The Freedom of Detachment & Next Meeting Sun. Sept. 17th

Dear School of Work and Prayer Friends:

 

We continue to meet, to discuss, and, by the grace of God, put into practice the Gospel norms of prayer as taught by St. John of the Cross and St. Teresa of Avila.  Fr. Thomas Dubay is our guide through his book Fire Within.

 

On Sunday the 20th we discussed chapter 8, The Freedom of Detachment.  In summary, we focussed on two key ideas that are indispensible for growth in prayer: (1) we practice detachment in order to love God through the sensible world and (2) we practice detachment by finding satisfaction in God more than in the objects that delight our senses.  As St. John of the Cross writes:

 

I should like to offer a norm for discerning when this gratification of the senses is beneficial and when not.  Whenever a person, upon hearing music or other things, seeing agreeable objects, smelling sweet fragrances, or feeling the delight of certain tastes and delicate touches, immediately at the first movement directs his thought and the affection of his will to God, receiving more satisfaction in the thought of God than in the sensible object that caused it, and finds no gratification in the senses save for this motive, it is a sign that he is profiting by the senses and that the sensory part is a help to the spirit.  The senses can then be used because the sensorial objects serve the purpose for which God created them: that He be more known and loved through them.

 

Such loving of God through every delightful object we encounter is an ideal difficult to achieve, which is why God is the only one who can perfect us in this area of holiness.  This all consuming holy process of purification is the topic of the next chapter: chapter 9 Fire in the Nights (pages 159-174).  We will meet to discuss chapter nine at the lovely home of Don and Deanne Wessel (thank you Wessels!) on Sunday September 17th at 6 pm.

 

your brother in Christ,

 

Chris