Merton: Spiritual Direction

“The only trouble is that in the spiritual life there are no tricks and no shortcuts. Those who imagine that they can discover spiritual gimmicks and put them to work for themselves usually ignore God’s will and his grace.” —Thomas Merton in Contemplative Prayers.

Thomas Merton’s concise book, Spiritual Direction and Meditation, is another excellent source for someone who wants to know what spiritual direction is all about. It is often recommended to spiritual friends before meeting about direction for the first time. It should also be a frequent reread for those giving spiritual direction. Merton reminds us that spiritual direction is not psychotherapy, and that directors should not become amateur therapists. He recommends that directors not concern themselves with unconscious drives and emotional problems. They should refer.

Merton’s sections on meditations are classic, straight forward, and practical. He uses the story of the Prodigal Son to serve as a model for meditation, as the son “entered into himself” and meditated on his condition, starving in a distant land, far from his father. Merton also suggests the Incarnation, the birth of God into human form, as focus for another meditation relating to birth events within our own spiritual life.

Merton emphasizes the importance of holy leisure, believing that meditation should not be work, remembering that it will take time. He reminds us of promising artists who have been ruined by a premature success, which drove them to overwork in order to renew again and again the image of themselves created in the public mind. An artist who is wise spends more time contemplating his work beforehand than he does putting paint to canvas; and a poet who respects her art burns more pages than she publishes.

In the interior life we must allow intervals of silent transitions in our prayer life. Merton reminds us of the words of St. Teresa: “God has no need of our works. God has need of our love.” The aim of our prayer life is to awaken the Holy Spirit within us, so that the Spirit will speak and pray through us. Merton believes that in contemplative prayer we learn about God more by love than by knowledge. Our awakening is brought on not by our actions, but by the work of the Holy Spirit.

Merton also cautions us about what he calls informal or colloquial “comic book spirituality,” which flourishes in popular religious literature: for example, when Mary becomes Mom and Joseph is Dad, and we “just tell them all about ourselves all day long.” This may be a helpful path to God for some, but it was not Merton’s path.

Joanna. Joannaseibert.com

First Step

“The heroic first step of the journey is out of, or over the edge of, your boundaries, and it often must be taken before you know that you will be supported. The hero’s journey has been compared to a birth; it starts out warm and snug in a safe place; then comes a signal, growing more insistent, that it is time to leave. To stay beyond your time is to putrefy. Without the blood and searing and pain, there is no new life.” —Diane Osbon in A Joseph Campbell Companion (N. Y.: HarperCollins, 1995).

fork in the road

People sometimes come for spiritual direction as they are taking that first step to becoming the person God created them to be. It is a fork in the road and always they are on a road less traveled. Sometimes the path is so undeveloped or uncared for that it is overgrown. In fact, a recognizable path can be seen only by someone who has traveled that way before. This is why we look for and need spiritual friends along the way.

Sometimes it may be necessary for someone to hold our hand just to get us started. Other times we see the way clearly after just minimum help. Sometimes we need a companion for a greater distance, until we become familiar with the path and adjusted to its twists and turns. The journey, and certainly the first step, is a birth offering a multitude of opportunities for rebirth. We can always count on labor pains and a messy experience before we hear our new voice. Friends and family may have difficulty accepting our change, our new birth, the different path we are now on.

Treasuring the journey instead of focusing on a goal can always keep us from wandering off the path.

Joanna. Joannaseibert.com

Pentecost Continues

Pentecost Continues

“When he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, ‘Receive the Holy Spirit.’” —John 20:22.

We are now into the season of Pentecost: remembering, celebrating that the Spirit was given to us on the Day of Pentecost. If you want to see what happened that day when the Spirit moved through a large room of people who did not have a clue what was happening, watch the video of Bishop Michael Curry’s sermon at the wedding of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle on the morning of Pentecost Eve.

Usually the minister’s words at a wedding are called a homily, a short sermon; but as one of the British commentators puts it, Curry’s message is a true sermon—and it is all about love. He first reminds us that when two people fall in love, nearly the whole world shows up, as it did on that Saturday morning. That is how important love is.

Bishop Curry reminds us that love has the energy of fire; and his enthusiastic, passionate words are indeed comparable to the Pentecost flames running through St. George’s Chapel on that day. It appears as though Bishop Curry is so filled with the Spirit, he has to keep holding on to his lectern to stay in place.

His body language signals that he wants to move out and reach more directly toward the young couple and his congregation. As you watch people’s faces, you can tell they have no idea what to do with him or his barnstorming message. They look mystified, amused, indignant, comical, questioning. Some look down at their program so others cannot see what they are thinking. Others glance at their neighbors to seek a clue from them about what is happening. Some almost fall out of their chairs! Some look at Curry as if they are mesmerized.

Perhaps the ones who seem to understand his message best are indeed the royal wedding couple themselves—especially Meghan, who beams a radiant smile with an occasional twinkle through the whole sermon.

Bishop Curry’s presentation and delivery are not given in the British style; but his message of love is true to his Anglican and African roots. He speaks out of his African American tradition, drawing from his ancestors in slavery and out of his training in an Episcopal style that Americans modified from the Anglican form. Curry speaks his truth, which comes from deep inside of him—as all these traditions mesh and kindle tongues of fire from the power of love that flames around the world.

Curry is a wonderful role model of what it is like to be filled with the Spirit. With Pentecost fire, have no choice but to speak the truth. Many people will not have a clue what we are saying; but everyone who receives us will be changed in some way.

Bishop Curry also reminds us that the truth from God should always be about love: loving God, loving ourselves, and loving our neighbor. Period.

I have so enjoyed our journey together through Lent and Easter.

Happy Pentecost Season.

Joanna joannaseibert.com