Tag: MeditationWhat is “spiritual reading” and how do busy people find time for this?
A: It sounds like you have found a wise spiritual director. If daily meditation is like the bread-and-butter of your spiritual diet, spiritual reading is your multi-vitamin supplement. First let’s reflect on why that is the case, then we can make some practical recommendations for squeezing it into your schedule. What Is Spiritual Reading? Spiritual reading consists of reading something that explains some aspect of Catholic truth in an attractive, enriching way. Its function is to help reinforce and deepen our Christian view of ourselves and the world around us. In previous eras, popular culture itself was imbued with the Christian world view, so even popular books and dramas would reinforce the Christian value system. But now that is not the case. Instead, our minds are flooded every day by messages (advertisements, films, TV shows, news, music) that directly contradict the Christian world view. That will have its effect on how we think and what we value. In fact, this is one of the reasons the Church is suffering so much from so-called cafeteria Catholics. They get their Catholic formation from secular sources (The New York Times, Newsweek…), and so they simply can’t understand why the Church would ever be against such popular and seemingly reasonable propositions like artificial contraception, artificial reproduction, and gay marriage. Because of this ongoing flood of secular ideals, we have to consciously nourish our minds with authentic Christian teaching in order to avoid being poisoned. That’s what spiritual reading can do. Spiritual reading is either instructive or refreshing. It either informs our minds so that we learn to think and understand more and more in harmony with Revelation, or it refreshes what we already know/have learned by making it shine out more clearly once again. In either case, it counteracts the seductive, secularizing messages that saturate our cultural atmosphere. This is why it’s such an important spiritual discipline. It plants seeds of Christian truth in your mind, and they grow and germinate in your subconscious as you go about your daily business. These seeds often flower during your daily prayer and meditation; in fact, spiritual reading frequently provides topics, ideas, or insights that are excellent material for Christian meditation. Getting Practical Spiritual reading differs from plain reading not only in the content, but also in the method. You don’t need to spend a lot of time doing spiritual reading; fifteen minutes a day is fine. And you don’t need to read fast. The idea is simply to taste, chew on, and swallow some healthy Catholic concepts every day. The difference between spiritual reading and meditation is the end result. The goal of your meditation is to converse with the Lord about what matters to him and what matters to you. The reflection and consideration that forms part of your meditation is meant to spur that conversation in your heart. The goal of spiritual reading is to inform your mind; it doesn’t finish with a prayerful conversation (though that can sometimes pop up spontaneously, which is fine!). A lot of the books we have been recommending on this Web site are prime material for spiritual reading. But if you’re not a reader, or if you think you don’t have time, you can also get creative. Good Catholic novels (novels imbued with a Catholic world view, where characters exemplify Christian virtue in a realistic but inspiring way) can serve as a kind of spiritual reading. Listening while you drive or exercise to recordings of spiritual talks, homilies, or conferences (or books on tape, or even good Catholic podcasts) can also do the trick. The point here is that we all need to be always growing in our knowledge of the faith, because if we are not growing, we’re withering. Yours sincerely in Christ , Fr John Bartunek, LC ThD PS: The beautiful painting is entitled “Prayer” by Itzhak Tordjman A Guide to Christian Meditation
Many of you know that Father John’s book, The Better Part is in its third printing. In the beginning of The Better Part Father John provided us with a brief but profound guide to Christian meditation. The good news is that now you can have that guide in a new book called A Guide to Christian Meditation. In this book, after a brief historical introduction to Christian meditation (not available in The Better Part), Father John provides an elegant and memorable method for meditation along with very helpful examples of specifically how to put this method into practice. He manages to do this while keeping our sights on Christ, not the method. This emphasis helps the reader to avoid common and unfortunately popular errors that overemphasize the means instead of the all important end – a deeper relationship with Christ himself. If you or anyone you know struggles with prayer or is looking for a way to enhance their prayer life, this is a fantastic resource at a very reasonable price (only $6.95!) Click here to purchase or learn more. Seek Him – Find Him – Follow Him Dan The Better Part – A Christ-Centered Resource for Personal Prayer
No one who is learning or desires to learn to pray more deeply and meditate more effectively on the person and work of Christ should go without this book. It offers a basic but at the same time sufficiently comprehensive overview of how to meditate in the Christian tradition (no New Age or Hindu/Buddhist influences here.) Beyond the solid instruction on meditation method, Father John provides us with meditations through the four Gospels and group study questions at the end of each of the 303 meditation units. Table of Contents (Partial): Gods Idea of Prayer
Types of Prayer
Four Step Structure of Meditation
Difficulties in Prayer
If you want to deepen your relationship with Christ by learning to meditate on Christ and his teaching through timeless and authentic Catholicism, this is the best way I know to start. Seek Him – Find Him – Follow Him Dan
Time for God – Book Recommendation
Father Philippe begins this fantastic book by laying the foundations of the heart of Christian mental prayer and meditation – God’s grace. He then provides a very clear and helpful contrast between Christian prayer and conflicting spiritual traditions that have recently made their way into Catholic spirituality. Through the remainder of the book he does a masterful job of drawing from the rich depths of the Carmelite tradition (St. Teresa of Avila, St. John of the Cross, etc.) to provide a meaningful review of key principals of meditative prayer. If you are seeking to better understand mental prayer, contemplation, how to deepen your own prayer life, how to overcome struggles with prayer, you can’t go wrong with Father Philippe’s faithful and coherent treatment of these topics. This really is a must read for both spiritual directors and those seeking greater depths in their prayer lives. Major topic headings for the book:
To purchase this book and support this site, click here. Seek Him – Find Him – Follow Him Dan PS: You might wonder why I have this book categorized in “Centering Prayer” and “PsuedoSpirituality.” The reason is that the book provides the most concise, coherent, and charitable treatment of the modern synthesis of Catholic and non-Christian prayer practices. A Simple Guide to Christian MeditationTo serve you in your commitment to prayer this Advent season, Father John has provided a simple introductory guide to Christian meditation. Each day you should reserve some time – 5, 10, or 15 minutes can be a good start – to spend in quiet, heart-to-heart conversation with Christ. This is called Christian meditation. The goal of this kind of prayer is to deepen your personal relationship with Christ, praising God and receiving his grace, and to identify yourself more and more with the purpose of your life: to live in communion with God through the fulfillment of his will. As you develop the habit of this prayer, you will find ways to personalize the method. To begin, however, and in order to overcome the distractions and dryness common to those starting off on a more demanding life of prayer, the following structure has shown to be of great utility. Be sure to choose a time and place conducive to the silence and attention required; most spiritual masters recommend that we do our meditation early in the day, before the thousand cares of this busy world tangle us up in their knots. They also recommend that we do it at the same time every day, and in the same place, somewhere quiet, where we know that interruptions and distractions will be limited. More important than the time and place, however, is the commitment to make meditation part of your daily spiritual fare, no matter how busy you get or little you feel like praying. Your meditation can be divided into 4 steps – the four “C”s: Concentrate, Consider, Converse, Commit. Concentrate This simply means focusing your attention on God, on his presence, on your relationship with him. You renew your faith, your love, your hope in him. You ask him for the particular grace you are seeking in this time together with him. You recall that he created you and is interested in you – so much so that he sent his Son to save you and established the Church to guide you to your eternal home. This first step of your prayer means concentrating on your true center: your identity as a creature, a beloved child of God in need of his grace. Consider In the second step of your meditation you take a passage from Scripture, or from a spiritual book, or the Catechism, of the writings of a saint, or even a sacred image or a beautiful natural landscape (you work out what kind of material is best for you through experimentation and the guidance of a spiritual director) and you read it over. You reflect on what it means, what it tells you about God and his ways and his plans, and what it means for you personally, in your particular situation and state in life. In this stage you ponder in your mind and heart some truth or aspect of God’s revelation, you apply it to your life and make it your own. Sometimes asking questions can help your consideration: what is the meaning of the passage? What are its key words? What is going on here? How would I express it in my own words? Converse Here is the core of the meditation: a heart-to-heart conversation with Christ about the passage you have been considering and the insights that the Holy Spirit has been giving you. This intimate, personal exchange is what separates Christian meditation from other merely psychological exercises that don’t move beyond concentration. Here is the mark of true prayer, where you respond to the Word of God with words of your own, expressing your admiration, your gratitude, your love, your confusion, your need – whatever the consideration stirred up in your soul. You also give him time and room to speak to you. He often chooses to do this not with words or even ideas, but by moving your will, by directly touching your heart. (Try not to get hung up on hearing him explicitly every day, but you should be able to look back over several days or weeks and recognize his action in your prayer life.) As you converse, in the silent depths of your heart you open yourself to God, offering your life and inviting him once again to come and show you the way to a living communion with him. All the other steps of the meditation are directed to this step, so if you only need a brief moment of concentration and consideration in order to enter into heartfelt conversation with the One who loves you, don’t dawdle on steps one and two. Normally, however, we need to gather our attention in order to be able to hear and respond to the Word of God, and steps one and two help us to do that. Commit Finish your prayer by letting it affect your life: commit yourself to do something concrete today as a result of the time you spent with our Lord, whatever you think the Lord is asking of you or whatever you think would please him. Whether it means making an extra visit to a chapel to spend more time with him, or asking someone to forgive yesterday’s temperamental outburst, or visiting someone who is in the hospital, or calling that person who needs a call – something concrete, measurable, real; something about which you can say at the end of the day: yes, I did that, or no, I didn’t. This insures that our prayer life doesn’t become a mere psychological sedative or an exercise of vanity. As you offer this commitment to the Lord, thank him for his presence and the graces he has given you during this time of prayer, ask pardon for your distractions (especially if you invited them or gave in to them out of laziness or lack of faith), and finish by entrusting the fruits of your prayer to the Blessed Virgin Mary through reciting a Hail Mary. End with the sign of the cross, and then go forth to glorify God by fulfilling his will out of faith, hope, and love. Yours in Christ, Father John Bartunek, LC For a more in-depth treatment of Christ-Centered Christian Meditation, check out Father John’s book, “The Better Part.” Click on the ad below and you can pick up a copy specially discounted for our readers. |
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