en en en en en en en en en es en en en en en en en en en en en en en en en en en en en es en en en en en en en en en en ru en en en en en en en fr en en en en en en en en en en en en en en en en en en en en en en en en en en en en en en en en en en en en ru en en en en en en en en en en en en en en en en en en en en fr en en fr en en en en en nl en en en en en en en en en en en en en de en sv en en de en en en en en de en en it en en en en en en en en en en en en
A Christian Brother's experience of how prayer has evolved to represent itself to him in all his senses as love
Go easy on yourself. When I was young that's not what they taught us, nor what we learned. We were pretty saturated with religion – in my case Catholicism – to the degree that often I had to go the Church for afternoon rosary recitation when I wanted to go hurling in the park.
Everyday Mass was of course compulsory, twice on Sunday, and disapproval of others talking in the Church was commended. And so on.
I don't resent it now, because at that time people really believed that such attention to holy things was the proper way to life, and that any other way was frankly improper, inadequate, unbecoming etc.
Enjoy your life. Choose ways to enjoy it, appropriate to your parameters – age, domestic situation, gender etc etc. Developing your talents is a great basis for this.
This will usually mean social involvement, competition, juggling your time-tables. Go for it. In my young years families didn't discuss such things, we just went to Church etc. It wasn't 'negotiable', and imposed for our 'benefit'.
Today, few families subscribe to such a way of life. The fewer the better!
Until well into my grey hairs I asked saints I had the honour to know for help in this thing called prayer. Methods were shared, and I tried. Not very successfully I must admit.
I 'reverted' to prayers. For example, I adopted a practice of getting up quite early – I still do – and of adding the Rosary to my morning things – I now don't.
These were choices I made in the roster of making my life more meaningful. Why drop the Rosary? Because I came to believe it was a "making myself holier" thing. Rather like the self-flagellation we were encouraged to practise in the Novitiate, and for which we were given small leather strips as whips.
Making oneself suffer was considered raising the bar on one's holiness, though no one mentioned that it smacked strongly of hypocrisy.
Anyway, I gave up these practices. I continue to rise earlier than most. I don't like it. I am not 100% sure why I do it, but it seems to be important to my life. Am I recommending you to do the same? No way. I am recommending that you enjoy as fully as possible every choice you make in your life.
Hold on. You gave up prayer? A 'Q' or two: What does it mean in your life? Delete. Reframe. What does it mean in MY life?
It means opening out to the reality I now dwell in, that all the universe / multiverse / cosmos / creation represents itself to me in all my senses as love, as well as my inner awareness and conscience and impressions and inspirations and such.
That representation comes across to me as all that I perceive, and so I sit somewhere and simply celebrate the experience of all this being love in action. Some time every day. Not much mine, creation's. Just that.
Mass? Daily, yes, but dragging my feet, unconvinced.
Well, as "prayer", yes. Hey, where does your 'Catholicism' come into all this?
Hardly. But then all the world's "isms" are undergoing great change anyway, as the world itself is. The search for deeper truth goes on and down.
Dear brave reader, try not to get uptight about all that. Your and my relationship with our God, if it is not warming and comforting, well, something's gone wrong. God is love. If love isn't comforting, is it love? Maybe reduced to just duty? Ugh.
Thanks for listening, but like my little nine-year-old girlfriend of many years ago used to sing every morning on the stairs, "Keep the sunny side up."
Brendan MacCarthaigh is a Christian Brother from Dublin working in India for over 50 years, mostly in Value Education with senior classes and teachers.
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