If you want to know God, prepare for an ordeal

There are times when reading Fr. Dear's web page is great, but there are times when reading about any contemplative drives one up the wall. I know hearing from us dealing with large families, being the referee, providing help when bad things like job loss and other problems come along drives contemplatives further into the cave with boredom over our "materialistic " life. Unfortunately, others find us in our caves. We call to God and we know He hears us and cares, but the problems are ours to solve.

Do we know God? You bet we do. We sit on our porches and talk to Him; we manage somehow to think of the whole world and cry bitter tears over things we don't even know how to pray for. Still, in our hearts we feel His love and His peace.

I, personally, have not eaten for a couple days because other's problems have stolen my need for food. I'll be fine. I do not have TV, am I a saint? Oh please. Dr. Paul Farmer, thank God, does not write contemplation, I love him, I pray for him. Also bunches of people I hear about and know personally, but they aren't important, just good people. Enough, God help us common folk.

Please notice this important announcement:
"Next month, his new book, Daniel Berrigan: Essential Writings, will be published by Orbis Books."

Each and every Roman Catholic library opens shelf space for this book.

I have now begun reading the most recent exegetical work from the Reverend Father Daniel Berrigan SJ entitled No Gods But One, on Deuteronomy, which the new reader might find contains great clarity and scholarship while retaining the evocative, associative style of this great poet. I am sorry not yet to find a review of it here, but like all great poetical works, evocative, each reader finds it resonates individually, deeply personally, according to the point in this Pilgrim path we each take together. If you find it easily dismissible then you most need to take and to read. I realize my need, and I read.

In fact I have read with great joy and gratitude several of the many exegetical works on Old Testament prophets written by the Reverend Father Daniel Berrigan SJ, and find this one very promising and instructive, in fact edifying, as ever.

I of course would recommend each reader to find and to read the originals, several now found favorably priced, while I look forward to reading this, the Reverend Father John Dear SJ's compilation of essential writings (ouch - how to select that which is essential when the entire opus is essential to the path of each Roman Catholic, from the Catonsville Nine, and the Night Flight to Hanoi, to the present day writings of this mighty and clear octogenarian). Father John Dear's other selections of the writings of our prophets have been essential, with brilliant commentaries.

Please read this great priest Daniel while he yet remains here with us.
And always read Father John.

Dear Father John,

This is not about your topic, but I wanted to share it with you anyway. About 4 months ago, I was diagnosed with an auto-immune disorder that caused very severe joint and long muscle pain. Just trying to move my arms before noon was just about impossible. Finally had to go to the ER, because the pain in shoulders, elbows and hips made me feel as if those bones were being disarticulated from the rest of me. One night, my shoulders were so very painful, and my elbows hurt touching the mattress, so there I was in bed, arms propped up on pillows, ice packs on both shoulders, lying on heating pad and wrapped in blankets to keep from shivering. My husband told me I cried all night--I do remember whimpering like a whipped dog. But then, I think the Holy Spirit pierced through all this misery, because over and over I thought, "This has to be mild compared to what Jesus suffered as e was hanging on the cross for me." Just that same thought over and over in my head got me through 'til morning when my husband took me to the ER. Where a doc was able to diagnose part of the problem and put me on Prednisone to reduce the inflammatory process going on in my body, and in a few days, the pain began to subside. Finally saw a rheumatologist--those people are very hard to see-not enough of them! Her fear was that I also had something really nasty, called giant cell arteritis, which can take your vision away. By the grace of God that was negative. So now, I'm better and am being very slowly weaned off Prednisone. I hope I'm a better person for experiencing this. Not a retreat as you described, but certainly a rich learning experience in its own right. God bless and keep you safe, Bobbie Paxton

Seek God Everywhere is available by pre-order through Amazon as well as the other works cited in this article immediately available very favorably priced, often shipped from the great Goodwill Industries.

Does anyone know the cause of sudden death in 1987 at the Jesuit Fordham University?

John,

Thanks so much for this glowing review of Seek God Everywhere. It was a joy to work together with Daniel Kendall, S.J., and Gerald O'Collins, S.J., as editors of this manuscript which is the result of transcriptions of talks Tony De Mello, S.J., gave at the Sadhana Institute in 1975. I'm so glad you enjoyed the book. Peace!

Jeff

Keep in mind that not all things spiritual are good. There are dark and evil spirits that desire to lead one astray.

I am curious to read the book because it sounds very good. I was thrown by the quote in the article's 11th paragraph [ I am reminded of the book of Wisdom: “If you want to know God, prepare yourself for an ordeal.”] I do not know which translation was used, but I have not been able to find anything like that quote in the book of Wisdom. It is surely a true statement, I just cannot find the verse. Anyone out there know what chapter & verse that's from?

There is another way of experiencing the Exercises besides the 30-day or 8-day retreat, what Ignatius called the 19th Annotation, or the Retreat in Daily Life. The same "Exercises" are covered as in the 30-day, but spread over several months, usually about 9, meeting with a guide or director weekly and maintaining a period of prayer daily. This makes the Exercises accessible to almost anyone.

I have been involved in a program called Bridges here in St. Louis that has been offering this form of the Exercises for over 20 years. Although Jesuits collaborate with us, the Bridges Program is a lay organization and most of the guides are lay people.

One of the great gifts of this form of the Exercises is that since you are living your every day life as you pray the retreat, the retreatant really has the opportunity to Seek God Everywhere, even in the most mundane realities of his/her life, or in major crises that may occur during the retreat.

More information about the Bridges Program can be found at www.bridgesfoundation.org.
Creighton Universities Online Ministries, http://onlineministries.creighton.edu/CollaborativeMinistry/online.html, also has a wealth of information on the Exercises and an online retreat.

http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/congregations/cfaith/documents/rc_con_...

But already in certain passages in these early works and to a greater degree in his later publications, one notices a progressive distancing from the essential contents of the Christian faith. In place of the revelation which has come in the person of Jesus Christ, he substitutes an intuition of God without form or image, to the point of speaking of God as a pure void. To see God it is enough to look directly at the world. Nothing can be said about God; the only knowing is unknowing.
...
Jesus is not recognized as the Son of God, but simply as the one who teaches us that all people are children of God. In addition, the author's statements on the final destiny of man give rise to perplexity. At one point, he speaks of a "dissolving" into the impersonal God, as salt dissolves in water. On various occasions, the question of destiny after death is declared to be irrelevant; only the present life should be of interest. With respect to this life, since evil is simply ignorance, there are no objective rules of morality. Good and evil are simply mental evaluations imposed upon reality.

Consistent with what has been presented, one can understand how, according to the author, any belief or profession of faith whether in God or in Christ cannot but impede one's personal access to truth. The Church, making the word of God in Holy Scripture into an idol, has ended up banishing God from the temple. She has consequently lost the authority to teach in the name of Christ.

With the present Notification, in order to protect the good of the Christian faithful, this Congregation declares that the above-mentioned positions are incompatible with the Catholic faith and can cause grave harm.

Bill Clinton, Jim Yong Kim, president of Dartmouth, and Bill and Melinda Gates care PASSIONATELY about the world's poor!

The quote is from Ecclesiasticus or the Wisdom of Jesus Son of SIRACH: "My Child when you come to serve the Lord, prepare yourself for testing" 2:1 (NRSV).

John is absolutely right about Tony de Mello. Great stuff (strange to refer to John as "right" as opposed to left [LOL]).

Another excellent book on Ignatian spirituality is _The Dynamics of Desire_ by James L. Connor and The Woodstock center, published by the Institute of Jesuit Sources in St. Louis. The book integrates much of Bernard Lonergan's thought with the dynamics of the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius

P.S. My old novice master used to quote the Jerusalem Bible translation of Ecclesiasticus pre the Wisdom of SIRACH (2:1): "Young man, if you aspire to serve the Lord, prepare yourself for an ordeal.

P.S.S. The Vatican's concerns about Fr. de Mello's teachings were laid to rest when some writings falsely attributed to Fr. De Mello were found to have been maliciously submitted for the Vatican's examination. When the Vatican realized some conservative were lying in order to make Fr. de Mello appear in an unfavorable light, the investigation ended with Fr. de Mello fully exonerated and justified.

No one believed in Jesus as Lord and savior more than Tony de Mello. His integration of that truth with his Indian cultural background, while placing his Christocentric religious vision in dialogue with Hindu and other wisdom traditions, is a service to the church and the entire human family.

Correction: That Title is "The Dynamism of Desire: Bernard J. F. Lonergan on the Spiritual Exercises of Saint Ignatius of Loyola" James L. Connor. ed.

I am married and did the Spiritual Exercises over 30 weeks instead of 30 days while staying at home. It was a wonderful and challenging experience of God. This 19th Annotation (a note that Ignatius wrote in his manuscript) or "Retreat in Daily Life" way of doing the Spiritual Exercises was quite doable in my life, though you do need to be consistent. Many leaders of these retreats think that the Exercises are actually more effective in daily life than going off to a retreat house for 30 days.