Living and praying as Jesus did

My purpose in these posts is to bring a variety of Christian and other writers in a desire to share significant writings that in my estimation contribute to the common good and directly or indirectly give glory to God and extend the Lord's work of salvation to all of humanity. G.S.

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LET'S DISCUSS LIVING CONTEMPLATIVELY AS JESUS DID - FOR TO THIS HE CALLS US

Jesus lived a contemplative life, that is, He always remained aware of his heavenly Father and in union of mind and heart and soul with Him. As our Lord, Jesus offers us the same way of living, in the Holy Spirit. In order to live in a contemplative way all the time during our very active lives, it is helpful to pray regularly in a contemplative way. God uses the moments of our daily prayer in order to bring about the same order in our way of being aware of ourselves, of Him, and of life and of living our life, our will, our awareness of God and of everything, including our way of living our thoughts, feelings, body awareness and sensations, and of course our will.

For centuries many among faithful Roman Catholic Christians found they could follow the Lord's guidance by contemplating with Mary the Mysteries of the Rosary - for the most part Gospel moments, events, experiences, or encounters of Jesus - allowing one to experience and enter into the reality and presence of God in the here and now by pondering Jesus Son of God in the Gospels. As one ponders these Mysteries of the Rosary, the murmuring of the associated prayers these are spaced with silent pondering on Jesus, Mary, and Joseph in the mysteries allows one to keep personal thoughts and feelings gently in the background while continuing in the foreground to focus on the Presence of God.

All the while one allows the body to breathe quietly, to relax, and rest in the Lord. Praying regularly - such as twice a day - like this allows our body, mind, heart, and spirit or soul to acquire the same dispositions more and more consistently all day long and in time even into the night during our sleep without the daytime wakefulness and awareness. The process of giving all our attention to the Lord involves a form of suffering and surrender, which for any believer is a precious form of adoration.

During prayer as during all our waking moments our mind with its imagination and other rational faculties is continuously boiling with thoughts, some organized and coherent and others helter-skelter or chaotic, which can become quite stressful and tiring. As if that were not enough, our psyche also includes our heart with all its emotions below the surface which become feelings as we are aware of them, and these too are continuously rising up without our will necessarily, and when these become more intense or chaotic or unruly or troubling, then between the mind and the heart life can become almost unbearable.

So, in order for the Lord to teach us how to live as He did on Earth all our waking moments and in time even during our sleep, our "training ground or time" is when we meditate. Whether we meditate during the Holy Rosary or during what is called silent meditation, we are able to follow simple instructions such as those above and other variations on this theme, to retain our attention from the boiling thoughts and feelings and gently offer our attention to the Lord, to Him as personally present to us.

While pondering the Mysteries of the Rosary we focus while alternating back and forth now on the mystery and then on the words of the prayers, not straining the brain or heart at all, but gently yet firmly focusing our inner lens on the real presence of God at this very moment, and the next moment, and the next, in a flowing stream of attention and adoration with some discrete currents of suffering or enduring this process and of surrendering ourselves to the Lord in this flowing.

While praying in silent meditation, one focuses the attention on the Lord present to us at all times, and one focuses by sitting upright and still, being aware of the body and one's breathing but not thinking about them nor brooding over any feelings or thoughts that may arise, and murmuring the Name of the Lord, as in "Jesus Christ", or the Russian Pilgrim's phrase "Jesus Christ Son of the living God have mercy on me a sinner", or Dom John Main OSB's phrase from the end of the Book of Revelation "Maranatha", or some other such holy phrase. The body awareness and stillness, the calm breathing with the Name or word associating with the breath, and the act of surrender and trust involved are also an act of adoration which allow the Christian to focus all attention on the Holy Trinity in the Person of Jesus in a personal and living, loving connection.

Obviously, doing this, continuing to make the gentle effort to give all our attention to the Lord Jesus present with and in the Holy Trinity is something we cannot accomplish by our own efforts alone. Because it is God's will, the Holy Spirit inspires, motivates, strengthen, leads, and guides us in our efforts and allows us to slowly become like Jesus and remain ever aware and mindful of the Father's love. God is ever present now in the Person of Jesus and is ever actually touching us and sustaining us in life from within while we in a true way "touch" Jesus with our focusing attention, however it may waver and seem chaotic or troubled.

Our poor efforts though carried by the grace of the Holy Spirit may seem to us to be sporadic, chaotic, focused then dispersed, succeeded by efforts to focus again, then distracted and so on... but we don't worry about the quality of our efforts, because this too would be giving our attention to thoughts and feelings, whereas we want to give ALL of our attention to Jesus and his love, not to our own self in all its poverty and self obsession....

So, as we go along and thoughts and feelings seize our attention, we simply acknowledge what's happening as it happens, seeing our thoughts and feelings for what they are without judgement, accepting what we're thinking and feeling at the moment. We neither approve nor disapprove of our thoughts and feelings but merely acknowledge them as real, as ours, and as present in us at this moment. Then in the very act of accepting thoughts and feelings as ours and simply allowing them to be as they are, we refuse to brood over them or to react to them or to give them any more attention in any way. Instead, we take our inner awareness and capacity to focus our attention and offer it all to the Lord and try to remain focused on Him. This is what makes such silent meditation an act of worship and adoration, giving God the first place.

As we do, we allow Jesus to exercise his lordship in our life and to work on the thoughts and feelings bouncing around inside us. While we try to remain focused on Jesus, those thoughts and feelings may clamor for our attention and we simply suffer them to be there but consign them to the background. We accept to endure them increasingly from a distance as we refuse them any more attention after having briefly noticed and accepted them as ours and let them be as they are without any fuss. It is while we engage in this process of suffering and surrender and remain focused on the Lord that He can deal with our thoughts and feelings and bring order, peace, and healing to us moment by moment. This entire process is a very personal and intimate form of adoration which is very pleasing to the Lord and surrenders to Him all lordship and indeed our very self.

It is very important to understand that there is infinite value through the work of the Holy Spirit in our accepting to suffer all this unwanted activity and inner turmoil . In this suffering the Holy Spirit gives us intimate communion with Jesus in his saving Passion. In our ongoing act of will - acting as gently with ourselves as we can - to surrender our will and attention to the Lord Jesus and in Him to the Holy Trinity, what is happening is that we are surrendering our will to the Father's will as Jesus did Himself.

SUFFERING our condition and offering it together with our ongoing SURRENDER of will with Jesus to the Father in the Holy Spirit, this is at the heart of what it means to be a Christian, to carry our cross, though the cross takes many forms in the course of our life of faith and hope in the love of God. It is in the course of our suffering and surrender in the Holy Spirit that the same Spirit of God can deal with our thoughts and feelings and slowly put his order, justice, and healing into them, give us rest in Jesus and strengthen our bonds of unity with the whole Body of Christ in the peace of the Holy Spirit and the love of the Father.

We can remain interiorly focused on the Lord Jesus by letting our body keep us aware of the present here and now (sitting still and quiet and being conscious of our joined hands and our breath for example) and repeating a prayer or holy phrase such as indicated above: "O my Jesus I trust in You!" or "God please help me." or "Jesus Christ Son of the living God have mercy on me a sinner." Perhaps the most powerful word is simply repeating the Name of Jesus as in "Jesus Christ"... sounding or "hearing" inside us on our out breath "Jesus" and then on our in breath "Christ".

This particular form of silent meditation is taught by Fr. Franz Jalics in his book "Contemplative Retreat" which is available at the Ignatian Center in Montreal or online at a reasonable price. His instructions are quite practical spread out over 10 days for those taking a closed retreat and over 20 weeks for those taking a retreat in the course of daily life, or simply as a reading companion for those taking it slowly by themselves. In all three of these ways of learning and practicing this way, it is good for one to meet regularly with a priest to discuss how it's going and obtain clarity with any difficulties or confusion.

In time dear friend in the Lord Jesus, as you try this and find that contemplating this way is helpful and you'd like to learn more about how to do this, you could obtain the book describing this way of being and of living our faith to connect with God. As I just described it was written to allow people to enter into a practical learning process either during a full time 10 day retreat, or on a retreat in daily life which extends a few hours a week over 20 weeks, or simply as a book to read slowly and to try to practice on your own time and according to your own rhythm.

In attempting any of these three methods, it is good to seek accompaniment and direction from a competent and well formed guide, prayer companion, or spiritual director. Such a helper must be committed to recognizing and acknowledging that the Holy Spirit is the only true Director of Souls, and that their role is only to help the one seeking guidance to be attentive to the voice of the Holy Spirit orienting them from within. Regularly Christians as well as all people of good will need help to distinguish the voice of the Holy Spirit from other voices that would mislead us away from God.

There is the voice of the ways of the world which is under the power of the "prince of this world, the devil". We are also misled by the inclinations of our flesh obsessed as it is with its own will, its own ways, and its own satisfactions. Finally, there is the tempter, Lucifer or Satan and his host of rebellious angels turned into demons, who would try to lead us astray and away from Jesus who alone is the way, the truth, and the life.

Peace and all blessings from God to you as you journey in faith and try to follow Jesus in living a contemplative life in both prayer and action.

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My purpose in these posts is to help spread the contributions of a variety of Christian and other writers in a desire to share significant writings that in my estimation contribute to the common good and directly or indirectly give glory to God and extend the Lord's work of salvation to all of humanity. G.S.

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© 2004-2021 All rights reserved Fr. Gilles Surprenant, Associate Priest of Madonna House Apostolate & Poustinik, Montreal  QC
© 2004-2021 Tous droits réservés Abbé Gilles Surprenant, Prêtre Associé de Madonna House Apostolate & Poustinik, Montréal QC 

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At a wedding a priest sings a secular song with adapted lyrics

My purpose in these posts is to bring a variety of Christian and other writers in a desire to share significant writings that in my estimation contribute to the common good and directly or indirectly give glory to God and extend the Lord's work of salvation to all of humanity. G.S.

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A good friend recently sent me a YouTube link showing a priest singing adapted lyrics to the tune of "Hallelujah"... written I believe originally by Leonard Cohen. I too have enjoyed listening to this tune until I could discern the lyrics, which with all due respect to Mr. Cohen I did not find necessarily inspirational....

As much as I find the music hauntingly beautiful, still, I regret to say that this performance by a priest from the Altar makes my skin crawl.... I understand that our culture has gone over the top in blissfully identifying with what we could all "performance mode"... in our fast changing pleasure driven culture even at the high points and meaningful moments of life everyone wants to perform.

However, a priest in chasuble in the sanctuary behind an altar stands not in his own name nor according to his own sentiments, however noble they may be and however much he may want to demonstrate caring for the engaged couple about to be or just previously joined in holy Matrimony, but that priests stands there first and foremost in the Person of Jesus Christ.

This is not a performance but a real time event that has its counterpart in eternity before the throne of God the Father... or however we can understand the eternal and glorious Presence of the Holy Trinity surrounded by myriads of angels and saints.... You've doubtless heard the expression "a Marriage made in Heaven"? Well that's what the Sacrament of Marriage, or Holy Matrimony, is - a couple joined simultaneously on Earth and in Heaven before God.

The chasuble is the garment in which the priest most solemnly represents Jesus at the Last Supper, with the Risen Lord bringing us now present to that moment and experience of his self offering at the Last Supper and and simultaneously to the moment of his self offering on the Cross on Calvary. Because Jesus is risen from the dead He is not a past historical figure but the Living One present at this very moment both on Earth and in Heaven and everywhere simultaneously in the universe and beyond it....

Jesus is both fully human, a man, and the Son of God; so that his offering of Himself at the Last Supper and on the Cross is a perfect offering of divine love, and as such, it is a self offering that is ongoing, not yet finished, until the very last human being will have lived and died and the last day has arrived and the Lord will come in final triumph of divine love over evil.

Even if the Marriage Rite were celebrated without Eucharist and so not in a chasuble for the priest but in alb and stole or alb and cope, this would still not be an appropriate time for a priest to perform. It is dignified, meaningful, and appropriate for other people to play music and sing to accompany in a meaningful way parts of the Liturgy, again with the entire focus of both lyrics and music on the Lord Jesus, the Word being spoken by God, and the High Priest who joins the engaged couple in the Sacrament of Marriage. A church sanctuary built around an Altar, which represents Christ the Rock upon whom we are lifted up to offer our lives also with Him to the Father; it may resemble a stage but it is never a stage for performance only.

If my comments offend anyone's sensibilities, I am sorry for that, but the truth must be told. Even if the entire world decided to do whatever "feels right" with the sacred Mysteries of our faith, I hope and pray the Lord will give me the strength to defend these Mysteries in accord with God's will as expressly manifested in our tradition and the Church's teachings, to my dying breath.

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My purpose in these posts is to help spread the contributions of a variety of Christian and other writers in a desire to share significant writings that in my estimation contribute to the common good and directly or indirectly give glory to God and extend the Lord's work of salvation to all of humanity. G.S.

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© 2004-2021 All rights reserved Fr. Gilles Surprenant, Associate Priest of Madonna House Apostolate & Poustinik, Montreal  QC
© 2004-2021 Tous droits réservés Abbé Gilles Surprenant, Prêtre Associé de Madonna House Apostolate & Poustinik, Montréal QC 

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Abortion cannot resolve pregnancy after rape

My purpose in these posts is to bring a variety of Christian and other writers in a desire to share significant writings that in my estimation contribute to the common good and directly or indirectly give glory to God and extend the Lord's work of salvation to all of humanity. G.S.

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THE DOUBLE OUTRAGE OF RAPE ON YOUNG GIRLS

Much is being made in social networks and online advocacy and pressure groups about the pregnancy of a 12-year-old girl from Paraguay. I am so in sync with everyone over the great wrong of the sexual abuse of children. It is totally unacceptable in all places and at all times that anyone should forcibly impose sexual relations on a unwilling partner, most especially on minors and other vulnerable people. Rape in itself is an outrage, but the rape of a young child is a double outrage.

FAILURE OF HUMANITY, OF HUMAN DEVELOPMENT

Those who do such things demonstrate a profound deficiency in their humanity. They are so absorbed in themselves that no others, not even  vulnerable children, are persons to them... they are unable or unwilling to respect children as persons, to treat them with the most basic of respect as independent persons. Such people are very dangerous and are a menace not only to the vulnerable but to families and society as a whole.

WE MUST CARE, ALL OF US TOGETHER

Young girls who are discovered to be pregnant require the most competent and sensitive of care. I am all in favor of doing all we can to support such girls and their families and communities. It was bad enough that they were in all likelihood traumatized by the experience of forcible sexual relations without their consent or even understanding of what was being done to them. It is imperative that we not add to their trauma by forcing upon them another traumatic experience, which abortion most certainly is, witness the countless women who have come forward in recent decades to relate the long term painful consequences of their abortions. When mature women experience abortion as a trauma, can you imagine how a young girl would experience it?

EXTREME CULTURAL VARIATIONS REGARDING SEXUAL MATURITY

Regarding pregnancy at a young age, we must be careful of the cultural biases we all carry within us, myself included. We in the West consider women under eighteen too young to get pregnant. However, in different societies and different times, it was and still is considered normal for women to marry and bear children not so very long after puberty. Christians have no trouble accepting that Mary of Nazareth conceived Jesus at or around the age of fourteen. In Québec and many other nations until not so long ago young women could marry without special permission if they were fourteen or older.

DELAYED MATURATION OF MODERNS

It is well known today that our commonplace "teenage" phase of life did not exist before World War II. It was the sudden affluence and leisure after the war that introduced "teen age" in our Western society. Before then, it was not unusual for children after puberty to be seen as adults and to leave go out to work and even leave home. My own parents entered the workforce at 13 and 14 years old, and my paternal grandfather started his working life at only ten.

ABORTION CANNOT RESOLVE RAPE

All people of good will acknowledge and agree that rape is an outrage. Regarding abortion there is not such a universal consensus. I thoroughly agree that stern action must be taken regarding rape under any circumstances, but I cannot be in sync with those who propose abortion as a solution to an unwanted or unexpected pregnancy, not even in the case of rape. I know, that sounds shocking to me too. Part of me freaks out at reading these words, let alone writing them; so I understand if they freak you out, but please bear with me for a moment and hear or read me out.

The child growing in the womb, even of that 12 year old girl, knows nothing of her being forcibly raped nor of our categories or ideologies or anxieties or inconveniences. No matter what might motivate us, to abort that unborn child would be a great wrong. That child is alive and deserves to live, and none of us have the right to snuff out that life. That is why abortion is a great wrong. One great wrong can never be considered a viable solution to another great wrong.

A WRONG CANNOT BE MADE RIGHT BY ANOTHER WRONG

Aborting the child produced by a rape can never resolve the rape. The rape has already taken place and nothing can make it go away. Adding another great wrong will not make it any better but will only compound the consequences, making them even heavier. Imposing abortion on that girl or convincing her that abortion would be better for her would be to mislead her. Taking the life of the most vulnerable among us, the unborn being even more vulnerable than young girls, can never be a solution to any of our uncomfortable life situations, not even unexpected or unexpected pregnancy. To take the life of another, no matter the circumstances, carries consequences that are dire and permanent not only for the one killed but also for the one who snuffs out that life.

HUMAN LIFE IS OF INESTIMABLE VALUE

The unborn child carried by that 12-year-old girl who was raped by her stepfather is nevertheless a human life with as much right to existence as you or me, and this right to life is the most fundamental of human rights. If we are unwilling to honor this right, then all our other rights collapse like a house of cards. The fact that we are alive at all to experience the difficulties we have in life is itself a great good, an inestimable value. Despite all our difficulties, life is eminently worth living.

HOW ABORTIVE WOMEN EXPERIENCED THEIR NATURE AS WOMAN

This is without even saying anything about the harm that abortion does to the women or girls who undergo this procedure. When advocates of abortion first proposed it as a viable choice for women and girls decades ago, we didn't know then what we know now after so many women have come forward with their testimonies of dire repercussions they suffered following their elective abortions. I understand that those who are committed to the right of women to choose have great difficulty admitting the harmful effects and long term consequences of abortion, but denial doesn't make the truth evaporate nor the facts go away. Women who have suffered after their abortion tell us that the abortion violated them in all that is most fundamental to their identity as women, even though they freely chose the abortion themselves.

They realized too late that as a woman they have been designed to give life. Their whole body is geared to nurturing and giving life, and when they interrupt a pregnancy - no matter the reasons or motivations - their whole body goes into suffering and grief over the interruption as a loss and over the decision they took and the action they have taken.

After one or more abortions, women tell us that they came to realize the truth that when their pregnancy was wanted, from the very first moment they realize they might be pregnant they relate to their fetus as a baby. It was only a fetus as long as they didn't know about its existence. In a completely different register of discourse, when their pregnancy was unwanted they were encouraged to think of the fetus as mere "product of conception". It was convenient for them, as they were convinced by others, to think of the fetus as though it were inanimate and impersonal. They were encouraged to think of it as a mere extension of their own body. As the saying goes, a woman enjoys exclusive freedom and authority over all decisions regarding her body.

The pain began for these post abortive women when the penny dropped, when they realized these two opposing experiences don't add up. They found here two outlooks that are completely divergent and contradictory while the biological reality and truth of the matter is only one. What is conceived by human beings can only be and therefore is a human person in the earliest stage of development, but an independent human individual all the same. Nothing further is added to it except for nourishment from the first moment of conception as the process of cell division and diversification attends to itself.

ZERO TOLERANCE FOR RAPE AND ABUSE OF CHILDREN

Let us stop here for now and reiterate that it is incumbent upon all of us to do all we can at every level of society to enforce "zero tolerance" policies and taboos to strike the "fear of punishment" into those people who are so deficient in their humanity that they represent a real danger of rape for our vulnerable children and women.

ALL WOMEN AND GIRLS DESERVE OUR COLLECTIVE CARE AND SUPPORT

We must also do all we can to support those women and even girls who find themselves with an unwanted or unexpected pregnancy. Pregnancy, birth, and child rearing are the responsibility and also the blessing of the whole human family, and we are all responsible to attend to the entire process. The burden of responsibility should never rest exclusively or even mostly on the shoulders of the pregnant woman or girl.

I am willing to continue this dialogue with those who may be interested to do so. Thank you.

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My purpose in these posts is to help spread the contributions of a variety of Christian and other writers in a desire to share significant writings that in my estimation contribute to the common good and directly or indirectly give glory to God and extend the Lord's work of salvation to all of humanity. G.S.

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© 2004-2021 All rights reserved Fr. Gilles Surprenant, Associate Priest of Madonna House Apostolate & Poustinik, Montreal  QC
© 2004-2021 Tous droits réservés Abbé Gilles Surprenant, Prêtre Associé de Madonna House Apostolate & Poustinik, Montréal QC 

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What does it mean to really forgive someone?

My purpose in these posts is to bring a variety of Christian and other writers in a desire to share significant writings that in my estimation contribute to the common good and directly or indirectly give glory to God and extend the Lord's work of salvation to all of humanity. G.S.

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As you may experience and say, there are in life experiences of hurt and injustice that are so grievous and hurtful that they are in effect burned into your memory... and this can cause us to experience all manner of strong negative emotions at the very sight or sound or even thought of them... and such after effects can bring us to question whether or not we have forgiven them. For this and other reasons it is important to remember that forgiveness is not about forgetting... our memory faculty does what it is supposed to do, it remembers....

Even after having forgiven, and even years later, at the sight or even the thought of the person who hurt you, you could still feel a violent revulsion, elicited by the memory of the hurt, the injustice, but such revulsion is not precluded by forgiving them. In order to become fully human and fully alive and open to the love of God and eternal life, we are required to forgive so that our soul might be open and receptive to God. We are not required to like those who have hurt us, those who go on hurting us, enemies... because to like a thing or a person is to anticipate a good feeling, a good taste because of that thing or person. I like apples because they taste good and when I see a good one, I salivate from the memory of having eaten apples before. When I see a lovely person who elicits peace, joy, love, I like that person because of the goodness emanating from him or her.

No, I don't have to like those who are so self obsessed that they have no feelings for me or those I love. When I think of such persons, it might happen that when I consider how limited they are in their experience of human life and interiority, and in contrast how rich and blessed God has made me in giving me to experience wonder at all his creation and beauty and also the full range of deep human experience from compassion to charity, from kindness to heroic acts of service; then it might happen that upon looking at those who have little or none of these finer human capabilities, that I might feel pity for them, and perhaps regret that they have not allowed themselves to go further, or let God open them up to becoming more human, more like Him....

Pity is already the beginning of what Jesus commanded us to do with enemies, with those who hurt or do evil to us, that is, to forgive them, not return evil but good to them, pray for them and desire their good, not their harm. I know I have forgiven someone when I push them into God's arms, into Jesus' hands, and ask Him to take care of them, which may one day include punishment if they do not reform.

Beyond pity, what also helps to forgive evil doers is the remembrance of my own sinfulness and fallibility. The more I live and learn about myself, my inclination to selfishness or other faults or flawed virtues, the more I realize how much I depend on the mercy and forgiveness and understanding of God, then the more I can begin to feel some compassion for others who are also flawed human beings. When they multiply offenses against me, I can begin to realize how my faults have similarly offended and hurt others, and then can begin the work of pleading with God to repair the harm I have done to others. In this way, my enemies can provoke me towards having a greater heart of repentance, a greater will to not only do more good but also to repair the harm I may have done, often without realizing it.

When I have traveled this far on the road of forgiveness it could happen that I being to realize how those who have done me harm and even go on doing me harm have been used by God as some kind of "agent provocateur" to provoke in me attitudes, dispositions, acts of the will, and new paths by which God can not only repair my own harm but also bring me into a greater participation in his own work of creation... bringing about more life in others and in his beautiful world, in which after all I am but a creature....

This is already a lot that God is doing and can do as soon as I begin to open myself to forgiving and going beyond that, and all of this goes on by God's loving, merciful, and creative action even though I may still experience hurt, revulsion, and even anger at the sight or memory of my enemies. In these ways, the Holy Trinity brings me into the depths of the divine love among the three divine Persons, and they fashion me into their own resemblance, and my suffering into a resemblance of the suffering of the Son of Man... and in this way giving me more and more participation in the death of Jesus; so that I may also participate more fully in his life, both on Earth and now in eternity....

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My purpose in these posts is to help spread the contributions of a variety of Christian and other writers in a desire to share significant writings that in my estimation contribute to the common good and directly or indirectly give glory to God and extend the Lord's work of salvation to all of humanity. G.S.

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© 2004-2021 All rights reserved Fr. Gilles Surprenant, Associate Priest of Madonna House Apostolate & Poustinik, Montreal  QC
© 2004-2021 Tous droits réservés Abbé Gilles Surprenant, Prêtre Associé de Madonna House Apostolate & Poustinik, Montréal QC 

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Catholic Survival Guide in a Troubled Marriage

My purpose in these posts is to bring a variety of Christian and other writers in a desire to share significant writings that in my estimation contribute to the common good and directly or indirectly give glory to God and extend the Lord's work of salvation to all of humanity. G.S.

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When we experience trouble in Marriage, it is difficult to know whether it is still possible for God to help us save our Marriage or whether it has already died. God is eager to help us discern our state of affairs beginning with our own state of soul. It is a miracle of God's power and love when a man or woman who had become completely absorbed in their own concerns - ambitions and fears - turns again to God and once again or perhaps for the first time finds joy in God while at the same time experiencing distress over the trouble or signs of breakup in their Marriage.

Each person makes choices every day. The married man did and still does. The married woman did and still does. We spend much of our lives driven by ambition, insecurity, or fear or any number of other passions, but a driven life often doesn't pay close attention to anyone else. Ineffectively absorbed in our own concerns we become handicapped and perhaps incapable of selflessly loving others. A driven human being develops hardness of heart, a condition that even God finds difficult to penetrate. God must be patient and wait until life's difficult and painful circumstances crack the hard shell of that heart, which is now a broken heart, and only then can God's love begin to seep through the cracks and finally enter into that heart to bring it back to life.

God designed human beings and marriage for each other. In God's design of human beings, a man and a woman can freely come together to be joined together by the power God entrusts to us to love the other as we love our self. The gift of Marriage is manifest when the man loves the woman before himself and when the woman loves the man before herself. They each take responsibility for their own life to care for their own life, to keep themselves healthy and energetic to be able to love the other well, and in time, to love the children entrusted to them by God and to love them well, as they need to be loved.

In the beginning, when the devil tempted the man and the woman, they gave in to the temptation to become selfish. The consequences of their sin is that the man became insecure in his work and in his relation to the earth and to the world. The man throws himself into his work, becoming obsessed with success and ambition and at the same time fearful of failure and of losing everything and afraid of dying. When he looks into his wife's eyes, it is no longer clear whether she respects him and supports him. For her part, the woman became insecure in her relation to others and in her relationship with her husband. She clings to her husband in a way that seems to him exaggerated, or nagging, and he pushes her away, and in time he stops loving her as she needs. When she looks into her husband's eyes, she no longer feels assured that he cherishes her.

To this day this remains the situation of humanity both within and apart from marriage. When the man or the woman remain obsessed with their wants and fears, they become incapable of truly loving the other and treat each other as objects to be possessed, forces to be controlled, resources to be managed, but not as precious persons to be loved and cared for. No marriage can survive such conditions for very long, when one or both no longer really listen to the other, no longer give their undivided loving attention to the other.

The most precious and valuable thing we have is our life, our attention, our genuine interest. As we give our undivided attention and wholehearted interest to others, as we invest ourselves in the other, as we encourage the other and value the other despite their shortcomings and faults; we allow God's power to flow through us and give life to the other. When we keep our attention to ourselves or invest it in things, the flow of God's power, life, and love stops, and we begin to dry up. We no longer give life to the other, and we end up sucking life out of the other, using the other, trying to extract from the other the vitality that we can only truly find in God. In effect we expect other human beings to be god, but it is impossible for them to be god, because like us they are only human. Only God can be god for us.

It is a fact that many people leave their spouses and get out of their marriages primarily for self preservation once they feel that the marriage has become lifeless and a drain. God doesn't approve of marriage breakups, of spouses turning away from one another, of giving up on the other, and of living only for themselves. At such times God can only weep for us and with us. Jesus showed us God's way by allowing his life to be drained out of him to the last drop as He hung on the cross. He accepted to suffer the full consequences of all of our sins in order to reverse the tragic fall of humanity and show us the way back to life, back to God the Father, back to paradise.

Some troubled spouses remain in their dried up marriage and accept to suffer being drained by the other because they count on God to replenish their life every moment of every day. They pray for their troubled spouse and hope they will accept to also turn to God for life and let Him renew them and restore their ability to stop thinking only of themselves and begin again to love the others, their spouse and their children if they have any.

Reader, if your spouse has left you or there are signs that this is about to happen or may happen, I have no idea whether this tragedy can be reversed or stopped. What is at stake is your free will and the free will of your spouse. Unlike taxes, love cannot be extracted by legislation or by force. Love can only be freely given. You can pray for this, but even God cannot force your spouse to do something if your spouse doesn't really want to do it. No one can force another person to act against their will, except through violence or by imposing one's will on the other by force, physical or psychological constraint. This can never be love but only exploitation. It would be dangerous to yourself for you to insist on something against your spouse's free will.

At all times but especially under trial it is very good and life giving for us to turn to God and ask Him for forgiveness, love, and life. I am glad every time that someone is able to accept grace and comfort from God, especially when under such difficult situations in their marriage.

However, as long as God is not real to us we spend our lives relying only on ourselves. We don't let God help us. We refuse his guidance and light. We live in darkness. Marriage is real when the man and the woman make themselves a gift for the other. Their life is a treasure that they freely choose to offer each day to the other out of love. This requires taking attention away from my own wants and giving my attention to the other, caring for the other. This has become so difficult because we no longer live in a Christian society. Society has become pretty much pagan because people live pretty much only for themselves, and by themselves, without God. When we are surrounded by selfishness, it is even harder to be selfless and loving.

Every human being struggles with this because of the original sin. At the beginning, the man and woman turned away from God. They stopped trusting God to give them all they needed. They began a new thing, trusting in a stranger instead of God, the tempter instead of the Creator. The tempter suggested they shouldn't trust God to give them all the good things they needed and wanted. He tempted them to think that they should stop relying on God and just grab for themselves whatever they wanted. He told them that they didn't need God to tell them what is right or wrong, that they could just decide for themselves and by themselves and be like gods.

That is how the first man and woman began deciding for themselves what is right and what is wrong. The creation had been a beautiful work of order and harmony, peace and love, goodness and beauty. They disrupted that harmony by pushing God away. They lost God's love and trust because they stopped trusting and loving God. They lost each other's closeness because they refused to accept responsibility for what they had decided and instead they blamed someone else for what they had done wrong. They became separate from nature because they stopped caring for it and began thinking only about themselves. This continues to be the situation of humanity, of the world, of planet Earth. This is why in our day humanity is endlessly at war, destroying the environment, and killing off so many creatures. This is why we cannot save ourselves, why we need a Savior, why we need God.

We need God every moment of every day for everything. We need the light God is offering so our mind can begin to see things clearly and understand what is really going on in us and around us. We need God's presence dwelling within us to see where we are going and what God is doing.

We need the love God is offering so we can stop trying to squeeze love from other human beings. If we let God love us and learn to love Him, then we will let Him fill us with his love to overflowing and in this way we will know happiness, but no human being can "make us happy" and we ourselves can "make happy" no one. God designed human beings with a huge space inside us to welcome the presence and love of the Holy Trinity, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

We cannot understand that because we cannot understand God, who is a divine being, completely different from us and from all that exists in the visible universe. God is a single divine being, but in God there are three divine Persons who live in perfect communion, harmony, love, and peace. God's simple desire that we exist is what is keeping the universe and us in existence. God is bursting with the dynamic energy of divine love, and it is from God's abundant life and energy that the universe was born and continues to exist. God created us in his own image and so we are most human when we accept to live in love and community, letting God's love fill us and move us to love Him back whom we cannot see by loving others whom we can see here on Earth and by accepting to be loved.

As we allow God to bring our will into harmony with his, we allow God to dwell in us and we begin to dwell in God. We live as children of God when we use our freedom to put our trust in God and let Him guide us along the path of our daily life. To become fully alive we need to continue to put God's will first, ahead of our own will, God's great will ahead of our small limited will. This feels impossible because we cannot follow God by our own efforts.

We need the presence, the power, the light and guidance, the love and peace that the Holy Spirit brings. We need to confess our sins to God through Jesus in the Sacrament of Reconciliation... this is a powerful way to practice surrendering our will to God. We need to do this as often as we notice that we have significantly turned away from the Lord.

Then as we participate in the Holy Mass each Sunday and even during the week, at each Mass we offer God our self, our life, all that we want and fear, all our responsibilities, all our weaknesses, and all our desires along with the bread and wine, and we let Jesus unite our offering of self with his, our spirit with his. Then, at Holy Communion the heavenly Father gives us his answer to our offering, our sacrifice. His answer is his gift to us forever the same, Jesus his Son, so that Jesus may slowly transform us and, with our daily consent, enable us to resemble Him more and more, and enable us to live our life as He did while He was on Earth. Jesus alone can enable us to live fully here and, when it is God's time, in Heaven.

There is nothing more delightful on Earth perhaps than people who trust in God together and share their lives together: husband and wife, parents and children, relatives, friends, co-workers, neighbors, cities, nations.... That is the kingdom of God: people who come to know that God is real, who experience God's love for them and accept that love including his forgiveness and mercy, and who begin and continue to know God's will and try to do it with his help, who discover God's ways and ever ask his help to walk in them.

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My purpose in these posts is to help spread the contributions of a variety of Christian and other writers in a desire to share significant writings that in my estimation contribute to the common good and directly or indirectly give glory to God and extend the Lord's work of salvation to all of humanity. G.S.

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© 2004-2021 All rights reserved Fr. Gilles Surprenant, Associate Priest of Madonna House Apostolate & Poustinik, Montreal  QC
© 2004-2021 Tous droits réservés Abbé Gilles Surprenant, Prêtre Associé de Madonna House Apostolate & Poustinik, Montréal QC 

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