Meditation Lk 13,18-21

The right time has come to reveal outside what the inside has done. The Gospel word for meditation has repeated, on my website you can find more than one introduction for the same periscope. From today, I invite you to deepen Words through replays, as Saint Ignatius says in Spiritual Exercises 2 that not so much knowledge, but internal feeling and the taste of things please and saturate the soul, that is, we stay where we feel interior movement What is a repeat? Referring again to Saint Ignatius in SE 62 we can read: After the Preparatory Prayer and two Preludes, it will be to repeat the First and Second Exercise, marking and dwelling on the Points in which I have felt greater consolation or desolation, or greater spiritual feeling.

Therefore, repetition is a time when prayer takes on a more personal character, becomes simpler and thus called to prayer with simplicity and depth. (cf. Guide to Spiritual Exercises, M.Ivens SJ, p. 156)

Stand in God’s presence. God is present here and now, looking upon you with love.

Ask for the Grace: I will beg God our Lord that all my intentions and actions may be directed purely to the praise and service of His Divine Majesty. (The Spiritual Exercises No.46)

Fixing a place, a picture for meditation: See the mustard seed from which a huge tree grows.

Ask for the fruit of meditation: Let me see mustard seeds in my life

  1. Mustard seed.

Mustard seed is some kind of beginning, an igniter to start the process of change. Each of us has in our experience moments that have become the beginning of something new. Remember them. What is mustard seed for you? What is your mustard seed? See that the mustard seed is very small, it’s easy to lose it, overlook it. You need to be mindful to notice them, let him stay in the place where he fell and let him grow. What is your awareness of what is happening inside and outside of your life?

  1. Mustard seed he took, sowed and grew.

Man took mustard seed, sowed it and it grew. The text does not show that this man had to work hard, that the seed germinated and eventually a tree grew. Maybe in our lives it is enough just to let various processes develop, not disturb them, not create resistance and not to cause fears that they could change us with their strength. As if we entered the current of the river and let him carry us. Each change process needs its own time and space. Relate it to your processes and changes. See how you give them space and time?

  1. Ignatius Loyola, Pilgrim’s Tale see pp. 37-53

Although this may seem unbelievable, the beginning of the change in Ignatius began with a serious wound with a cannonball. As a result of this event, Ignatius had to undergo a long recovery process. He couldn’t walk because his legs had suffered the most. So, during the healing process he began to read the lives of the saints. He was reading for only one reason: it was the only book available in the place where he was then. This reading led him to many thoughts and became the beginning of conversion, from a man who liked to play and the world life he began to become more and more for God. Could he have done otherwise? He could. He accepted the situation as it was, though it was difficult for him and used what he had. He surrendered to the process that had occurred and the changes began to happen. Ignatius was looking for good, fullness, not lack, evil. You can only find what you are looking for, which your attention is directed to.

Take this to your life, what does it look like in your life?

The final conversation: Spend a little time at the end, being with God, Jesus, the Holy Spirit….as you would with a good friend: sometimes talking, sometimes listening, sometimes being together in silence. Speak to God about your feelings. Remember that times when ‘nothing is happening’ can also be significant. When you’re ready, end your prayer by saying thank you or using words that are familiar, such as the Lord’s Prayer (Our Father)–whichever feels right and comfortable. (The Spiritual Exercises No.54)

 

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Meditation Lk 12,35-38

The right time has come to reveal outside what the inside has done. The Gospel word for meditation has repeated, on my website you can find more than one introduction for the same periscope. From today, I invite you to deepen Words through replays, as Saint Ignatius says in Spiritual Exercises 2 that not so much knowledge, but internal feeling and the taste of things please and saturate the soul, that is, we stay where we feel interior movement What is a repeat? Referring again to Saint Ignatius in SE 62 we can read: After the Preparatory Prayer and two Preludes, it will be to repeat the First and Second Exercise, marking and dwelling on the Points in which I have felt greater consolation or desolation, or greater spiritual feeling.Therefore, repetition is a time when prayer takes on a more personal character, becomes simpler and thus called to prayer with simplicity and depth. (cf. Guide to Spiritual Exercises, M.Ivens SJ, p. 156)

Stand in God’s presence. God is present here and now, looking upon you with love.
Ask for the Grace: I will beg God our Lord that all my intentions and actions may be directed purely to the praise and service of His Divine Majesty. (The Spiritual Exercises No.46)

Fixing a place, a picture for meditation: See yourself expecting someone important to you, see the place where you are waiting.

Ask for the fruit of meditation: for the desire to be mindful of God’s presence

  1. Expect.

What do the words: expectation and waiting mean to you? How do you expect and wait for God, for others, for upcoming events? Note your waiting in different situations, see what it is like. Set them up with the gospel waiting.

  1. I expect you …

In today’s Gospel passage, we are talking about waiting for the second coming of Jesus. However, do we sometimes wait for Jesus in our everyday life, who is somewhere and to meet him we have to go to the Church (where he is too), or sometimes we do nothing and wait for some extraordinary miracle or sign that Jesus will confirm his presence? Maybe in your daily relationship with Jesus you don’t have to wait for him, just notice his presence, because he is waiting for you.

Notice how did you meet Jesus today.

See with your imagination that Jesus is waiting for you. What does his expectation look like, maybe he is preparing something for you? How will you respond to his waiting?

  1. One of the experiences of God’s presence in Ignatius’s life after conversion.

After the above-mentioned temptation, he began to feel notable changes in his soul. Sometimes he was so dejected that he found no enjoyment in the prayers he recited, not even in attending Mass, or in any other form of prayer. Sometimes the exact opposite happened to him, and so suddenly that it seemed he had stripped away all sadness and desolation, just as one strips a cloak from one’s shoulders. He was astonished at these changes, which he had never before experienced, and said to himself: “What kind of a new life is this that we are now beginning?”

Ignatius noticed the coming of God in this change, God who always was, is and will be.

The final conversation: Spend a little time at the end, being with God, Jesus, the Holy Spirit….as you would with a good friend: sometimes talking, sometimes listening, sometimes being together in silence. Speak to God about your feelings. Remember that times when ‘nothing is happening’ can also be significant. When you’re ready, end your prayer by saying thank you or using words that are familiar, such as the Lord’s Prayer (Our Father)–whichever feels right and comfortable. (The Spiritual Exercises No.54)

 

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Meditation LK 11,37-41

The right time has come to reveal outside what the inside has done. The Gospel word for meditation has repeated, on my website you can find more than one introduction for the same periscope. From today, I invite you to deepen Words through replays, as Saint Ignatius says in Spiritual Exercises 2 that not so much knowledge, but internal feeling and the taste of things please and saturate the soul, that is, we stay where we feel interior movement What is a repeat? Referring again to Saint Ignatius in SE 62 we can read: After the Preparatory Prayer and two Preludes, it will be to repeat the First and Second Exercise, marking and dwelling on the Points in which I have felt greater consolation or desolation, or greater spiritual feeling.

Therefore, repetition is a time when prayer takes on a more personal character, becomes simpler and thus called to prayer with simplicity and depth. (cf. Guide to Spiritual Exercises, M.Ivens SJ, p. 156)

Stand in God’s presence. God is present here and now, looking upon you with love.

Ask for the Grace: I will beg God our Lord that all my intentions and actions may be directed purely to the praise and service of His Divine Majesty

Fixing a place, a picture for meditation: See the Gospel scene of Jesus’ meeting with the Pharisees or see your meeting place and your meeting with Jesus.

Ask for the fruit of meditation: about an encounter inside me- in my sanctuary, where I am. Alone with God whose voice echoes in my depths. (CCC 1776)

  1. Outside.

See external things, gestures, behaviors. They can be good and needed. Sometimes they are an expression of the internal, sometimes they are the beginning of internal changes. Remember that both the external and the internal is to lead you to the Fullness of Life in God here and now.

  1. Inside.

Thoughts are the result of our desires, while desires are a kind of energy that stimulates us to live. God comes to us in our desires. It is important to read them, what they say to me, what they say about me. We get to know ourselves through our desires. Look for desires in you, do not run away from them, but sit with them at the table and ask what they say to you.

3.From A Pilgrim’s Journey, The Autobiography of Ignatius of Loyola (p.64,77) to your reflection:

He ate no meat, nor did he drink wine, though both were offered him. On Sundays he did not fast, and if someone gave him wine, he drank it. And because he had quite meticulous in caring for his hair, which was according to the fashion of the day – and he had a good crop of hair – he decided to let it grow naturally without combing, cutting, or covering it with anything either during the day or night. For the same reason he let the nails of his feet and hands grow, since he had also been overly neat with regard to them. (…) It was likewise in Manresa – where he stayed for almost a year, and after experiencing divine consolations and seeing the fruit that he was bringing forth in the souls he was helping – that he abandoned those extremes he had previously practiced and began to cut his nails and hair.

The final conversation: Spend a little time at the end, being with God, Jesus, the Holy Spirit….as you would with a good friend: sometimes talking, sometimes listening, sometimes being together in silence. Speak to God about your feelings. Remember that times when ‘nothing is happening’ can also be significant. When you’re ready, end your prayer by saying thank you or using words that are familiar, such as the Lord’s Prayer (Our Father)–whichever feels right and comfortable. (The Spiritual Exercises No.54)

 

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Meditation Lk 10,38-42

The right time has come to reveal outside what the inside has done. The Gospel word for meditation has repeated, on my website you can find more than one introduction for the same periscope. From today, I invite you to deepen Words through replays, as Saint Ignatius says in Spiritual Exercises 2 that not so much knowledge, but internal feeling and the taste of things please and saturate the soul, that is, we stay where we feel interior movement What is a repeat? Referring again to Saint Ignatius in SE 62 we can read: After the Preparatory Prayer and two Preludes, it will be to repeat the First and Second Exercise, marking and dwelling on the Points in which I have felt greater consolation or desolation, or greater spiritual feeling.

Therefore, repetition is a time when prayer takes on a more personal character, becomes simpler and thus called to prayer with simplicity and depth. (cf. Guide to Spiritual Exercises, M.Ivens SJ, p. 156)

Stand in God’s presence. God is present here and now, looking upon you with love.

Ask for the Grace: I will beg God our Lord that all my intentions and actions may be directed purely to the praise and service of His Divine Majesty

 

Fixing a place, a picture for meditation: The image can be a scene from the gospel: Mary sitting at Jesus’ feet, listening to His word or you can see your meeting with Jesus in the place where you usually meet Him.

Ask for the fruit of meditation: that I would like to choose the one thing 

One – the meaning of the word behind the Greek dictionary: emphasis, one, only, one alone. What does it mean for you to be in one, the one is needed? What is your one?

One – many things are sometimes in our thoughts, we have many things to do, also many relationships attract us, and other that we are worried a lot. However, there is one that gives me peace, which makes me know why I live, which is with me always and forever. God, for whom the most important is me – a human, not my failures and successes, only me. What place does God have in my life, what is His one (I do not ask about the rank of the first, second or third place, but does He have a place that is only his and what it is)?

I encourage you to reflect on one also based on a fragment of the Autobiography of Saint Ignatius of Loyola (cf. p. 108-109), in which we can see that what we can take as inspiration from God it can’t be it, it can simply be a temptation. So, we are tempted by the appearance of good. How do I recognize what is my one then?

“… returning to Barcelona, he began his studies with great diligence. But one thing was proving a great hindrance to him, and that was that whenever he tried to memorize anything, as is necessary in the early stages of grammar study, new understandings of spiritual things and new delights came to him, and in such a way that he could neither memorize anything nor could he rid himself of them, no matter how much he tried.

Giving much thoughts to this matter, he said to himself: “Even when I am at prayer at Mass, such clear understandings do not come to me!” Then, little by little, he came to recognize that these were temptations.” 

The final conversation: Spend a little time at the end, being with God, Jesus, the Holy Spirit….as you would with a good friend: sometimes talking, sometimes listening, sometimes being together in silence. Speak to God about your feelings. Remember that times when ‘nothing is happening’ can also be significant. When you’re ready, end your prayer by saying thank you or using words that are familiar, such as the Lord’s Prayer (Our Father)–whichever feels right and comfortable. (The Spiritual Exercises No.54)

 

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