FG#3 – Interior Freedom episode 3- Fountains of Grace: reflections on contemporary spiritual classics with Donna Garrett

Join host Donna Garrett, with Fr. Daniel Brandenburg, LC, as they discuss the spiritual classic “Interior Freedom” by Fr.  Jacques Philippe  a priest of  Communaute des Beatitudes, an international association of the faithful of Pontifical Right founded in France in 1973.  The members of the Community, which has a contemplative vocation based on Carmelite spirituality, are actively engaged in the service of the poor and the proclamation of the Gospel.

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Discussed in this episode, among other topics,  from “Interior Freedom” page 66

Donna Garrett is joined in this particular series by Fr. Daniel Brandenburg, LC

“ Freedom can be diminished by a dependence on someone whom we love too much(and in the wrong way) who becomes so indispensable to us that we partly lose our autonomy. But a refusal to forgive also binds us to the person we resent, and diminishes or destroys our freedom. we are as dependent on the people we hate as on those we love in a disproportionate manner. When we foster resentment toward someone, we can’t stop thinking about him. We are filled with negative feelings that absorb a large part of our energy, and so there is an “investment” in that relationship that does not leave us available, psychologically and spiritually, for what we should be concentrating on. Resentment attacks our vital forces and does us much harm. When someone has made us suffer, our tendency is to keep the memory of the wrong alive in our minds, like a ‘bill” we will produce in due time to demand settlement. Those accumulated bills end up poisoning our lives. It is wiser to cancel every debt, as the Gospel invites us to. In return, we will be forgiven everything, and our hearts will be set free, whereas nurturing resentment toward others closes us to positive things they could contribute to us.”

For other episodes in the this series click here “Fountains of Grace w/Donna Garrett”

You can find “Interior Freedom” here

Fr. Jacques Philippe

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[powerpress] Msgr. Esseff discusses to be truly alive in joy and happiness we have to forgive. Forgiveness is always a choice and in that is joy. We shouldn’t put conditions on our forgiveness…that can be a challenge for some, but it is necessary. We need to take the person where they are…we don’t love them because they have changed, but we love them where they are at. We can become slaves to our resentments. Resentments, hatred, bitterness, retaliations harden our hearts and destroy us. Allowing the love of Jesus to penetrate our hearts we are freed. We can not perfectly forgive, it is grace from the Father that allows to enter into that forgiveness.

The transformation of resentments is a key:

For ourselves

1. To name them, the painful moment or event
2. To look inside as to why and to what it touched so deeply within me
3. To allow yourself to feel fully the depth of impact of the pain
4. Talk to yourself about the experience and then begin to journal or share it with another
5. Choose what will bring peace, joy, relief and tranquility
6. To cling to continuation of pain brings anxiety, anger, turmoil and desolation

For another

1. Listen to the painful experience
2. Don’t talk to them out of their pain, don’t try to fix the situation for them
3. Offer them a choice to continue in the pain or begin to move out of the pain; to continue in the pain gives the power over to the one they resent and diminishes your own power

Be sure to visit Msgr. Esseff’s website:  “Building a Kingdom of Love“