Episode 2 The Daily Prayer of Discernment: The Ignatian Wisdom of the Examen Prayer with Fr. Timothy Gallagher.   The First Step in the Examen Prayer:  Gratitude.  Taking time out of the day when our hearts are free to receive the Lord’s presence.  Prayer always takes two persons in relationship…ourselves and God.  Then together with the Lord, we see what the gifts of love God has poured out upon us.  The key in this first step, is not to look for our missteps (that may come later), but to look for the gifts and give thanks.

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As outlined from the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola
(translated from the autograph by Fr. E. Mullan, S.J.  1909 in the public domain)

METHOD FOR MAKING THE GENERAL EXAMEN
It contains in it five Points.

First Point. The first Point is to give thanks to God our Lord for the benefits received.
Second Point. The second, to ask grace to know our sins and cast them out.
Third Point. The third, to ask account of our soul from the hour that we rose up to the present Examen, hour by hour, or period by period: and first as to thoughts, and then as to words, and then as to acts, in the same order as was mentioned in the Particular Examen.
Fourth Point. The fourth, to ask pardon of God our Lord for the faults.
Fifth Point. The fifth, to purpose amendment with His grace.

OUR FATHER.

Father Timothy M. Gallagher, O.M.V., was ordained in 1979 as a member of the Oblates of the Virgin Mary, a religious community dedicated to retreats and spiritual formation according to the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius.  Fr. Gallagher is featured on the EWTN series “Living the Discerning Life:  The Spiritual Teachings of St. Ignatius of Loyola”.  For more information on books and audio available for purchase from Fr. Timothy Gallagher check out his website: www.frtimothygallagher.org

 

For the other episodes in this series check out
Fr. Timothy Gallagher’s “Discerning Hearts” page

 

VATICAN CITY, 25 JAN 2012 (VIS) –

Benedict XVI dedicated his catechesis during this morning’s general audience to Christ’s priestly prayer during the Last Supper, as narrated in chapter 17 of the Gospel of St. John. In order to understand this prayer “in all its immense richness”, said the Pope, it is important to see it in the context of the Jewish feast of atonement, Yom Kippur, in which the high priest seeks atonement first for himself, then for the order of priests and finally for the community as a whole. Likewise, “that night Jesus addressed the Father at the moment in which He offered Himself. He, priest and victim, prayed for Himself, for the Apostles and for all those who would believe in Him”.

The prayer which Jesus prays for Himself is the request for His own glorification. “It is in fact more than a request”, the Holy Father said, “it is a declaration of willingness to enter freely and generously into the Father’s plan, which is accomplished through death and resurrection. …

Jesus begins His priestly prayer by saying: ‘Father, the hour has come; glorify your Son so that your Son may glorify you’. The glorification Jesus seeks for Himself, as High Priest, is to be fully obedient to the Father, an obedience which leads Him to fulfil His filial status: ‘So now, Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had in your presence before the world existed'”.

Episode 3 Beginning to Pray:  “Heaven in Faith”  Day 2 Prayer 1 – “The Kingdom of God is Within You”

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Dr. Anthony Lilles is a Catholic husband and father of three teaching Spiritual Theology at St. John Vianney Theological Seminary. He  teaches spiritual theology and spiritual direction to transitional deacons, and the spiritual classics to the men who enter the Spirituality Year, a year of prayer in preparation for seminary formation.  He is the author of the “Beginning to Pray”  catholic blog spot.

From “Heaven in Faith: Day 2 Prayer 1” found in The Complete Works vol 1:

6. The same saint also says that “God is the center of the soul.  So when the soul with all” its “strength will know God perfectly, love and enjoy Him fully, then it will have reached the deepest center that can be attained in Him.”  Before attaining this, the soul is already “in God who is its center,” “but it is not yet in its deepest center, for it can still go further.  Since love is what unites us to God, the more intense this love is, the more deeply the soul enters into God and the more it is centered in Him.  When it “possess even one degree of love it is already in its center”; but when this love has attained its perfection, the soul will have penetrated into its deepest enter.  There it will be transformed to the point of becoming very like God.”

 

For other episodes in the series visit the Discerning Hearts page for Dr. Anthony Lilles

This the text we are using to discuss “Heaven in Faith” you can find it here and order from the Carmelite Sisters

 

We would like to offer heartfelt thanks to
Miriam Gutierrez for providing for us “the voice” of Blessed Elizabeth for this series

Faith at Work:  Finding Purpose Beyond the Paycheck is fantastic…a remedy for  spirituality seekers  in the workplace (and in the home as well)!  You have to love a work that begins with conversion as a goal.   Kevin Lowry offers concrete helps which assist all of us deepen our relationship with Christ and His Church, and live authentic lives as Catholics in the world.  Great for individuals and for group study as well.

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“Too many Christians treat ambition and success as if they’re four-letter words…. For a Catholic in business, they can be touchstones of sanctification.”— Scott Hahn, Ph.D., professor of biblical theology, Franciscan University of Steubenville

 

 Be sure to visit Kevin Lowry’s website at Grateful Convert

 

 

Check it out here

 

 

Episode 2 – The School of Prayer: Reflections on the teachings of Pope Benedict XVI –  Faith and reason in the life of prayer.  Allowing God to effect our minds, as well as our hearts.  If you let God close you will be free…to let him in so close that God prays in you.  Letting God’s love be the norm of our culture…in the other and in the poor.  The role of silence in prayer and posture of kneeling.

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Deacon James Keating, PhD, the director of Theological Formation for the Institute for Priestly Formation, located at Creighton University, in Omaha.

From  Pope Benedict’s 2nd audience on prayer:

A look at recent history reveals the failure of the predictions of those who, in the age of the Enlightenment, foretold the disappearance of religions and who exalted absolute reason, detached from faith, a reason that was to dispel the shadows of religious dogmatism and was to dissolve the “world of the sacred”, restoring to the human being freedom, dignity and autonomy from God. The experience of the past century, with the tragedy of the two World Wars, disrupted the progress that autonomous reason, man without God, seemed to have been able to guarantee.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church says: “In the act of creation, God calls every being from nothingness into existence…. Even after losing through his sin his likeness to God, man remains an image of his Creator, and retains the desire for the one who calls him into existence. All religions bear witness to man’s essential search for God” (n. 2566). We could say — as I explained in my last Catecheses — that there has been no great civilization, from the most distant epoch to our day, which has not been religious.

For more information on the “Institute of Priestly Formation” and for other material available by Deacon Keating, just click here

Don’t forget to pickup a copy of “Communion with Christ” , it is one of the best audio sets on prayer…ever!

Check out Deacon Keating’s “Discerning Heart” page

Episode 1 The Daily Prayer of Discernment: The Ignatian Wisdom of the Examen Prayer with Fr. Timothy Gallagher – Serves as an introduction to the coming series and the Examen Prayer.  

Can we live with our spiritual eyes open to catch the action of God?  The Examen Prayer is the one prayer St. Ignatius could not imagine doing without.   You can’t stand still in the spiritual life if you are praying the Examen Prayer.   

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As outlined from the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola
(translated from the autograph by Fr. E. Mullan, S.J.  1909 in the public domain)

METHOD FOR MAKING THE GENERAL EXAMEN
It contains in it five Points.

First Point. The first Point is to give thanks to God our Lord for the benefits received.
Second Point. The second, to ask grace to know our sins and cast them out.
Third Point. The third, to ask account of our soul from the hour that we rose up to the present Examen, hour by hour, or period by period: and first as to thoughts, and then as to words, and then as to acts, in the same order as was mentioned in the Particular Examen.
Fourth Point. The fourth, to ask pardon of God our Lord for the faults.
Fifth Point. The fifth, to purpose amendment with His grace.

OUR FATHER.

Father Timothy M. Gallagher, O.M.V., was ordained in 1979 as a member of the Oblates of the Virgin Mary, a religious community dedicated to retreats and spiritual formation according to the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius.  Fr. Gallagher is featured on the EWTN series “Living the Discerning Life:  The Spiritual Teachings of St. Ignatius of Loyola”.  For more information on books and audio available for purchase from Fr. Timothy Gallagher check out his website: www.frtimothygallagher.org

 

For the other episodes in this series check out
Fr. Timothy Gallagher’s “Discerning Hearts” page

 

Episode 2 Beginning to Pray:  “Heaven in Faith”  Day 1 Prayer 2 – “Abyss calls to Abyss”

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Dr. Anthony Lilles is a Catholic husband and father of three teaching Spiritual Theology at St. John Vianney Theological Seminary. He  teaches spiritual theology and spiritual direction to transitional deacons, and the spiritual classics to the men who enter the Spirituality Year, a year of prayer in preparation for seminary formation.  He is the author of the “Beginning to Pray”  catholic blog spot.

From “Beginning to Pray: Your Life Hidden in Christ“:

Elisabeth of the Trinity says that the journey to contemplative prayer (which she refers to as the pathway of the abyss), requires that we die to trying to live merely by natural lights. Instead we must seek to live hidden with Christ in God. She taught this because she understood the peace and strength such a life provides – she herself thrived in it. Christ is the supernatural Light, the inexhaustible source of loving knowledge of God in our hearts. If we live by the loving knowledge that Christ alone provides we discover that we are invincible to things which “pass away”, for our hearts transcend them, “seeking God alone.” (Heaven in Faith, #11).

 

Other episodes in the series can be found here

This the text we are using to discuss “Heaven in Faith” you can find it here and order from the Carmelite Sisters

 

We would like to offer heartfelt thanks to
Miriam Gutierrez for providing for us “the voice” of Blessed Elizabeth for this series

 

For other episodes in the series visit the Discerning Hearts page for Dr. Anthony Lilles

Episode 1 Beginning to Pray:  “Heaven in Faith”  Day 1 Prayer 1  – “Remain in Me”

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Dr. Anthony Lilles is a Catholic husband and father of three teaching Spiritual Theology at St. John Vianney Theological Seminary. He  teaches spiritual theology and spiritual direction to transitional deacons, and the spiritual classics to the men who enter the Spirituality Year, a year of prayer in preparation for seminary formation.  He is the author of the “Beginning to Pray”  catholic blog spot.

From “Beginning to Pray”:

Elisabeth of the Trinity  understood her mission to be to help people enter into deep prayer. A carmelite nun, she saw self-occupation as a huge block to prayer and actually said that she would help lead souls out of themselves and into God. She was convinced that once we are free of our big fat ego – God is able to transform us in love. She called this transforming encounter with the Lord “the divine impact.”

With her love for the Scriptures, her devotion to the Trinity, her captivation with Christ’s salvific work – her writings are filled with helpful insights. Not everyone finds her easy to read – her flow of thought follows a musical composition rather than the rules of logic – and she is dense with quotations from the mystical tradition of the Catholic Church. Although she only lived to the age of 26, from the beginning of the Twentieth Century to today, many contemplatives have found her solid teaching helpful.

This the text we are using to discuss “Heaven in Faith” you can find it here and order from the Carmelite Sisters

 

We would like to offer heartfelt thanks to
Miriam Gutierrez for providing for us “the voice” of Blessed Elizabeth for this series

 

For other episodes in the series visit the Discerning Hearts page for Dr. Anthony Lilles

Episode 1 – The School of Prayer: Reflections on the teachings of Pope Benedict XVI –   “Life without prayer has no meaning or points of reference”.  The relationship between the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit  is so essential to our understanding of prayer.  The meaning of the Church.  Suffering the coming of the Holy Spirit.  Jesus is the face of God.  Do not be afraid, He will teach you happiness.

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Deacon James Keating, PhD, the director of Theological Formation for the Institute for Priestly Formation, located at Creighton University, in Omaha.

From  Pope Benedict’s 1st audience on prayer:

Human life is a fabric woven of good and of evil, of undeserved suffering and of joy and beauty that spontaneously and irresistibly impel us to ask God for that light and that inner strength which support us on earth and reveal a hope beyond the boundaries of death.

In the examples of prayer of the various cultures which we have considered, we can see a testimony of the religious dimension and of the desire for God engraved on the heart of every human being, which receives fulfilment and full expression in the Old and in the New Testament. The Revelation, is in fact purifying and brings to its fullness man’s original yearning for God, offering to him, in prayer, the possibility of a deeper relationship with the heavenly Father.

At the beginning of our journey in the “school of prayer” let us now ask the Lord to illumine our minds and hearts so that the relationship with him in prayer may be ever more intense, affectionate and constant. Once again, let us say to him: “Lord, teach us to pray” (Lk 11:1).

For more information on the “Institute of Priestly Formation” and for other material available by Deacon Keating, just click here

Don’t forget to pickup a copy of “Communion with Christ” , it is one of the best audio sets on prayer…ever!

Check out Deacon Keating’s “Discerning Heart” page

 VATICAN CITY, 11 JAN 2012 (VIS)

Jesus’ prayer during the Last Supper was the theme of Benedict XVI’s catechesis during his general audience, which was held this morning in the Paul VI Hall in the presence of 4,000 faithful.

The Pope explained how the emotional backdrop to the Last Supper, in which Jesus bade farewell to His friends, was the immanence of His approaching death. Moreover, in the days in which He was preparing to leave His disciples, the life of the Jewish people was marked by the approaching Passover, the commemoration of the liberation of Israel from Egypt.”It was in this context that the Last Supper took place”, the Holy Father said, “but with an important novelty”. Jesus “wanted the Supper with His disciples to be something special, different from other gatherings. It was His Supper, in which He gave something completely new: Himself. Thus Jesus celebrated the Passover as an anticipation of His Cross and Resurrection”.

The essence of the Last Supper lay in “the gestures of breaking and distributing the bread, and sharing the cup of wine, with the words that accompanied them and the context of prayer in which they took place. This was the institution of the Eucharist: the great prayer of Jesus and the Church”. The words the Evangelists use to describe that moment “recall the Jewish ‘berakha’; that is, the great prayer of thanksgiving and blessing which, in the tradition of Israel, is used to inaugurate important ceremonies. … That prayer of praise and thanks rises up to God and returns as a blessing. … The words of the institution of the Eucharist were pronounced in this context of prayer. The praise and thanksgiving of the ‘berakha’ became blessing and transformed the bread and wine into the Body and Blood of Jesus”.

Jesus’ gestures were the traditional gestures of hospitality which a host would extend to his guests, but in the Last Supper they acquired a more profound significance, Pope Benedict explained. Christ provided “a visible sign of welcome to the table upon which God gives Himself. In the bread and the wine, Jesus offered and communicated His own Self”. Aware of His approaching death, “He offered in advance the life that would shortly be taken from Him, thus transforming His violent death into a free act of the giving of Self, for others and to others. The violence He suffered became an active, free and redemptive sacrifice”.

“In contemplating Jesus’ words and gestures that night, we can clearly see that it was in His intimate and constant relationship with the Father that He accomplished the gesture of leaving to His followers, and to all of us, the Sacrament of love”, said the Pope. During the Last Supper Jesus also prayed for His disciples, who likewise had to suffer harsh trials. With that prayer “He supported them in their weakness, their difficulty in understanding that the way of God had to pass through the Paschal mystery of death and resurrection, which was anticipated in the offer of bread and wine. The Eucharist is the food of pilgrims, a source of strength also for those who are tired, weary and disoriented”.

Benedict XVI went on: “By participating in the Eucharist we have an extraordinary experience of the prayer which Jesus made, and continues to make for us all, that the evil we encounter in our lives may not triumph, and that the transforming power of Christ’s death and resurrection may act within each of us. In the Eucharist the Church responds to Jesus’ command to ‘do this in remembrance of me’, she repeats the prayer of thanksgiving and blessing and, therewith, the words of transubstantiation of the bread and wine into the Body and Blood of the Lord. Our Eucharistic celebrations draw us into that moment of prayer, uniting us ever and anew to the prayer of Jesus”.

“Let us ask the Lord that, after due preparation also with the Sacrament of Penance, our participation in the Eucharist, which is indispensable for Christian life, may always remain the apex of all our prayers”, the Pope concluded. “Let us ask that, profoundly united in His offering to the Father, we too can transform our crosses into a free and responsible sacrifice of love, for God and for our fellows”.

At the end of his catechesis the Holy Father delivered greetings in a number of languages to the pilgrims present in the Paul VI Hall, inviting them to participate with

“faith and devotion” in the Eucharist which, he said, is indispensable for Christian life as well as being the school and culmination of prayer. Addressing young people, the sick and newlyweds, he pointed our that last Sunday’s Solemnity of the Baptism of the Lord is an occasion to reflect upon our own Baptism. “

Dear young people”, the Pope exclaimed, “live your membership of the Church, the family of Christ, joyfully. Dear sick people, may the grace of Baptism ease your sufferings and encourage you to offer them to Christ for the salvation of humanity. And you, dear newlyweds, … base your marriage on the faith which you received as a gift on the day of your Baptism”.
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Loving unconditionally, as Jesus did, especially those who are the most difficult and challenging….Join Teresa Monaghen, of Pro Sanctity, as she offers a “Personal Plan for Holiness”. Listen along with these short, but beautiful meditations which encourage us to continue on our journey as “saints in the making”!

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Learn more about Pro Sanctity at www.prosanctity.org

December 16, 2011. (Romereports.com)

Benedict XVI is set to appoint Hildegard of Bingen as a Doctor of the Church in October of 2012. She was a German Benedictine nun and was known for her visions and prophecies.
Hildegard of Bingen lived in the twelfth century. In addition to being a nun, she was a composer, philosopher, physicist and ecologist. A multi-talented woman, and a pioneer for many of these fields during the Middle Ages.

She came from a wealthy family and when she was only eight years old was sent to study in a monastery. She eventually decided to become a nun and later became an abbess.

Her visions and prophecies were recognized by the pope during that time, allowing her to speak about them publicly.

Since she has not been officially canonized, the ceremony is likely to take place before the pope names her as a Doctor of the Church in October.

Benedict XVI dedicated several of his general audiences to this German nun, saying that she “served the Church in an age in which it was wounded by the sins of priests and laity”.

Benedict XVI
September 8, 2010 
“She brought a woman’s insight to the mysteries of the faith. In her many works she contemplated the mystic marriage between God and humanity accomplished in the Incarnation, as well as the spousal union of Christ and the Church. She also explored the vital relationship between God and creation, and our human calling to give glory to God by a life of holiness and virtue.”

So far there are 33 doctors of the Church, only 3 of whom are women. During World Youth Day, Benedict XVI also announced that the Spanish San Juan de Avila would also be appointed as a Doctor of the Church.

With this appointment, the Church recognizes a person’s contribution to Catholic theology, which is still felt despite the passage of time.

VATICAN CITY, 28 DEC 2011 (VIS) – Prayer in the Holy Family of Nazareth was the theme of Benedict XVI’s catechesis during today’s general audience, which was held in the Paul VI Hall in the presence of 7,000 pilgrims.

“The house of Nazareth”, the Pope explained, “is a school of prayer where we learn to listen, to meditate, to penetrate the deepest meaning of the manifestation of the Son of God, drawing our example from Mary, Joseph and Jesus”.

“Mary is the peerless model for the contemplation of Christ”, he said. She “lived with her eyes on Christ and treasured His every word. … Luke the Evangelist makes Mary’s heart known to us, her faith, her hope, her obedience, her interior life and prayer, her free adherence to Christ. All of these came from the gift of the Holy Spirit, which descended upon her just as it descended upon the Apostles according to Christ’s promise. This image of Mary makes her a model for all believers”.

Mary’s capacity to live by the gaze of God is “contagious”, the Holy Father went on. “The first to experience this was St. Joseph. … With Mary, and later with Jesus, he began a new rapport with God, he began to accept Him into his life, to enter into His plan of salvation, to do His will”.

Although the Gospel has not preserved any of Joseph’s words, “his is a silent but faithful presence, constant and active. … Joseph fulfilled his paternal role in all aspects”. In this context, the Pope explained how Joseph had educated Jesus to pray, taking Him to the synagogue on Saturdays and guiding domestic prayer in the morning and evening. “Thus, in the rhythm of the days spent in Nazareth, between Joseph’s humble dwelling and his workshop, Jesus learned to alternate pray and work, also offering up to God the fatigue by which they earned the bread the family needed”.

Benedict XVI then turned his attention to the pilgrimage of Mary, Joseph and Jesus to the Temple in Jerusalem, as narrated in the Gospel of St. Luke. “The Jewish family, like the Christian family, prays in the intimacy of the home, but it also prays together in the community recognising itself as part of the pilgrim People of God”, he said.

Jesus’ first words – “Why were you searching for me? Did you not know that I must be in my Father’s house” – pronounced when Mary and Joseph found Him sitting among the teachers in the Temple, are a key to understanding Christian prayer. “From that moment, the life of the Holy Family became even richer in prayer, because the profound significance of the relationship with God the Father began to spread from the Heart of the boy (then adolescent, then young man) Jesus to the hearts of Mary and Joseph. The Family of Nazareth was the first model of the Church in which, in the presence of Jesus and thanks to His mediation, a filial rapport with God came to transform even interpersonal relations”.

“The Holy Family”, Benedict XVI concluded, “is an icon of the domestic Church, which is called to pray together. The family is the first school of prayer where, from their infancy, children learn to perceive God thanks to the teaching and example of their parents. An authentically Christian education cannot neglect the experience of prayer. If we do not learn to pray in the family, it will be difficult to fill this gap later. I would, then, like to invite people to rediscover the beauty of praying together as a family, following the school of the Holy Family of Nazareth”.
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[powerpress]  Msgr. Esseff not only laments the horror of the massacre of the Holy Innocents in Bethlehem 2000 years ago, but the tragedy of the continued holocaust of children within their mother’s womb that occurs today.  He reflects on the passage from Revelation which recounts the hatred the devil has for the womb of the woman:  The enemy HATES life.  Msgr. Esseff reminds us of the VICTORY of Christ and discusses the forgiveness and hope found with God.  He shares the stories of two seperate women named Maria, both of whom touched his life and who can help show us the way.

[powerpress]  Msgr. Esseff, on his patronal feast day, discusses St. John the Evangelist.  He recalls the message found in the Gospel of St. John, his letters, and stories from St. Polycarp.  Msgr. Esseff discusses the relationship of Our Lady with John, and the gift Jesus made of her to John and to us all.  He also shares how deeply the Sacred Heart is found in the teachings of St. John.