Stories for Your Spirit, Volume II
A sample story from the new edition!
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Religious Fiction; 57 Meditations
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Prayer
A young man, after entering the Abbey of Gethsemani, began to question everything about prayer, from its purpose to its basic meaning. As a maverick among the other pupils, he sensed a kindred spirit in Father Thomas. With Thomas, he felt safe enough to open himself and his doubts concerning this sacred practice, prayer.
The pupil said to Thomas, “Father, I sense that prayer is a bunch of rubbish. We have prayers of blessing, consecration, thanksgiving, confession, forgiveness, and just about everything the human mind can think up. I listen to my mind retelling off all my wants and needs. I hear my ego making all kinds of promises and bargains. And my mind and ego actually think they have the right to ask God to fulfill them. If prayer is so sacred, why in my heart do I feel that it is empty nonsense?”
Thomas laughed and responded, “You're in good company. There was a young man in Galilee who said the same thing about the Chief Priests' and Pharisees' praying. He called them 'prayer warriors who were prayer-ignorant.'”
The surprised pupil asked, “Jesus?”
“Yes, one and the same!”
The pupil hesitated, “But why does it feel like he's not listening?”
“Tell me, how much time did you spend listening for his answer?”
The pupil reflected, “Maybe two or three minutes.” He paused, “Maybe a little less.” He paused again, “Well, actually only a few seconds.”
Thomas smiled, “So you expect God to catch up to you on the go and hit you over the head with His answer!”
The pupil blushed and then laughed. “So how should we pray?”
Thomas reflected, “We are going to have to create a new language of prayer, and this new language has to come out of something which transcends all our traditions, and comes out of the immediacy of love.”
“Something greater than the Catholic Church?”
“Something higher than all religious institutions; the God center in each of us. We all want and need to experience God's love. What we have forgotten is that He is already in the very essence of our being, our Spiritual Center.”
“So how do we get there? What is the new language?”
“Meditation is one way to get there and that language is very personal to each person.”
“So I don't need to pray anymore.”
“Of course you will need to pray. It will just be a different way of communicating.”
“When I pray, should I pray out of my Spiritual Center, or should I pray in order to reach God in my Spiritual Center?”
“When you pray while you are in your Spiritual Center, you will be having a conversation with God. If you are not in your Spiritual Center, you will only be talking to God, and the language won't have changed much.”
“But if I am not in my Spiritual Center, how do I know if God hears my prayer?”
“In your mind you don't know. But since God is in you, your heart knows that He hears your prayer before the words come together in your mind.”
“So why is it important to pray?”
“When you pray to God, you are giving the mind comfort that He is there somewhere. When you pray while you are in your Spiritual Center, it is like taking a bath in Divine Love. You and God are in the tub together. You have no other needs or wants than to just be there. You experience contentment. You become connected on a deep level to everything and everyone else in the universe.”
The pupil smiles mischievously, “Do I still have to pray for forgiveness in confession?”
Thomas smiles, “Absolutely, only it will be different. Because God is in you, your heart knows that he witnesses your every action. So His first question to you becomes, 'can you forgive yourself.' Because forgiveness is part of who God is, He will want you to make forgiveness part of who you are.”
“How do I get to my Spiritual Center? How does meditation work?”
“That, my son, is a long difficult journey, but worth the effort. I use meditation to quiet my mind by focusing on one thing. I let go of everything until I am left with no-thing, a dark stillness. In that stillness, I find all-things, a bright light. I find God waiting for me. Would you like to start that journey?”
“Yes!” the pupil said without hesitation.
(In Memory of Thomas Merton)