WCCM Benedictine Oblates are encouraged to read a designated portion of the Rule daily, and to write a brief, personal response. I hope that this blog will support our Oblate community in this practice. Please, keep blog entries brief and in a first-person ("I") voice. Refrain from discussing, offering an opinion, or commenting on other entries. Simply consider how a particular section of the Rule is speaking to you in your present circumstances.
“We must know that God regards our purity of heart and tears of compunction, not our many words. Prayer should therefore be short and pure….” These words sound to me very much like the words of John Main but they are the words of the Rule of Benedict. My own practice then, of saying the one word, during my meditation, is reinforced in and by the very heart of the Benedictine Rule. But I like that. Every now and then I need words coming from a different direction. Keep going those words say to me. It is the way for you into a “relationship with the God who is in relationship with (you) us always.”(Chittister)
“Above all, in our prayer we are not trying to possess or to change God. If we are trying to do anything it is to be one with God who is.” (John Main, “Door to Silence”, Kindle loc697). Again, Abba, you call me to the “irreverent” reverence of a child, who boldly jumps into their Father’s arms and comfortably curls up there.
“We must know that God regards our purity of heart and tears of compunction, not our many words. Prayer should therefore be short and pure….” These words sound to me very much like the words of John Main but they are the words of the Rule of Benedict. My own practice then, of saying the one word, during my meditation, is reinforced in and by the very heart of the Benedictine Rule. But I like that. Every now and then I need words coming from a different direction. Keep going those words say to me. It is the way for you into a “relationship with the God who is in relationship with (you) us always.”(Chittister)
ReplyDelete“Above all, in our prayer we are not trying to possess or to change God. If we are trying to do anything it is to be one with God who is.” (John Main, “Door to Silence”, Kindle loc697). Again, Abba, you call me to the “irreverent” reverence of a child, who boldly jumps into their Father’s arms and comfortably curls up there.
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