Newsletter - 7 July
Exercises in “Abiding”
A few weeks ago, I told the story of how my wife Nancy and I visited a monastery in Ireland. At the time Nancy was feeling a need for change but was unclear about what that might mean. She spoke to an elderly monk about our situation. He listened carefully and offered two words of counsel – “just abide.”
He was referring to a word often used in the Gospel of John, especially in the parable of the vine (Jn 15:1-11) where the word “abide” (in some translations “remain”) is used 10 times. Jesus says to his disciples: “Abide in me as I abide in you. Just as the branch cannot bear fruit by itself unless it abides in the vine, neither can you unless you abide in me.” Some of you asked an obvious question “How do I abide in Jesus?” One way to learn and practice “abiding” is a one-week retreat based on the Spiritual Exercises of St Ignatius.
The main purpose of this retreat is to renew and strengthen our call to follow Jesus. It begins with recognising God’s purpose for our lives and the obstacles that prevent us from living according to that purpose. We are then led to offer ourselves anew as followers of Jesus.
The heart of the retreat is praying with the mysteries of Jesus’ life from his birth to his death and resurrection. Here the retreat becomes “exercises in abiding.”
As we pray with Jesus’ life, we ask for a grace – “an interior knowledge of Jesus so that I may love him more fully and follow him more closely.”
We are encouraged to use all our faculties, including our imagination and senses, to enter the events of Jesus’ life.
We are to be attentive to our inner response to these events – our thoughts and feelings.
We end our prayer by speaking to Jesus as we would to a friend telling him how “abiding” in the events of his life has spoken to us.
We are also given “rules for discernment” to help recognise the movement of the spirits in our lives – are they bringing us closer to Jesus or leading us away?
These exercises are a good “school of prayer” in which we learn to “abide” in daily life not just when on retreat. The Chemin Neuf Community offers these retreats at our two houses in the UK and in your own home with an online format. Chemin Neuf UK (chemin-neuf.org.uk)
Deacon Ted Wood ccn
Focus of the Week
EVENING MASS
The Sunday evening mass will be on 7 July at 5.30pm. The Mass includes music in a relaxed atmosphere, and is followed by the Cockfosters Parish Pub.
ADORATION
There will be no Adoration from 8 July.
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Adoration will resume on Monday 9 September.