Praying and the problem of distractions seem to go together. We begin to pray by raising the mind to God, but often our attention on God does not last very long. The other element, raising the heart, is more constant provided we do not deliberately turn to doing something else....
At the end of his blog entry - "Surviving Catastrophe" - Kevin Burns wrote: "What Philip Shano's article on the Restoration of the Jesuits provoked in me, and why I waded through these details, was that in addition to wanting the get the history clear in my mind, I wanted answers to another question. After 41 years of invisibility, how was it that the Society of Jesus managed so quickly to re-establish itself around the world?" . . how did the Ignatian vision live on? Today, Bill Robins, SJ responds to those questions....
At the end of his blog entry - "Surviving Catastrophe" - Kevin Burns wrote: "What Philip Shano's article on the Restoration of the Jesuits provoked in me, and why I waded through these details, was that in addition to wanting the get the history clear in my mind, I wanted answers to another question. After 41 years of invisibility, how was it that the Society of Jesus managed so quickly to re-establish itself around the world?" . . how did the Ignatian vision live on? Today, Phil Shano, SJ responds to those questions....
Our contemporary world is driven by four basic narratives. Narratives are those stories in which we try to understand our lives. The narratives of our post- modern age are security, meaning, liberty, and belonging. God enters those four basic narratives and opens them to a path of radical inclusivity where everything will be integrated in the love that is God. That entry of God into the human story is called Incarnation....
As Fr. Joseph Tetlow S.J.--among others--has pointed out, the Examen spiritual exercise has come through hard times. While a number of authors over the years have tried to revive and enhance the exercise, no single approach has proven satisfactory in bringing it back to the important place it was meant to have according to the mind of St. Ignatius....
Prayer is a raising or lifting of our minds and hearts in a loving conversation with god. For most of us, the usual topic of this conversation is asking for something from God. We were encouraged by Jesus to do so fr He assured us to "ask, and it will be given to you"(Mt. 7:7): :And whatever you ask in prayer, you will receive, if you have faith" (Mt. 21:22). His prayer to the Father during the agony in the garden was asking the Father to be released from the need for suffering. But Jesus added a condition that we must include in our own asking--"not my will but thine be done" (Lk. 22:42)...
At the end of his blog entry - "Surviving Catastrophe" - Kevin Burns wrote: "What Philip Shano's article on the Restoration of the Jesuits provoked in me, and why I waded through these details, was that in addition to wanting the get the history clear in my mind, I wanted answers to another question. After 41 years of invisibility, how was it that the Society of Jesus managed so quickly to re-establish itself around the world?" . . how did the Ignatian vision live on? Erik Oland, SJ writes in response to those questions....
Kevin Burns responds to Philip Shano's article on The Suppression of the Jesuits in 1773. and raises a challenge to readers. How did the "aged survivors of the catastrophe" manage to capture the hearts of the young men who would so quickly re-establish the restored Jesuit order after 41 years of invisibility?...
The Mission Intention for February 2014 is For Evangelization: That priests, religious, and lay people may work together with generosity for evangelization. This posting is by Bill Robins, SJ in Kathmandu...
Consolation and desolation mean direction. Consolation is a balance between extremes. Desolation is seducing oneself to an extreme. An analogy: In the famous corridor at the Gesu Square (Rome) Jesuit Br. Pozzo applied artistic perspectivism to explain Jesuit spirituality. The corridor teems with masterful paintings and murals. Standing at either end of the corridor renders the murals and paintings warped and disproportionate. Standing, however, at the center of the corridor under a painting of the Holy Trinity renders the paintings along the corridor proportionate. From this center perspective the corridor makes sense. One can enjoy and identify with the artwork. The universe, similarly, only makes sense when we have God as the center of our lives. This worthily explains consolation and desolation....
