Our Lord Jesus Christ, DIALOGS OF ST. CATHERINE OF SIENNA
"But if you ask Me, whether the soul should abandon vocal prayer, since it does not seem to all that they are called to mental prayer, I should reply 'No.' The soul should advance by degrees, and I know well that, just as the soul is at first imperfect and afterwards perfect, so also is it with her prayer. She should nevertheless continue in vocal prayer, while she is yet imperfect, so as not to fall into idleness. But she should not say her vocal prayers without joining them to mental prayer, that is to say, that while she is reciting, she should endeavor to elevate her mind in My love, with the consideration of her own defects and of the Blood of My only-begotten Son..."
St. Teresa of Avila, INTERIOR CASTLE
"...if it is prayer at all, it must be accompanied by meditation. If a person does not think Whom he is addressing, and what he is asking for, and who it is that is asking and of Whom he is asking it, I do not consider that he is praying at all even though he be constantly moving his lips. True, it is sometimes possible to pray without paying heed to these things, but that is only because they have been thought about previously; if a man is in the habit of speaking to God's Majesty as he would speak to his slave, and never wonders if he is expressing himself properly, but merely utters the words that come to his lips because he has learned them by heart through constant repetition, I do not call that prayer at all -- and God grant no Christian may ever speak to Him so!"
St. Teresa of Avila, AUTOBIOGRAPHY
"I do not understand the fears of those who are afraid to begin mental prayer: I do not know what they are afraid of. The devil does well to instill fear into us so that he may do us real harm. By making me afraid he stops me from thinking of the ways in which I have offended God and of all I owe Him and of the reality of hell and of glory and of the great trials and griefs which He suffered for me. That was the whole extent of my prayer, and remained so for as long as I was subject to these perils, and it was about these things that I used to think whenever I could; and very often, over a period of several years, I was more occupied in wishing my hour of prayer were over, and in listening whenever the clock struck, than in thinking of things that were good. Again and again I would rather have done any severe penance that might have been given me than practise recollection as a preliminary to prayer. It is a fact that, either through the intolerable power of the devil's assaults or because of my own bad habits, I did not at once betake myself to prayer; and whenever I entered the oratory I used to feel so depressed that I had to summon up all my courage to make myself pray at all. (People say that I have little courage, and it is clear that God has given me much more than to most women, only I have made bad use of it.) In the end, the Lord would come to my help. Afterwards, when I had forced myself to pray, I would find that I had more tranquillity and happiness than at certain other times when I had prayed because I had wanted to."
St. Teresa of Avila, AUTOBIOGRAPHY
"The blessings possessed by one who practises prayer -- I mean mental prayer -- have been written of by many saints and good men. Glory be to God for this! If it were not so, I should not have assurance enough (though I am not very humble) to dare to speak of it. I can say what I know by experience -- namely, that no one who has begun this practice, however many sins he may commit, should ever forsake it. For it is the means by which we may amend our lives again, and without it amendment will be very much harder. So let him not be tempted by the devil, as I was, to give it up for reasons of humility, but let him believe that the words cannot fail of Him Who says that, if we truly repent and determine not to offend Him, He will resume His former friendship with us and grant us the favours which He granted aforetime, and sometimes many more, if our repentance merits it. And anyone who has not begun to pray, I beg, for love of the Lord, not to miss so great a blessing. There is no place here for fear, but only desire. For, even if a person fails to make progress, or to strive after perfection, so that he may merit the consolations and favours given to the perfect by God, yet he will gradually gain a knowledge of the road to Heaven. And if he perseveres, I hope in the mercy of God, Whom no one has ever taken for a Friend without being rewarded; and mental prayer, in my view, is nothing but friendly intercourse, and frequent solitary converse, with Him Who we know loves us."
A. Tanquerey, THE SPIRITUAL LIFE (1930)
"Meditation, however, is most useful and profitable to all for salvation and perfection; to beginners, as well as to more advanced souls. It may be even said that it is the most effective means of assuring one's salvation. This is the teaching of St. Alphonsus, who gives the following reason, 'that whilst habitually practicing the other exercises of piety, like the Rosary, the Little Office of the Blessed Virgin Mary, fasting, etc....one may, unfortunately, still live in mortal sin, whilst the habitual practice of mental prayer cannot suffer one to remain long in such a state. One either relinquishes mental prayer or relinquishes sin.' (Praxis Confessarii). How could we day by day go into the presence of God, the source of all holiness, while conscious of mortal sin, and not determine, with the help of grace, to break with sin and to seek in the Tribunal of Penance that pardon the supreme need of which we recognize? But, if we have no appointed time and no practical method for the consideration of the great religious truths, we allow ourselves to be carried away by dissipation of mind and the example of the world, until we lapse into sin and live in sin."
---------------------------------------------------------
THE ORDINARY DEGREES OF PRAYER
Prayer is a divine colloquy arising from the intimate spiritual relationships which exist in faith and in charity between God and the soul. It depends upon God and upon the soul. The soul must use its intellect and will to know God, to love Him, and to converse supernaturally with Him. But it can only do this when, and in the same measure, it is moved and aided by divine grace. The gift of grace is God’s part in the prayer. For true prayer, both God and the soul must play their parts in harmony and union. The two categories of prayer and their different degrees are distinguished according to the relative parts played by divine grace and by the human faculties. In all degrees of ordinary prayer, the soul acts with the help of ordinary grace. This ordinary grace is available always for every soul of good will., and becomes more intense in each degree of ordinary prayer. Ordinary prayer is divided into meditative (or discursive) prayer, affective prayer, and the prayer of simplicity, according to the relative parts played by the intellect and will.
I.- MEDITATIVE OR DISCURSIVE PRAYER
Meditative Prayer is that which we make when God is giving His grace to our soul in an interior and hidden manner, and we are making every effort to raise our mind to Him through considerations, and to raise our will by acts of love, desire and devout resolve.
2. PREPARATION
It is essential to understand a threefold preparation for prayer, consisting in remote, proximate and immediate arrangements.
Remote preparation is indispensable, the most important of the three, and unhappily the one we usually lose sight of. Needless to say, this preparation is ever the same throughout all degrees of prayer. Who is more admirably disposed for prayer than the religious who strives habitually for purity of heart and detachment through mortification, for faculties disciplined by both outer and inner surroundings of judgment and will, who consecrates himself to God in totally generous fraternal love, who is humble through practising the presence of God, and furthermore desires to learn to know God and the things of God by application to sacred study - yet who, amidst all, is recollected and interiorly silent so that he may safeguard what has been revealed in his heart....
3. THE CORE OF MEDITATIVE PRAYER
Four stages are fundamental and are bound to be present in this prayer.
4. CONCLUSION AND CONTINUING EFFECTS.
Having given thanks to God for all His blessings,’ we end the meditation in a humble, confident prayer for the grace to keep our resolution.
5. A CONCRETE EXAMPLE OF MEDITATION
As proximate preparation last night, I read again Mgr. Gay’s pages on the eternal love of God. Here is this morning’s meditation.
Putting Myself in the Presence of God
Kneeling, I gazed at the Tabernacle, or upon a crucifix. I give myself completely to God, letting every image or thought fall away out of my mind, returning and returning to Him. My God, You are here! And I am here with You for a little while, trying to learn to love You. Without You I am helpless, and should only offend You. So help me, God. Oh my God, show me how. . . .’
Considerations.
Dare I think it? Yet it is true, God loves me with an everlasting love. Before the existence of Angels, when God was alone in perfect happiness, needing nothing, He knew me and loved me, though I did not even exist. God knew every creature that He was going to bring into existence, as it was abiding perfectly in His Word. Seeing Himself, God saw me. And loving, in the Spirit, His Word, He would love me. This is the Love that loves me!
Self-Examination.
And how have I responded to Your eternally seeking love? Oh my God, You have had to raise me time and time again from carelessness, from failings that were marked, often grave. And still cold-hearted, I slight You, ignoring this love of Yours.
Affective Acts.
Oh God, can You forgive what has been happening! I know now what ingratitude is; now I see my pride rearing and entwining me in self-love. Oh my God, teach me sorrow, teach me to repent. But how? How can I respond to Your ever-lasting love? Impossible! My God, I am unable. And yet You beseech, You long for this poor creature in Your infinite mercy. My good God, Your love never ceases.
Resolutions.
From this very moment I resolve to remain with You always. At the beginning and in the midst of any work, I shall be ever sensitive to You, desirous only to keep us together, in Your everlasting love.
Conclusion.
Thank You my God, for Your light, for having touched a little this hardness in my breast. How well You know how very little I can do. Without Your help my weaknesses overwhelm me. Be my strength, bless my resolution. Oh Mary, Virgin Most Holy, you are the way to this everlasting love of God.
Spiritual Bouquet.
Ipse prior dilexit nos! Oh yes, my God, You loved me first!’
II. CONSOLATION AND ARIDITY.
After what we have said, meditation would seem reasonably simple and worthwhile. But in practice it is sometimes difficult; and often we cannot see improvement. Why should this be so? Now difficulty comes either from God or from ourself. And God is not usually the source.
2. CONSOLATION.
The feeling of consolation is tender, a spiritual joy suffusing our senses. To know it we must experience it. Heart-filled with the Lord, we rejoice and hasten to Him. In all His delight He is in us, and we are attended, drawn, enfolded and finally lost in His love’.
3. ARIDITY
Aridity is absence of the sensible and spiritual consolations that once made prayer and the practice of virtue easy’.
4. DISTRACTIONS.
Distractions are unwanted thoughts that take us out of prayer’. True, we turn to some of them ourselves, though more often they surge spontaneously through our mind. But once aware of a distraction we are responsible. Willingly we may take it or leave it. And even leaving it, our innocence is not always perfect; there can be a deeper willfulness, a subtle guilt in causa: for who among us does not know well our natural tendency to be idle, unrecollected and out of union with God? Our inconstant mind is seldom free enough to be fixed in prayer upon a single object; and harrying figures of thought make pieces of our concentration.
THE PRACTICE OF MENTAL PRAYER
by Dom Godefroid Belorgey, O.C.S.O. (1951)
1. - ELEMENTS AND PURPOSE.
Our faith needs strengthening. That is why considerations hold so important a place in the first degree. Discursive prayer, discourse, or more simply, meditation are the other names that illustrate how arduous it is to search into truth, turning ideas and turning them repeatedly in their every aspect, until they penetrate our understanding and arouse these ardent acts of desire and resolution.
The will acts in real prayer. Without it our labor might be exclusively intellectual. Now after consideration we understand why something true and good attracts us, and why on the other hand, error, or evil is repugnant. Then our will makes affective acts in accord with our understanding; so that lovingly and with desire we seek whatever good has been proposed by the mind. Or if it is a question of evil, we hate it. As we should have reason to expect then, this condition of the will is actively fruitful, with its decisive and resolute seeking after what is good, its forsaking what is not good.
All in all, meditative prayer profoundly deepens our convictions. It fires our heart and subdues or strengthens the will as our moral progress requires. It has achieved its object if the grand truths of religion penetrate our lives to such an extent that we are living those very truths. But for this, study alone does not suffice.
Or we might say that meditation puts into practice the psychological principle so well presented by Eymieu in his Gouvernment de soi-meme: ‘Thought leads to action.’ And although a pure thought does not often touch us, if it is embodied in some form that our senses can grasp, then we are powerfully inclined to do something about it. Such a thought becomes ours and we live by it. And since we act according to our convictions, it is inevitable then that we come to live what we think, to live what we love. If so many Christians abandon the practice of their religion so easily, it is because they have no religious convictions.
To live in faith, or with faith, is not enough. Justus ex fide vivit. The just man lives, says Saint Paul, by his faith; and not cum fide alone.
After this somewhat theoretical statement, we should like to review a number of the different ways of practising meditative prayer.
We do not discuss the sacramental life in this book, except to say that frequent partaking of the Sacraments of Holy Eucharist and Penance is the living wellspring of prayer. We presuppose this, of course.
According to Tanquerey, the proximate preparation comprises three elements: first, perusal of some spiritual author, or listening to a subject for meditation before we retire; next, having reflected on the subject for meditation until asleep, we return to it the first thing in the morning (let us concentrate, encouraging our heart’s response); so that when we enter the meditation it will be with a confident, humble ardor, desiring to glorify God more and more. Truly, a soul that has done all this is ready for converse with God; at the beginning of meditation it is almost in His presence. Still it must intensify its dispositions.
Immediate preparation for prayer consists in putting ourself in the presence of God. This is the first element in the meditation proper, and is absolutely important. For prayer is conversation; and the two who talk, God and the soul, must realize each other’s presence. God is always present; though instead of being here with Him our heart is usually wandering in thought or imagination somewhere of among creatures. The presence of God means being recollected. It means withdrawal of our faculties from created things, allowing every care and reverie, all that is not God, to fall away. This establishes the favorable atmosphere, the necessary stillness that corresponds closely to what Saint Benedict desires in chapter XX of his Rule.
He says that if we are respectful and modest in the presence of a powerful person from whom we want a favour, then how much more so should we be when we are with Our Lord in prayer. As for public prayer, maxime credamus, let us emphasize our belief in the presence of God. In this way we shall come to realize that we are actually speaking with someone. But quanto magis, how much more’! For now we are with no creature, however powerful, but with the Creator Himself. At this time our attentive reverence cannot but be transformed into adoration. Being in the presence of God in this manner prepares us for worthy prayer: humbly - we see our nothingness in the face of the allness of God - and confidently, knowing that the Creator is our Father as well. Everything goes smoothly after this.
Once in the presence of God, we tell Him our needs. We begin by adoring Him, and end by begging for His light so that we may see into truth, and for His grace so that we may abide with Him, under His sight.
- First, considerations about God, and our relationship with Him; they nourish and fortify our convictions of the Christian virtues’. We could consider how necessary and important it is’ to avoid some fault or acquire a certain virtue; or we might entreat Him fervently for this virtue, praying for the kind of grace that would maintain the untiring cooperation of our will’.
-Then self-examination on this point, ascertaining both our present failings and the way ahead.’ This examination kindles ardent affective acts. We are sorry for the past, we beg for guidance along the way ahead, and prayerfully seek a grace-full progress in the virtue of our desire’. Finally we make a practical and enduring resolution to leave the fault or love the virtue upon which we have meditated.’
And now is the time for a spiritual bouquet. No one can tell us about it better than Saint Francis de Sales. After we have finished, we ought to gather a little bouquet of devotion. And this is what I mean. Anyone who has been strolling in a sweetly-scented garden does not like to leave it without taking away four or five flowers, so that they may be at hand throughout the day; thus it is when our mind has savored of some mystery during meditation, we ought to select two or three points that are attractive and pertinent, to which we may return often, mindful of their spiritual sweetness.’
Briefly, the spiritual bouquet and being mindful of God are one inseparable practice, the importance of which both Saints, Benedict and Francis de Sales attest for us. Lasting, real progress in our soul can be the only fruit of a practice that seeks to prolong our prayer all the day, confirming and regenerating in us the spirit we had originally when we came out of meditation. And assuredly it is our strength as our faults lessen, as we become better, and at last as we are established in the kingdom with Jesus, saying, I live for my Father. I am always attentive to Him, always doing with love His will and His good pleasure.’
I rest here like this, now and then closing my eyes and quietly praying for love. A gradual, increasing silence comes, giving peace to my soul. Now not only in desire, but in the fullness of reality, I am with Him, under the gaze of God. And even if it meant spending most of my time just desiring God, only in His presence, not before, should I attempt a consideration.
And in this life too, God declares His especial love for me. He saw to it that I was born into a profoundly Christian family; and on the day of my Baptism He came and made His abode within me; and then, still in my childhood He invited me to receive Him in His Holy Eucharist. Oh! how many many times since then has He given Himself to me! Ceaselessly He drew me. And in ways I shall not ever know He prepared my consecration. What can be said of this unforgettable, heavenly kindness that brought me to a monastery? Yet even beyond the bounty of graces that I am aware of, what of all the saving, silent ones which have been ever present, ever upholding me!
Now I know how to undo the past. You give me confidence in the midst of all my failings. In contrition and repentance then, that old lovelessness is lost my God, lost in the tears of my heart. Oh God! burn sorrow into this heart, that sorrowing compunction so dear to Your holy Benedict, Your Saint. I long to suffer, to atone, and through it to love You more, my God. I implore Your mercy, Your grace, Your help!
1. SOURCES OF DIFFICULTY IN MENTAL PRAYER.
At the end of prayer then, or during the particular examen, we must probe back into our preparation; after which we should consider carefully each element in the meditation itself. Have I moderated my remote preparation at all, by failings in self-denial or prayer? Have I carried out my duties in a well-ordered way? We shall remark often, as we do now, that most of our difficulty is caused by negligence in mortification, obedience, fraternal love or by spending our prayer and study time wastefully. Have I made my proximate preparation as well as possible? Am I immediately prepared for meditation by being in the presence of God, imploring His graces? Are my considerations profoundly searching and productive? After all, they must arouse my heart and steel the will to act. We are never to forget that the purpose of consideration is to permit us to grasp, really, a pure thought. Only then can we make the kind of affective acts that are the principle of prayer.
Until this point is reached, we have no meditation but a mental exercise. It is the will that a soul makes the gift of itself, and finds union with God; short of this it is only a spectator. There is an abyss between seeing and doing. Seeing good, the power of darkness hates it. Having recognized good, our heart is stirred to follow. And yet our love is never bound; we can be hostile, resisting evidence, delaying the final self-surrender’.
The more insight we are given, the more is our love illumined in the light of understanding; and our heart rejoices in its treasure. Then, the will aroused, we can moderate the working of our mind, so that it has but to nourish our heart, maintaining the pitch of love already achieved there. And as long as a consideration lasts, let us use it, interspersing frequent self-examinations; only aridity should make us leave it and take up another.’
And so prayer is more a matter of the heart than of the head.
A badly chosen subject is little aid to prayer. A well chosen one is supple, harmonizing with our spiritual tone; it is lovingly productive. The subjects contained in Saint Benedict’s first degree of humility are ideal meditation for a beginner: God and His perfection, man compared with God, our duties. Heaven, Hell, Sin. . . . And after a short while we can engage in rich scriptural reflection on Our Lord and His Blessed Mother.
These few paragraphs have outlined the usual human failings in prayer. But if we are sincerely unaware of any negligence, can we question God? Are we to doubt Him?
Never! God always has His plan, though it may not at all times resemble ours. Sometimes we can see Him helping us; at other times He is too hidden. There are certain aspects of consolation and aridity, or dryness, that apply to meditation alone; however our remarks will extend generally.
God’s only desire is for our soul to know His presence, and to be radiant with it. So He will take us to Him, teaching us to understand what is supernatural, enlightening our intelligence, unfolding mysteries and raising our will above ourself to Him alone. The wearying vanities of the world cannot last in the presence of this consolation from above; it is living and marvelous beyond anything we should ever merit. Even as certain pleasure is compatible with our duties, God will not withhold it from our prayer. We may rejoice in this gift as long as it helps us to love its Giver, God.
And we shall not err. Was not our heart burning within us, whilst He spoke in the way?’ (Luke, 24:32) God knows how helpful His consolation is; Saint Bernard mentions his need of it. And the Church prays that we may be consoled in the joy of the Holy Spirit. This is a token then, of the divine graciousness. Let us take it gratefully, that it may take us to the Father, Who has an especial love for each one of us. What can we give God in return? Greater appreciation and generosity. Thus consoled, we are patient in our daily trials, capable of firm and fitting resolutions, spiritually stronger, lovers of prayer; and faith in God’s goodness fills us increasingly. Yet this is hardly a beginning of His gift.
Now it is possible to feel or imagine strikingly similar consolations that are the devil’s, or that originate in our human tendency to twist and overstrain the consolation of the Lord. And so we must mistrust any feelings that bind us to external things, make us proud or turn us from our allotted duty. If they become strong, it is time to open ourself in all simplicity to our director. For God moves in peace and silence.
Let divine consolation make us cautious. There is a spiritual greed that fastens us more to the consolation of God than to the God of consolation.’ Sometimes when this consoling vanishes, so does the life of prayer! For the guise of our pride is varied; it can be condescending, egotistical or self-assertive. And we often assume complacency at the moment when God yearns for us to redouble our effort.
God’s consolation is also our support in another, drier time; it steadies us, so that when the purifying trial of interior suffering comes, we shall not falter in ascending to our Love.
God is either recalling us to order, or trying us, in His mercy; it is dryness through fault’ or dryness without fault.’ Now we say again that if self-examination reveals a particular failing, or some spirit of relaxation, neglect in little things, immortification, waste or deliberate day-dreaming in our remote preparation, then we need look no further. We are at fault. This is God’s warning. How very humble and grateful we should be for it. We beg His pardon and set our again, knowing we have no right to be consoled, yet somehow confident and happy in a deeper knowledge that His gifts, well-used, will lead us directly to Him.
However we may not find any distinct fault even after careful and unagitated examination. In the fourth degree of humility, Saint Benedict speaks of detachment not only from created things, but also from consolation in prayer. In this manner God purifies and confirms the virtue of His faithful servant’.
Again give thanks to God! And leaving the difficulties as they are, unexaggerated, let us dwell patiently in His gift. Can anything be more purifying than this arid, creatureless seeking after God? Our duty is to endure, continuing undaunted in our customary spiritual exercises, letting our nature lament as it will. And fast in our heart is Saint Teresa’s warning that the gravest danger she ever ran in her life was to give up prayer. If the aridity lasts it is well to seek the help of our director and tell him all. He will give us specific direction, teaching us how to practise Saint Benedict’s golden rule: Secure the soul in silence, love patience, and endure, neither tiring nor surrendering’.
Aridity expresses itself in many ways and degrees, although it is divided generally into two sorts. A calm, arid period does not impede prayer. But troubled aridity is a time of confusion and temptation. It is a painful warfare of distraction in which we try to pray.
It is naive to think that we can be affected only in a limited manner. Some characters are beset, almost possessed by external things. Poorly planned studies, worrying, yielding to distraction in our daily tasks, all are sources of difficulty in prayer; and any sickness, any general or specific depression serves to increase our inconstancy of mind. Then too, our heart is dangerous, beguiling us back to things we loved; and its feeling, impulses, like toys of the devil, win us away from God. We can say yes or no to such distraction. Our answer is our reward. But even if it should be yes, we can still will it away and return to Him.
Yet above all this, it is possible to rest preserved, habitually recollected in the presence of God. In prayer, a simple glance to Him can carry our mind and heart over beyond the distraction, back to God again; we are humbled of course, yet unperturbed.
We cannot always re-enter into His presence like this. For we cannot always escape some kind of torment or withering dryness. But using no impatience and no force, we have got to try to let the distractions fall away. Again and again returning to God, we seek Him, searching in the very deep of our being. And often all this will seem sterile. But God is not away; such is our confidence. He is here as He desires, doing great things within us. And we are never-failing in our faith!
