In the months ahead, members of the Retreat Team are praying for you and your intentions at 12pm each weekday in the Trinity Prayer Room. We will offer here a little something for your prayer each week.

Take a moment to become quiet and still. Bring your attention to your breath, gently breathing in the Spirit of Love, and breathing out Peace. Listen to the words of Jesus: “Whenever you pray, go into your room and shut the door…..” Mt 6:6 Let your attention now focus on your heart as you ponder the reflection.

Adapted from Julian of Norwich the Showings – A Contemporary Translation by Mirabai Starr, Canterbury Press Norwich, 2014, Ch 52, pp142,143.

During our lives here on earth, we experience a wondrous mixture of well and woe. We hold inside us both the glory of the Risen Christ and the misery of the Fallen Adam. Christ protects us in our dying and, through his gracious touch, uplifts us and reassures us that all will be well. Adam’s fall has broken us all. We are so fragmented, afflicted in our feelings in so many ways, that we hardly know where to turn for comfort. The various pains and transgressions of this life fill our hearts with sorrow and cloud the eyes of our souls.

But we cultivate our intention and wait for God. We have faith in God’s mercy and grace, and trust that God is working within us. In God’s goodness, the eyes of our understanding are opened and we are given insight. Sometimes we glimpse more, sometimes we see less, depending on what God gives us the ability to receive. Now God elevates us; now God allows us to come tumbling down.

The mixture of sorrow and joy is so powerful that we cannot figure out how to handle it all, let alone assess how our fellow spiritual seekers are doing. The diversity of feelings can be overwhelming. And yet, in those moments when we sense the presence of God, we surrender to God, truly willing to be with God, with all our heart, with all our soul, and with all our strength.

Reflection: Julian of Norwich, a fourteenth century anchoress, lived through the plague which was said to have decimated half the population of Norwich. Her writings, born of her experience, speak to the diversity of feelings we are experiencing in these times of living with a worldwide virus. May we learn from her wisdom.

What is the intention you want to cultivate in these days? How will you wait for God?