Pentecost Retreat

So, this last weekend, Pentecost weekend, I was on retreat at Little Portion Hermitage and Monastery in Arkansas, the home of the Brothers and Sisters of Charity, the community founded by John Michael Talbot. I'm writing now to try to process that experience.

In the past, retreats or conference weekends were the types of experiences where I would arrive with great, vulnerable-feeling anticipation, which would be met with equally explosive emotional catharsis and maybe either spiritual breakthrough, or at least enough of a feeling of a new freedom, that I could come home and say, "This is what happened...."

This time was different. Probably the last several retreats I've been on have been not like I described above, and that might be a factor of both the retreat and a change in me. But this time was not only different from my earlier experiences, but different from recent stuff too.

Speaking of the old days, this was actually my fourth trip to Arkansas. The first two times were to other retreats at their old retreat center. Well, the first one was actually cancelled, but I went anyway and spent time on my own, because I felt such an intense need to go there. It was on St. John of the Cross, actually (hah!) and was called The Lover and the Beloved. When I arrived, there was a young priest or seminarian who gave me his copy of the book that he had brought to the non-retreat. So, I read the book there. Now, I was not Catholic yet, but I believe I was at that point decided that I would become one. I remember the point in reading the book where I was brought back to my college library and reading the Carmelite mystics, and saying to the Lord, "If there's anyone left on the face of the earth who knows you like this, those are the people I want to be with."

The second retreat was with John and Paula Sanford, on inner healing, and my third trip was to the location I was at for this retreat, while I discerned joining the community. That last time was October of 1993, and I did not recognize anything this time, between it being so long ago, and their buildings burning down in 2008.

So, this retreat was called "Exploring the Gifts of the Holy Spirit." The information presented was not what I'd call new to me. It was a very small group; under 20 retreatants. In theory, the bulk of Saturday was in silence, but in reality not much of that happened. Yeah, that's ok. Being in their gardens and just drinking in the views -- not something I'm necesarily known for -- was very restful. I embraced my inner Franciscan. Right upon entering the dining room (after my GPS sent me on a wild goose chase, and my cortisol levels were boosted), I met another woman from Ohio, and that was pretty much the only social interaction step I needed for the weekend. We sat by each other in all the session and meals and chatted a bit. In such a small group, we were able to get to know each other a bit just from the interactions. 

But what impacted me the most? I think for one it was meeting the anxiety level in me, the froth, the kind of addictive behavior that emerged in a land without data access (honestly, after that was hard, it was quickly very nice). I realized I had been trying to fill myself with work, with social media "connections." But seeing it, I was able to be dissatisfied, turn from it, and seek God. Peacefully.

The other thing that impacted me was just looking into John Michael's face, figuratively speaking. I found in him an authentic and dedicated seeker after God. I found in him the imprint of long obedience, of conformity to Christ, a witness to living in faith, a witness to what happens when one seeks truth and surrenders to love. He was careful with his words, but I got to hear not the part where he is still working at saying the right thing, but the evidence that the Lord has taught him through long experience. He was the most welcoming and open-hearted to non-Catholic Christians of any Catholic, I believe, that I've met. He also spoke truth about the identity of the Catholic Church more firmly than any Catholic I've met. He simply lives in Christ, in Scripture, in the Church. He does not live in politics, in factions, in trends. I know he has said that among Catholics, he is considered too progressive for the conservatives to stomach, and too conservative for the progressives to stomach. I think it reveals how we all want to make gods after our own likeness.

But it really isn't so much about him. It is really about what Christ does in a soul surrendered to Him. 

One point of discussion that impacted me was that of speaking in tongues. I received tongues when I was 19, when I was still Lutheran. I came to associate tongues and charismatic gifts with the non-denominational fellowship I joined and spent five years in. Then part of me felt some disassociation with all of that when I became a Catholic, and part of me never had a good theological grasp of what was happenning with this gift. So to a large extent, I ceased to use it. 

John Michael's comments on this gift, in part, emphasized how it involves our spirits praying and bypassing our rational minds. Our spirits can use this gift to praise God when our minds "can't even." And then he talked about how when we pray in faith, we actually speak into existence those things that we are agreeing with God about. I know that I have found this to happen, that when I am praying in tongues, my spirit then knows what to pray for with my mind. As he put it, the veil between heaven and earth is made very thin when we use this gift. 

Now, if you look at how many words I feel the need to churn out just to finally write about an impact, you see that my rational mind has a lot to say. And I realize I tend to get very elaborate thought trains which sometimes take me off in directions and tangle me. Bypassing my rational mind and seeking instead to agree with the mind of God and speak forth his praise by faith is a prescription I need right now.

I have arrived home with a lively sense of God's presence with me. I see clearly how much we need love, hope. I see more clearly how we have an enemy that wants to rob us. I see how walking by faith is our way of living in union with God. Where there is faith, love and hope grow, too. 

He made one comment about St. Padre Pio and the "Three Days of Darkness." I've had this flavor of thought before, as well. He believes that this is an accurate prophecy, and that we are currently in the Three Days. The beeswax candles without which we won't see? Pure faith. From there, one can extrapolate what it means about "going outside" and "looking out the windows," and the many other things that are mentioned. 

Epiphany 2018

I'm going to try to write part two, following on from the Encounter Ministries conference.

I decided in advance to leave the conference early because I knew that today is Epiphany, and I felt it important to be back in my parish, and dutifully in my choir spot for this feast.

It was Epiphany Sunday in 2009 when I first sang with this choir, and it suffices to say that I captured an authentic experience of God in that blog post. In fact, next to the Christmas Eve Midnight Mass which sparked my conversion to Catholicism, that Epiphany Sunday was one of the single most significant moments in my Catholic life.

Just like Christmas coming around yearly was a true and dramatic re-meeting of the grace I experienced on the night of my conversion for years and years, I have found that Epiphany has been the same for this other experience of God. I didn't want to miss being where God could reveal something more to me.

Snapshots:

I remember the moment in Japan when I was at a parish Bible study, unable to understand much of what was going on, but having a burning sense that God's call to me had to do with parish life.

I remember despondantly watching people go up to recieve communion when I was not yet confirmed as a Catholic. I wanted so much to do what they were doing, but I also judged them for not loving God as much as I did. God impressed on me: "These are the people I have called you to love."

I recall hearing at Christmas that the shepherds who watched their flocks were those who were raising sacrificial lambs for the temple, as we sang "The First Nowell" as a prelude. Suddenly, I felt like I was filling in the blank form I saw last year at Epiphany, about how Advent, Christmas, Lent, Easter, and Pentecost all lead from one into the next. As we sang the opening hymn, We Three Kings, it made complete sense that the gifts the Kings brought spoke of Jesus' death, and burial. Epiphany does announce the whole Paschal Mystery.

And in this grace that the Lord has led me into, I have had the cycle of joyful mysteries, the cycle of sorrowful mysteries, and the cycle of luminous mysteries. I heard the bells ringing years ago, announcing Pentecost. I heard them ringing again months ago, announcing Pentecost. I saw it happening over the weekend. It is dawning; it has dawned. The glorious mysteries. God is not done.

And where it happens, the glorious, mysterious, unfolding of my very own vocation, is right there, right here, in my normal life, and in my parish. That which leads is mysterious, but my need is daily to seek and ask and look for Jesus, to plead to see Him more clearly, to plead for clear revelation. The glory is Jesus, and only Jesus. It is a perilous, dangerous moment, when Herod seeks to destroy, and utter discretion, mature wisdom, complete mistrust of evil intent must prevail.

I suppose none of this makes a shred of sense, but this is because it is alive.

I came back from the conference early because the place where God speaks powerfully into my life is in my own parish, and in the ministry I'm a part of there. That part is easy. What God speaks and how I respond... that part has never been easy, and it is always simple, because it is about one thing: Seek Jesus, Follow Jesus, Trust Jesus, and Only Jesus.

One thing the conference reminded me of is to constantly seek more. I think this was hard for me, because I can habitually ask more of myself always, and it wears me out. In fact, I've been learning not to ask so much of myself. I need to put into practice the reality that asking more of God is not to push myself into work mode, or to expect more "output" from me. It is to desire Him. Maybe I am a bit afraid of, as Teresa put it, "I die because I do not die." To desire -- ah, it can be so painful. And to desire without picturing how God is supposed to answer. Oy!

I think there is something here. I think I fear the pain of desiring, of longing. But this really was what Fr. Riccardo spoke of. I also intuit that there is more purification to be had.

"More, Lord. More." How many times did someone pray that over the weekend. At one point, I think it was Fr. Matthias who asked everyone to pray that, like a small child. Praying from the place is a purifying thing, too.

I think all this is another reason why I feel frightened to be losing my spiritual director, even if I never really sought his help as one to show me where to go. But I knew I had a safe port, and accountability, and someone knew.

What the Lord showed me was that running into the Lord's embrace, I drop the worries, even the fear of the pain, because the embrace of the Lord dwarfs all that.

And, that really is what Epiphany tells me today, too. It is all about pointing out Jesus, and going full throttle to seek Him.  Sometimes I get stuck standing with amazement staring up at the star.

Just like I was getting grumpy at those folks for being to amazed and excited and all that, I see that it is really that I need to deal with my own over-amazement, or having mercy on myself in it.

Or just bring it to Jesus like everything else.

Encounter Ministries Conference 2018

I spent the last few days at the Encounter 2018 conference in Ann Arbor, Michigan. I am writing this to help digest my own experience of it.

I almost ended up not going because of a glitch which I admit I had a hard time letting go of. I registered very early on, following a sudden impulse, in a way I rarely do. Because of family logistics, I knew I'd be needing to bring my daughter along. As I went through the registration, I found that there was a registration for kids under 13, and that they were admitted at no charge. Great! I was ready to pay for her, regardless, but this was even better.

But the night before the conference started, I was told my daughter had no registration, free registration never existed, the conference was full, and that was that. Previous communications had not helped one bit.

So, up until about two hours before we had planned to leave, I was no longer certain I would go, or what my daughter would do. Then, I was told a space had opened up, and I could bring her. My daughter (who can become completely unreadable when faced with circumstances like this) was evidently pleased that she was not being left behind or forced out. We went, I payed her registration, as I was happy to do. But it bugged me to no end that my assertion that I was not lying about free registration went unanswered. In between time, the venue had changed to another state, and everyone's registration was help open to refund if needed. I have a feeling the website was re-done at that point, eliminating the option. It just really, really bugged me that I was left to feel like a liar that was being mercifully accomodated instead of someone whose registration was unjustly cancelled.

It is a little unusual for me to get bugged by things like this, but it didn't completely end there. When we arrived, I realized that basically all the staff of the conference was young enough to be my children, biologically speaking at least. I realized I have issues with this generation. There, I said it. As we walked into the church building, I noted people with staff t-shirts shouting and squeeling to each other, hugging, laughing, chatting, singing with each other -- but not really attentive to the people they were there to greet and welcome at all. I questioned one young man about something; he didn't know the answer, but walked off to a seperate room (passing 6-10 other staff) to find someone who knew. He gave us an answer, which we pursued, only to find that we had been incorrectly directed. It worked out, but my frustration grew. I really value competence and serious mindedness. I realized I was in sanguine happy land. Isn't administration a spiritual gift, too?

To be honest, this was not an easy conference for me to settle down into, but this wasn't for any of the reasons that those who know what this was might guess. The whole thing was focused on welcoming the supernatural experience of God into average Catholic life. I am 100%, wholeheartedly in agreement with this premise. Signs, wonders, healing, miracles, words from God: it is all normative Christianity, and it is clearly a way which God is opening up all around us, through a multitude of avenues. God is coming on the scene with Pentecost.

But, I struggled to settle down into it all. I'm writing to understand this.

I think first I need to just write about what happened there. Then, I think I need to write about what happened at Mass this morning. (My daughter and I left yesterday afternoon before the Vigil Mass in order to be home for my parish Mass this morning, for reasons I'll have to write about later.)

First, there's the praise and worship. I've realized for a few years now that I have a hard time with this form of prayer these days. It is what I cut my teeth on in my 20s, and it was a huge staple in my life for decades. Musically, I am not opposed to guitar, drums, or any of that. What I find I struggled with was two-fold. Musically, modern praise and worship is insipid. Forget three chords; these songs are comprised largely of only three notes. Second, lyrically, almost none of it was Scripture, but vapid rhyming phrases about God. Occasionally, there was a nugget of something that could be meditated on. In some of the worship sessions, I knew none of the songs; nevertheless I could sing the whole thing after hearing half a verse, because it was that predictable. It was very, very difficult for me to focus, worship, and pray with this as my platform. There was nothing to lift mind or soul. For one group, I had to go into distracting-voice-deflection mode, but fortunately I've honed that skill in 25+ years in Catholic parishes.

The talks were awesome, and by that I mean they reflected normal Christianity, and by that I mean they were designed to build faith in the love and the action of God in our lives. The buzzword is "activation," and clearly that is something we all need; we need to stop and pray for God to come and draw us in as active participants into the things the speakers spoke on.

I had no idea, honestly, that so many people carried so much physical pain and brokenness. There were 1,000 people present, and I think it is fair to say that hundreds of people reported healing of significant physical issues. For this we rightly give God thanks.

At this particular point in my life, thanks be to God, I do not carry physical pain. I did stand up at one point, to receive healing prayer, because I told my daughter the night before that if they offered prayer for this certain thing, I would receive it. Two things, actually, although for the second I was standing to pray over someone else, too. It fitting the irony of the whole experience: the circumstance when I asked for prayer, people were instructed to come around and pray over those who stood. Not a single person came to pray over me, even though I must have been in eye shot of at least 50 people. Still, I felt the embrace of God's healing heat. I can't tell you if anything changed, because these are genetic things I know I am predisposed to, and I was really praying into the future.

There was plenty of time for prayer and soaking in God's love and receiving His powerful presence. In the midst of these, I was able to acknowledge the sadness in my heart over the fact that my spiritual director is at death's door. He is 87 years old, and very ready to meet the Lord. For my part, I think of the bittersweetness of laying bear one's soul to another human being, and then being left alone by that person. I have gone through this is various ways multiple times over the last decade, and while God has never left me abandonded and without help, a series of experiences like this is simply not easy. It hurts. This hurts.

The one moment in the conference when I really felt my spirit dance was on Friday evening, when Fr. John Riccardo delivered a word he called a scalpel. Essentially he called us to receive God's gift of a broken heart, so that we would love as God loves, including suffering the pain His heart feels. He spoke of St. Francis and St. Faustina, but in them I heard echos of St. Therese's Oblation of Merciful Love, and my Carmelite vocation, to be love in the heart of the Church. Ironically, when he spoke of suffering love, my heart wanted to dance. It is not that I enjoy suffering. The Lord knows that if I could feel only pleasure for the rest of my life, I would be delighted. But in this I heard my vocation that God is already teaching me to live. It is not the delight of suffering; it is the delight of hearing God call my name. And I realized that my Carmelite vocation, my vocation to be a hidden, contemplative lover of God and one who lives a life of prayer, never knowing exactly what the fruits are: this vocation is vital to the Body of Christ.

I was also reviewing some notes that I had actually recorded in this blog, about the Carmelite Congress I attended in November (complete, night and day difference from my response to this Encounter conference in terms of ease of communion with God). One thing that struck me was the thought of peaceful confidence. The Carmelite vocation is one of inner peace, of confidence and courage arising from affirmation of the one we know loves us. Peace.  Frankly, I did not feel peaceful at the Encounter conference -- not because of anything not of God, but because everyone was so dang excited, amazed, astounded. I get it -- these are signs of the Holy Spirit being present. It's in the Scripture. I have been there. I've been there in living my Carmelite vocation. But, there is a process by which we come to accept the glorious move of God as commonplace to our lives, or normal. This was something God spoke to me way, way back, when I was about two or three weeks into my call to become a Catholic. He told me, "I want the glorious to become commonplace in your life." To be at peace, and to radiate peace, communicates God in a certain way. To radiate excitement is necessary, mind you, to wake people up from sleep and to announce a new day.

Really what I am left with is a realization that God has actually called me to a vocation, and that this vocation determines how I respond and interact with other members of the Body. It helps me, but sometimes it helps me in a backhanded way, precisely because we are not all the same. Yet, we all need each other. I need them; they need me.

I have a desire to discuss these things with some of my Carmelite community members who have spent long years in the charismatic renewal. (Fr. Matthias, however, made the point-well-taken that he does not like to associate himself with the term "charismatic," due to all the baggage is has accumulated over the years, and because he prefers to think not of a group but of the reality of God. This I applaud and I feel the same.) I will never forget that one of my first exposures to Catholicism was at the Carmelite parish in West Milwaukee where for some reason I stumbled into some discussion. I asked the priest something about the charismatic movement, and he responded with something like, "That's very nice for beginners in the spiritual life. If you want something more substantive, check out Carmel." I was so, so, so offended and thought he was incredibly arrogant, which I'm sure was simply me looking into the mirror.

But, I guess the point I'm getting to is that God does many good things, and He uses all His people, but not in the same ways. I am responsible for living what He has given me.

And I guess that's why I need to write about what happened at Mass this morning, next.

Meditations on the Pentecost Sequence

I'm putting into one place my novena's worth of meditations I wrote on the Pentecost sequence, Veni Sancte Spiritus. Here are the links, in order:

Come, O Father of the Poor
Sweet, Comforting, Refreshing Guest
Labor, Heat and Woe
Fearing the Light of the Holy Spirit
Nothing Without You
Wanting to "Look Good" for God
Scary Changes
Why Ask for the Gifts of the Holy Spirit
Give Us Virtue's Sure Reward

In short, what I've gleaned from reflecting on this Sequence is this: The entrance of the Holy Spirit gives light, but that light reveals sin, disorder, attachments, things that need healing and purification, further enlightenment, and an even greater need for the Holy Spirit's work. (Once upon a time I thought it was all about spiritual bling.)

The Holy Spirit's role is to transform us into other Christs. This is not only about inner purification, but also about real fruit born in ministry. But, it is also not only about outward fruit and ministry, but also about inner purification.

I have more to muse on regarding all this, but I'll save it for a future post.

Give us Virtue's Sure Reward

The final piece of the Pentecost sequence:

Give us virtue's sure reward

Give us your salvation, Lord

Give us joys that never end.

Amen. Alleluia.

Da virtutis meritum

Da salutis exitum

Da perenne gaudium

Amen. Alleluia.

Give reward of virtue, give us salvation at our passing on, give us eternal joy. Amen. Alleluia.

Just based on the feeling of words, I like that the word used for virtue (virtutis) is so close to the word for miracles (vertutis). I also like how the "Amen. Alleluia" is sung in chant so much that I've typed it three times. (Actually, four!) Some prayers are just so awesome that you can't conclude them any other way.

This prayer ends with the ultimate cry of faith. If we live in step with the Holy Spirit, undergoing purgings, prunings, choosing against selfishness and for love, choosing spiritual poverty and not living for sense gratification, I think we come to a point where we either rethink it all and revert to living in and for the flesh, or we bet everything on the way of Christ. And these concluding words are what is in the heart of those who have bet all. Sometimes we experience no evidence at all that choosing for God has a reward. But we are promised it. So we have hope for it. We cannot see what is on the other side of death, but we have come to know and love the One who has gone there. So we have faith in Him. And ultimately after living in Him we can imagine no other joy than to be with Him. That love will finally reach its pure fulfillment when we see His face in eternity.

These are the things that sustain martyrs and witnesses to the daily Yes to God. And when you and I add our Yes to their resounding chorus of Yeses, this is how the Church moves forward to our ultimate home.

Like I said, AMEN, ALLELUIA!

Why Ask for the Gifts of the Holy Spirit?

Today's piece of the Pentecost sequence:

On the faithful who adore

And confess you evermore

In your sevenfold gift descend

Da tuis fidelibus

In te confidentibus

Sacrum septenarium

Give to the faithful who trust in you the sacred sevenfold gifts.

This puts me in mind of a very basic truth of Christianity that was lost on me as a Protestant. I mean, I had been taught the concept, but I found too many (theo)logical loopholes in the rest of what I was taught so that this truth had no ability to grip my heart and convince my life. And that is simply that the point of living on earth as Christians is to live as Jesus did.

In fact, just a few days before I met the people who were to become instrumental in my experiencing the Holy Spirit in His charismatic dimension, I wrote a song called "We See But Darkly." And in the song I asked the question that plagued me in those days:  "If Jesus is my Lord, and God my Father/Why should I have to even bother with this earthly life?/Why can't I just go to heaven now?/What difference would it make, anyhow?"

The answer to that question is in what we beg for in this piece of the sequence.

We beg for the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit primarily because our life in Christ before entering heaven is about practicing love, and getting used to Divine Love. That entails being sanctified. Being sanctified has to do with embracing God's will, so that all of our energies are trained on what God most desires for us: Love of God and love of neighbor.

When wisdom, understanding, counsel, knowledge, fortitude, piety and the fear of the Lord fill us, we are true to our name: Christian. Jesus is the Christ, the Anointed One, because He is in perfect union with the Holy Spirit, making visible the invisible God. We as His Body are called to do the same: make visible the invisible God.

God forms a people to live in the world and make Him known. That's what I missed as a Protestant, and that's why we ask for these gifts of the Holy Spirit.

Scary Changes

Today's piece of the Pentecost sequence:

Bend the stubborn heart and will

Melt the frozen, warm the chill

Guide the steps that go astray

Flecte quod est rigidum

Fove quod est frigidum

Rege quod est devium

So, sorta like this: Bend that which is rigid, warm that which is cold, make true that which has gone wrong.


I don't know about you, but I have been Queen of Rigid, Cold and Wrong. Empress, really.

Sometimes there is nothing scarier than the Holy Spirit bending you when you are rigid. Because really and truly, if you are actually able to discern that it is the Holy Spirit who is acting, you really think He is completely messing up your life. That rigidity is security. It's a standard. It feels so righteous. Well, except for the joyless, pained and isolated parts. Butthosearesoeasytoignore! Because, security!

When we trade our humanity for security, we are in big trouble.

And when God warms us? Another potential for confusion! Warmness entails nearness, and, dear me, nearness activates all sorts of puritanical fears. Too much warmness, and there might be a fire! We might really get purified!

What if our steps leave the path we are used to, even if our normal is just a weenzie bit wrong? Heck, we could end up anywhere if we open up to course correction. See earlier complaint about security.

But in this prayer we beg for the changes we might not even recognize we need. For Jesus to be Lord of my life means that I put my life at the disposal of the Holy Spirit to be refashioned until I look like Jesus. That will require a lifetime of course corrections, meltings and bendings. This is where trust come in. We've got to trust God's perspective. This is also where meditating on Scripture comes in! We need to know what Jesus looks like, so that shock of what the Holy Spirit sets out to do doesn't blow us out of the water. This is also where prayer comes in, so we can discuss with the Lord all the anxiety that sanctification provokes.

Wanting to "Look Good" for God

Today, I want to think about this piece of the Pentecost Sequence:

Heal our wounds, our strength renew

On our dryness, pour your dew

Wash the stains of guilt away

Lava quod est sordidum

Riga quod est aridum

Sana quod est saucium

The Latin is a bit more blunt: wash that which is dirty, water that which is dry, heal that which is wounded. I like that, perhaps because with use, the English has lost some of its punch for me in these lines. Jesus did not come for the (self-) righteous, but for sinners, and the better grasp we have on our need for God's mercy, the better shape we are in for receiving it. I'm not sure where we get this goofy religious idea that we have to try to "dress up nice" to present ourselves to God so that we will be acceptable to Him. Where's the logic there? God knows all (or He wouldn't be God) and can see through me and understand me better than I know myself. If I were perfect without God, I would be God myself. And last I checked, I am not uncaused being.

Quite often, when I am in the communion procession at Mass, I think of the hymn "Just As I Am."

Just as I am, without one plea
But that Thy blood was shed for me
And that Thou biddst me come to Thee
O Lamb of God, I come....

I come to Jesus because He asks me to come. He desires me to come. It isn't because I have something He needs or because He's going to put me in a line-up to choose someone who is good enough to be in His company. He wants me to come to Him because that is who He is.

And this bit of the Pentecost sequence reminds me of who I am: wounded, parched (unable to sustain or produce anything of life), and stained by my sin. But the Holy Spirit, Lord and Giver of Life, who binds Father and Son and sends the Son into the world, desires to come to me and change me into the very image of Christ: Whole and healing, with a stream of living water that brings life wherever it goes, made pure and bringing purity.

That's awesome.

Nothing Without You

Today's bit of the Pentecost sequence:

Where you are not, we have naught

Nothing good in deed or thought

Nothing free from taint of ill

Sine tuo numine

Nihil est in homine

Nihil est innoxium

Here, the Latin is much simpler and the English has to dance around with a bit more flair to fill the same syllable count. Remember of course that the Church sings her prayers, which in itself reflects the holy nature of prayer, of superfluous beauty spent for God's glory.

The Latin really just says, "Without you [oh deity], nothing is in man, nothing is freely innocent." The paradox is that God who is omnipresent can be excluded from souls by the very will given to the souls by the omnipotent God.

It seems that the root sin of humanity is pride: we think we are something when we are nothing. And this prayer says it plainly: we are nothing without the presence, the life breathed by the Holy Spirit. I'm not much of a linguist, nor am I much of a philosopher, but it strikes me as interesting to meditate on the phrase "nihil est in homine" -- nothing is in man. "Is" generally refers to the existence of something, while "nothing" of course is about the lack of something. Perhaps this drives at the God-shaped hole we all have within us, this having-been-created-for which we need to discover so that our calling out to God means something to us. It's this sense that I don't know who I am without You. And an existence that doesn't make sense to myself is unbearable, so I must seek so that I have peace.

We are designed for communion with God. In that communion, we experience the flow of freedom and innocence through us, which is the Spirit of God living through us. So today's chunk of this prayer expresses awareness of the depth of our need. Our human identity depends on our union with the Holy Spirit.

Fearing the Light of the Holy Spirit

Today I want to think about this bit of the Pentecost sequence:

Oh most Blessed Light Divine

Shine within these hearts of thine

And our inmost being fill

O lux beatissima

Reple cordis intima

Tuorum fidelium

To be filled with light connotes to me a complete lack of any need for fear, for suspicion, for lack of trust. Nothing evil can hide; everything is plain.

The irony is of course that we do fear the light. The whole contest between light and darkness in Scripture (especially from St. John) demonstrates clearly that sin is comfortable with darkness and fears light. So light can actually be a very threatening thing to our sinful status quo. Praying for an influx of the Holy Spirit is not for the faint of heart. As C. S. Lewis tells us about Aslan, he is wild, but he is good.

Even though the light of the Holy Spirit is pure goodness, we are likely to experience it as pain because of our impurities, St. John of the Cross reminds us: "The soul, because of its impurity, suffers immensely at the time this divine light truly assails it." (The Dark Night, Bk. 2 Ch. 5.5)

So this prayer is really one of deep surrender. When we know that God's ways and plans and desires for us are higher than our own, we can trust Him to do within us whatever He wants. But fasten your seatbelt. God answers all sincere invitations.

Labor, Heat and Woe

Today's bit of the Pentecost Sequence:

In  our labor, rest most sweet

Grateful coolness in the heat

Solace in the midst of woe

In labore requies

In aestu temperies

In fletu solatium

This puts me in mind of St. Teresa of Avila's analogy on prayer about the different ways a garden gets watered. Sometimes we need to carry those buckets of water and manually dump it out on each plant. That is when prayer takes mental effort to get cranking. There's also the water-wheel where some effort constructs a system that waters more automatically. But then there are the times when the rain comes directly and no effort is involved at all. This prayer is a gift given by the Holy Spirit. Teresa calls it contemplation.

A more tangible thing this puts me in mind of is something I find happened a lot with my daughter when she was younger. I would always find her at productive peace when I was busy working, doing something she could see, like cleaning or cooking. My quiet presence registered with her quiet presence as peace, security and stability. Quiet people really appreciate this kind of flow! But if I was doing think-work (or wasting my time on the computer), she would start to feel agitated and would get clingy. In those moments, if I got up to clean, it would bring neither of us peace. I couldn't drag her into a place of peace by flipping a switch into "work = peace" mode.

The parallel I'm drawing is that we can't command the graces of the Holy Spirit. We can only discover them active while we are going about what God has given us to do. When we don't feel particularly inspired to pray, we pray out of discipline. Inspiration may or may not come later. Sometimes God leads us through moments of woe on purpose, and we need to walk through them on purpose. Eventually we will see that the Holy Spirit meets us there and brings consolation.

The labor, the heat, the woe are just normal aspects of Christian life. We are not to fear them, be surprised at them or try to avoid them, but rather keep an eye gazing heaven-ward, expecting the Holy Spirit whom we implore to meet us when the moment is right.

Sweet, Comforting, Refreshing Guest

Today's bit of the Pentecost Sequence to consider:

You of all comforters best

You the soul's most welcome guest

Sweet refreshment here below

Consolator optime

Dulcis hospes animae

Dulce refrigerium

So, we are calling the Holy Spirit: best comforter, sweet guest of the soul, sweet refresher.

What comes to mind, I think because of that word that is like "refrigerator" is how when you are kind of hot and weary from working, say, in a kitchen with little moving air, and you just don't really want to trudge much further, but there isn't any way to cool off. And then it rains. Ahhh.... so refreshing. Making you feel energized again, giving you the ability to keep on. That Presence which I cannot cause but I welcome with great joy.

I also think of how, in the spiritual life, how we can feel weary and dull because of the sameness of sin, even if we convince ourselves we only have little sins in our life. When we live according to the flesh, according to natural inclinations, we get to feel dull and heavy. The Spirit of God challenges us, shakes us up, calls us to repent, to dig deeper, to reject complacency and couch-potato-hood.

Guests have a way of doing that, don't they? We clean our house with amazing diligence when someone comes to visit. Everyone gets along well and speaks politely when a guest is here. Everyone pays a bit more attention to how they act.

The Holy Spirit reminds us that, in Christ, we do not live our lives for ourselves, and that when we do, we become sad. We are made glad by the daily dose of the cross He brings to us -- that stirring that brings us life and bends us again to truth and love. Our openness to Him teaches us to be open to all people, and especially to other believers.

Sweet Holy Spirit, come

Come, O Father of the Poor

Come, O Holy Spirit, come! And from your celestial home/Shed a ray of light divine

In these nine days before Pentecost, we pray for the the Holy Spirit to come to us. To ask intelligently, we also meditate on His person, who it actually is we invite. All of this is contained in the Veni, Sancte Spiritus, or the Pentecost Sequence, which is prayed in the Latin Catholic liturgy on the feast of Pentecost.

Today I'm thinking about this chunk: 

Come, O Father of the poor! 

Come, source of all our store!

Come, within our bosoms shine!

Veni pater pauperum

Veni dator munerum

Veni lumen cordium

My almost non-existent Latin skills and a dictionary tells me that the more literal translation into English would be "Come, father of the poor/Come, giver of gifts/Come, light of our hearts."

Speaking of the literalness of things, St. Teresa of Avila had to remind me (in her discussion of the Our Father that I recently read) of the depth of the word "father." My barren computation of this word tends to stop with the sense of "sire." A father, however, is far more than a man who contributes his seed to begin life and then absents himself. To father, as a verb, St. Teresa reminds, is to take on the responsibility for, to provide what is necessary for life, and at sacrifice.

We call on the Holy Spirit here as Father of the poor. The sense is that we seek His fatherhood for ourselves; we desire this poverty of spirit. He is indeed the one who gives life to this desire for poverty. It is His nature, and He imparts His nature to those who share His life. Spiritual poverty clings to nothing, and possesses everything. The Holy Spirit is the bond of the love of the Trinity which fills the Church and makes Her supernatural while still on earth.

And the Holy Spirit is also the provider for the poor in spirit. We have nothing of ourselves; we look to Him for everything and acknowledge every gift He sends as we employ it in living. We are to think of ourselves always as children of the Holy Spirit. That He lives within us explains who we are and how we appear to others: the light of our hearts shining in a dark place.

We pray the novena to meditate more deeply on this reality, drawing its fruit into our souls.