The heart is commonly reached, not through the reason, but through the imagination. John Henry Newman Am I allowing my imagination to stimulate or encourage me to be in touch with and live out of my deepest desires? What you are in love with, what seizes your imagination will affect everything. Pedro Arrupe If God […]
Can I say this is what I want? Or at least, “I want to want it”? Is my faith – what I believe and how I am in the world – leading me towards freedom, compassion, generosity of spirit – or is it leading me towards greater anxiety, confusion or fear? Our disciplines of attending […]
Dispositions [eg: being open, truthful, aware] are the means to acquiring reality. Friedrich von Hugel Is the way I am – in my life, my prayer, my relationships – helping me towards a greater integration or disintegration? Prayer is a matter of intention, disposing yourself towards receiving something. Rowan Williams What matters is not what […]
It is on the level of disposition and desire that we need help most. Michael Paul Gallagher Attention animated by desire is the whole foundation of religious practices. Simone Weil The wisdom of discernment is choosing life-giving habits of the heart. Loving must be learnt by heartIf it is to be any good.It isn’t in […]
A condition of complete simplicity T.S.Eliot Whatever you find in your heart to do in following God,that do, and remain within yourself in Him. Abba Anthony I will allure her,and bring her into the wildernessand speak tenderly to her Hosea 2:14 The desert is the place of personal integrity, without masks or pretensions. All effort […]
My life is with my brother (and sister) Abba Anthony The way forward is the way to someone else. John V. Taylor Hospitality begins at home – with ourselves.Hospitality is about acceptance, of ourselves and others,and is always in the context of the immediate and the concrete. [Remember] You shall also love the stranger,For you […]
Go, sit in your cell, and your cell will teach you everything. Abba Moses Do not be always wanting everything to turn out as you think it should, but rather as God pleases, then you will be undisturbed and thankful in your prayer. Abba Nilus Prayer leads us straight into the heart of mystery where […]
This is a difficult country, and our home. Edwin Muir Strive with all your might to bring your interior activity into accord with God, and you will overcome exterior passions Abba Arsenius When you walk through fire you shall not be burned. Isaiah 43:2 The desert is the primal scriptural symbol of the absence of […]
Nothing can overcome us, but only humility. AmmaTheodora Hearing that a brother was to be brought before the council, he came also, carrying a leaking basket of sand. He said, “How should I judge my brother when my sins run out behind me like the sand in this basket?” Abba Moses Nothing can overcome us, […]
This meditation is the first in Fr Philip Carter’s series Spirituality of the desert, the series that will accompany us during Lent this year. Desert: Uninhabited, desolate; uncultivated, barren. Waterless and treeless region…. It is difficult to conceive of either Judaism or Christianity without the desert. The austerity and relentless simplicity of the desert- and […]