Daily Meditations Archives - Page 340 of 351

Contemplation and Self-Abandonment

07/30/2012

Contemplation (the prayer beyond words and ideas) is a way to describe what Jesus did in the desert. It is not learning as much as it is unlearning. It is not explaining as much as containing and receiving everything, and holding onto nothing. It is refusing to judge too quickly and refining your own thoughts and feelings by calm observation and awareness over time—in the light of the Big Picture. You cannot understand anything well

Re-creation

07/27/2012

Once two brothers went to visit an old monastic. It was not the old man’s habit to eat every day. When he saw the brothers, however, he welcomed them with joy and said: “Fasting has its own reward, but if you eat for the sake of love you satisfy two commandments, for you give up your own will and also fulfill the commandment to refresh others.” It’s not something that most of us like to admit,

Staying by Oneself (Part II)

07/26/2012

The inner attitude with which monks are supposed to sit in their cells is described by another elder in a drastic image: “When you dwell in the desert as a hesychast [a person who practices quietistic meditation], don’t imagine that you are doing something great. Instead, think of yourself as a dog that has been driven away from the crowd and tied up because he bites and bothers people.” The monks do not remain sitting

Members of One Another (Part IX): Weep with Me, Forest and Desert (II)

07/25/2012

The whole creation was altered by thy Passion: for all things suffered with Thee, knowing, O Word, that Thou holdest all in unity. This is a remarkable statement, but it does not stand alone. The ‘Praises’ return frequently to the theme of this all-inclusive co-suffering: Though Thou wast shut within the narrowest of sepulchres, O Jesus, all creation knew Thee as true King of heaven and earth. The whole earth quaked with fear, O Word,

Members of One Another (Part IX): Weep with Me, Forest and Desert (I)

07/24/2012

Sin and salvation, however, are not merely human in scope, but they also involve the entire created order. When Adam fell, the whole creation fell with him; and by the same token our human salvation will inaugurate the salvation of the total cosmos. As Fr Sophrony puts it, ‘Every saint is a phenomenon of cosmic character’. We are not saved from but with the world. This cosmic understanding of sin and salvation has a firm

From Blaming to Forgiving

07/23/2012

From Blaming to Forgiving Our most painful suffering often comes from those who love us and those we love. The relationships between husband and wife, parents and children, brothers and sisters, teachers and students, pastors and parishioners—these are where our deepest wounds occur. Even late in life, yes, even after those who wounded us have long since died, we might still need help to sort out what happened in these relationships. The great temptation is

The Eastern Christian Spiritual Tradition

07/20/2012

The Eastern Christian spiritual tradition is not composed of “schools” as in the West, where they are typically associated with a particular religious order (for example, Benedictine, Carmelite, or Franciscan). Yet there is more than one approach in the East. The one favored on Athos is known as hesychasm, from the Greek word hesychia, translated as “stillness.” It flourished especially in the fourteenth century on Athos, at a time when a controversy arose over the

TAX COLLECTORS AND SINNERS (Part II)

07/19/2012

THE PHARISEES SAID TO HIS DISCIPLES, “WHY DOES YOUR TEACHER EAT WITH TAX COLLECTORS AND SINNERS?” —MATTHEW 9:11 When someone tells you how special you are, all that you can accurately say is: This person given his particular taste and needs, desires, appetites and projections has a special desire for me, but that says nothing about me as a person. Someone else will find me quite unspecial and that too says nothing about me as

TAX COLLECTORS AND SINNERS (Part I)

07/18/2012

THE PHARISEES SAID TO HIS DISCIPLES, “WHY DOES YOUR TEACHER EAT WITH TAX COLLECTORS AND SINNERS?” —MATTHEW 9:11 If you wish to get in touch with the reality of a thing, the first thing you must understand is that every idea distorts reality and is a barrier to seeing reality. The idea is not the reality, the idea “wine” is not wine, the idea “woman” is not this woman. If I really want to get

Staying by Oneself (Part I)

07/17/2012

The ancient fathers continually advise the monks to remain in their kellion, to hold out and not run away from themselves. Stabilitas — constancy, holding on, staying by oneself — is the condition for every kind of human and spiritual progress. St. Benedict sees in stability the cure for the sickness of his day (the time of the great tribal migrations), of uncertainty and constant movement. Stabilitas means remaining in the community that one has