

Let Me Be a House of God

Any building can become a monastery if it is consecrated to God as such.

The following is, I think, a perfect prayer for those of us who want to go through the world as 'walking monasteries,' living for the glory of God.

'Dear Lord,
The indwelling in me of the Holy Spirit
implies that like the Church, the Altar, the Tabernacle,
I am consecrated to be the temple,
the house, the home of God Himself.

My body is set apart,
dedicated to God's use as something holy,
never to be profaned by worldliness,
by selfishness, or by sin.

My body is the Spirit's chosen dwelling place,
a privileged altar.
It must then not be looked upon
as a market place for the transaction of business,
or a school for study, or a playground for amusement.
It is none of these.  Indeed, it is not really my property at all, but Your very own...

I must never dare to bring the God dwelling within me
into contact with things which He abhors.

O God, hidden within me,
forgotten and neglected on so many days, during so many years,
I ask You to forgive my carelessness, my irreverence, my infidelity....

Joyfully I consecrate to You my body,
with all its members and all its senses,
my hands and feet, my eyes and ears and tongue,
my powers of seeing and hearing and speaking,
my impulses and instincts and appetites and desires.

I make them over to You by deed of gift;
to be absolutely and forever Yours,
to be employed always in Your service,
never to be used against Your will.

O God, take this body of mine,
consecrate it,
let it never be defiled by sin.
Let it never become the abode of evil,
nor be used against the best interests of any of Your children.'

(from "Listening to the Indwelling Presence," compiled by a Religious, Pellegrini, Australia, 1940, pp. 24-26)

Painting:  Thomas  Jones Barker. Margaritte in the Cathedral 

To continue our spiritual monastery, click here

A House of God

"The monastery is the house of God... the monk is a witness to God... an athlete, a slave in the service of his divine Master, a soldier fighting for the heavenly King, a pilgrim journeying towards the heavenly Jerusalem" (Daniel Rees, Consider Your Call, Cistercian Publications, Kalamazoo, 1980, p. 100)

When we think of the word "monastery," we might imagine a cluster of buildings hidden away in the woods, or high on a hill, or even in a city.   The truth is:  a monastery can be anywhere.  

A monastery's difference from any other building is not in its exterior.  It has walls made of brick or wood or stone; it is covered by a roof and fitted with windows; it is as subject to storms and the effects of aging as any other structure.  

The difference is one of purpose.  As we have said here many times, a monastery is a place consecrated to God, a place of prayer, a place where God is loved and lived for and served.  

For today's post, why don't we take a little field trip?  It will only take a minute. Click this line and come along.....

What Does it Take to Make a Monastery? 







To see about our own spiritual monastery in the world, click here