Today’s gospel (Mark 1:29-39) was about how Jesus grasped the hand of Simon’s mother-in-law who was sick with a fever. He helped her up and the fever left her and she waited on them. My mind just focuses in this piece of the gospel because this is the way how I started my spiritual journey jumping to the unknowing with my total trust that He will take my hand and guide me. I remember that I bought a bible and used the parish bulletin to guide me with the daily readings. This strategy forces me to know my parish and get involved and to be faithful to the daily readings. Little by little, I began to be attracted to silent. I was exposed to a Centering Prayer group few years later and realized that I was praying in similar way intuitively. My participation in this group began and I learn about this prayer more formally. The path has been slow because changes are slow. Every time I reach a dead end in my way, I usually got a little anxious until I remember that I am not in charge that He is guiding me. With time, the image of holding His hand has been with deeper trust and confidence. The daily practice of Centering Prayer has giving me the way to develop a deeper relationship with God and a total confidence that He is taking my hand always guiding me wherever He wants I need to go.
Category Archives: Group
Fr. William Meninger Homily July 3_Do you know what the last word is?
July 3, 2016
When someone has an important agenda, for example, he or she is running for office and has an original, significant platform to offer, they send out advance men. Today this takes the form of news conferences, political rallies, media interviews, public debates and so forth. Well, we see in today’s Gospel ,Jesus also had his own way of sending out advance men and women and his own particular instructions. If he were doing this today, Jesus would not have given those precise instructions that we just heard. It would not be politically correct or even sociologically advantageous to curse those who did not accept his platform.. Also shaking dust off of the feet is not today a very effective method of communicating disapproval.
Even personally I know that when I leave the monastery several times a year to go on a mission teaching centering prayer or the process of forgiveness and sharing,if you will, the platform of my community, the only limitations I observe in my packing are the requirements of United Airlines.
Today we are, each one of us, the advance men and women for Jesus. Christianity has grown. Instead of 72 Jesus now has millions. We take a different approach today. In fact we take millions of different approaches. Each one of us according to his or her own calling, own graces, own talents, station in life, occupation, personal relationships and even own weaknesses serves as advance persons for the platform and the coming of Jesus into our world.
We are the inheritors of those 72 disciples and Jesus sends us into our times with the same message of peace and love. When we sincerely try to do this, we will discover that even the demons are subject to us and Satan will fall from the heavens.
There is a very real sense in which we can say that what we read in the Scriptures is not the last word. While we do understand that Jesus is the first and the last word, the Alpha and the Omega, that word is today communicated to the world through us, through you and me.
Do you know what the last word is? It is not what Jesus said 2000 years ago it is what you do yesterday, today and tomorrow. The last word of divine revelation is spoken by the Holy Spirit through you and me. The last word is the last kindness you did to someone else, it is the last time you prayed for others, it is the last time you fed someone who was hungry, clothed someone who was naked, sheltered someone who was homeless, instructed someone who was ignorant, encouraged someone who was doubtful, admonished someone who had fallen from grace or comforted someone who was in grief.
Indeed the kingdom of God is at hand. Look about you. It is on your right hand and your left. It is where you were yesterday, where you are now and where you shall be tomorrow. You don’t have to pack for it or even sally forth into the world, it is at hand. God has sent the Spirit of his son into our hearts and you and I and the Holy Spirit are his advance men…Are you ready?
May you be happy,
May you be free,
May you be loving,
May you be loved.
Father William Meninger
Trinity Homily. Fr. W. Meninger at St. Andrews Episcopal Church 2014
Fr. William Meninger click here for audio
Friends,
Fr. William delivered this homily on Trinity Sunday, June 15, 2014 at St. Andrews Episcopal Church , Seattle. When he set his notes down and began to preach, I knew I was a part of a Holy Spirit inspired moment.
The audio below is about 30 minutes in length. Give a listen. In the seven or eight years of my close association and travels with Fr. William, I believe it to be one of his three finest teachings. (The other two in my estimation is his teaching on Julian of Norwich and the New Creation Mythology. The other is the Loving Search for God and the Spiritual Journey using the 12th-century Buddhist ox herding pictures as a paradigm for the spiritual journey developed from a paper he delivered at the annual Academy of Religion in San Diego , November 2014.)
If someone is able to transcribe the sermon , will you please let me know and email it to me in PDF. I would like to make it a part of Fr. William’s archival history. Thank you in advance.
Blessings,
-Dan
Dan Dobbins dandobbins10@gmail.com
Fr. William Meninger click here for audio
What is Contemplative Prayer?
Emptiness and Non-Attachment, by Carl McColman.
“Last week I wrote about the difference between how Catholics understand meditation and contemplation, based on material found in the Catholic Catechism. A reader left the following comment on that post:
We rest in God. But we do not empty our minds. We are always in communication with God. Prayer is focusing on God and we praise him for who He is, we intercede for others, and we put our requests to Him. We align our wills with His in prayer. Never do we make our minds a ‘spiritual vacuum’ for something else other than the Holy Spirit to fill it.” Read more.
Exploring Foundations of Contemplative Living
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Dear friends For me, it is a privilege to be working with the group that is planning the retreat led by James Finley and I am very excited to let you know with enough time. I would like to invite you personally to this event. The space is limited. For more information and registration go to http://www.stpauls-church.org/ or call (216)-932-5815 Please, register early before is sold out. Josefina Fernandez |
Merry Christmas 2015
May the graces and blessings
of Christmas pour over you.
May the peace and silence rest within you.
May the Light fill your heart with joy,
now and always!
Holy Mary, we are blessed by your faith and trust in God and grateful for your confidence in the unknown mystery of the Incarnation.
Again, we remember that awesome truth of the Incarnation powerfully stated by Raimon Panikkar: “… God became Man…so that Man may become God… The distance betwee the human and the Divine is zero in Christ.”
An for Fr. Thomas Keating poetically adds, ” As the divine light grows brighter, it reveals what it contains, that is divine life; and divine life reveals that the Ultimate Reality is love.” (Mystery of Christ)
I hope this message fill your heart with joy.
Josefina Fernandez
Contemplative Prayer: Joanne Underwood Awakening
Reply
There is an article about Contemplative Prayer in the February 27th edition of The Catholic Exponent. It is about the awakening story of Joanne Underwood and how the experience of Centering Prayer and the support of Contemplative Outreach have helped her. If you have someone you know that may be benefitted by reading this article, please do not hesitate to send this link. Perhaps it will stir up some interest in Centering Prayer!
This is the link:
Raimon Panikkar
Inter-Religious Studies
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http://youtu.be/1eoSg3hMups
