Inner Land Prayer

I come to you my Lord, that you may reign over me.
I claim the promise that you would carry me to yourself on eagle's wings
I come as one of your chosen people, your own possession.
I bring you Lord, the barren land of my being,
so that its desert may blossom like the rose.
as you drench it in the torrent of your love.
I, yield to you the inner land of my being,
that you may clear it of all that would hinder your sacred covenant.
I lay before you the closed and cluttered country of my heart
that you may break through and set me free to
walk with head held high, through the land of promise
to which you call me.
Enlighten the eye of my mind
so that I may see what needs to be set right
in the inner city where you are to reign.
Give me the sword of the Spirit
that I may set forth in high adventure
to claim nry land for your Lordship.
Cut your covenant with me
and seal it with your precious blood.
Share with me the wine,
the milk and the honey which flow in the new creation.
Give me to drink
of the Eucharistic cup of the new and everlasting covenant.
Call me to your banqueting table
and clothe me as one of your household
in the royal robe of your mercv.
May you find your delight in us, O Lord,
and give us the land.

On Eagle's wings

Exodus 19: 4' You yourselves have seen what I did to the Egyptians, and how I bore you on eagles' wings, and brought you to Myself. Now then, if you will indeed obey My voice and keep My covenant, then you shall be My own possession My Peculiar people among all the peoples, for all the earth is Mine; and you shall be to Me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.

The Eagle in Isaiah 40:31 takes advantage of air currents to fly with little or no effort. The eagle does not escape the strong winds and the storms. It simply uses them to lift itself higher. When the storms of life come upon us, we can rise above them by setting our souls toward God allowing his mercy an faithfulness to lift us above them. It is not the burdens of life that weigh us down, it is how we entrust them to the what Deuteronomy 33:27 calls the everlasting arms beneath. The eternal God is your refuge,and underneath are the everlasting arms." We must wait on the Lord, until we catch the wind of the Spirit. Eagle believers are those who seek to find out where God is going, and then go with Him. They don’t sense fighting against the wind currents. They find out what God's doing and enter into it.

When the eagle is teaching its young to fly, it pushes the young chick out of the nest and lets it flab and flop for a while, but then swoops down and picks the struggling eaglet on its own strong safe wings. Deuteronomy 1:29-31 "The Lord your God, who is going before you, will fight for you, as he did ... in the desert. He carried you, as a father carries his son, all the way you went until you reached this place."

And He will raise you up on eagle's wings,
Bear you on the breath of dawn,
Make you to shine like the sun,
And hold you in the palm of His Hand.

"They that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength;they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk and not faint." We are to run to the one in distress and not to faint or forget.

Scott Hahn subtitles his book on the Covenant: The Father who never forgets his promises. He tells of an Armenian father who told his son, Armond, “No matter what happens, I’ always be there for you.” In 1989 there was an earthquake in that country that in four minutes left 30,000 dead. The father thought immediately of his son at school and running through the streets he made for the class-room where he knew his son would be. He started digging through the rubble with his bare hands, even as a bystander muttered “Forget it , the’re all dead in there.” But this man could not forget or forsake his son. So he kept on digging and scraping for 36 hours. At last from under a wallboard, he heard a groan and he called, “Armand” and a shaky voice cried: “Papa!” When the same father had dragged out 14 more still alive, Armand hailed his classmates “See I told you, my Father wouldn’t forget us.”

The word "covenant" means "come together", as found in such words as "convention" and "communion" A covenant is a solemn agreement, whereby not only goods are exchanged but there is a commitment of persons to each other. Note the two elements in marriage. It is a contract—“This gold and silver, I thee give and with all my worldly goods, I thee endow.” But more so, there is the giving of Bride and the Bridegroom to each other. “With this body, I thee worship…” That is the covenant of marriage which binds husband and wife to each other until death do them part. Your heart and mine are one! This is what the Lord is saying to us and this too is our response to his Covenant.

The contract proposed to the Jewish people is that they would be given a land to live in and Promised Land. The Covenant promise is that they would be a Chosen people. But the contract was not to inherit a mere patch of physical territory. It was to to take possession of an inner land, to discover for themselves a land of heart’s desire,--- a place of settlement.

We all have our personal land which flows with the wine and milk and honey of the spirit. We are invited to discover that inner land where we can find rest. We must not allow strange gods to take over this sacred space. We know the hurt that comes from having forces of occupation parading and prowling over one’s native land. But more importantly there is an inner land that must not be violated or trampled on. This is were the prayer of stillness and silence as exercised in this group does its saving work.

In Bible terms we speak of cutting a covenant where blood flows and where the blood of the parties are mingled and they become a family of Blood Brothers and Sisters. Blood is thicker than water! Blood brother can refer to one of two things: two males related by birth, or two or more men not related by birth who have formed a union and sworn loyalty to each other. This is usually done in a ceremony, known as a blood oath, where the blood of each man is mingled together. The process usually provides a participant with a heightened symbolic sense of attachment with another participant.

Stanley the New York Reporter in his search for the missioner, Livingstone, tells of his trek through the African jungles. Stanley was confronted by a warlike tribe and was too weak to struggle with them. He was advised to enter into a covenant with them and was told that this would mean drinking each other’s blood. While he did not relish the idea, it was explained to him that is he did so, their lives would be one and everything that the Tribal chief had would be his if he needed it. The only thing that would be asked of him was to hand over the white milk goat.

The New York reporter was in such poor health that the only thing he could stomach was goat’s milk. This would be the end of him. But he was assured that this was merely symbolic of what Stanley himself could offer and there was no intention of withholding the milk from him. In return the Chieftain handed over an ornate seven foot tall spear. The Chieftain announced to his people, “Come trade with Stanley for we are blood brothers.” It was only later that he understood the significance of that spear for as soon as others saw the Tribal chief’s weapon they would fall over themselves to heap gifts son Stanley. They knew that the two had cut a covenant and that they could work together in confidence and fidelity.

The Hebrew Tradition associates two qualities with the idea of Covenant: They are Mercy and Fidelity. The Biblical terms are Hesed and Emet. These are the two binding forces that hold the Covenant in place. The Bible treats them as if they were Personal forces, like nouns standing up on their own rather than mere descriptive adjectives.

Let us pray that in the hour of need we may experience that Hesed and emet Jahweh--the merciful and never forgetting fidelity of our God.
But if we are to enjoy the Covenant protection in our lives, we are called to become eagles ourselves-- showing our brothers and sisters them the same mercy and faithfulness and carrying them in the palms of our hands.

In Covenant with Mary

Mark Twain tells of the day a certain King and the Queen were bringing their new little Prince home from the royal hospital. On the way home their carriage collided with a poor man’s cart. In the humble vehicle the poor man was bringing his wife and new baby home from the midwife's house. In the confusion of the moment, the two couples picked up the wrong babies by mistake and the little Prince went home to be raised by the pauper and his wife.

As the baby grew into childhood, he was forced to go into the streets and beg for food. However, unknown to him the very streets he begged on, belonged to him because they were the property of his true father and mother. Day after day out he would go to the palace and looking through the iron fence at the little boy playing there and he would say to himself, "If only I were a Prince." Of course, he was the Prince! But he was not aware of it.

He lived his whole life in poverty because he didn't know who he really was since he didn't know who his mother was. How true this is of many Christians. They have never taken time to find out to whom they belong. They have never realized who their real mother is. Ever since the day we were born spiritually, we became sons and daughters of the God and his own Mother Mary.

We are heirs to a royal throne. How sad to think we go through self–imposed spiritual poverty and cheat ourselves out of the riches of God's marvellous grace. We must learn to live no longer from the meagre ration of self, but out of the infinite supply of the King and Queen of Heaven.

The Holy Spirit came upon Mary and made her his Bride. She has been a faithful Bride and Mother and together they continue to bring forth Christ—that is the Whole Christ—the Mystical Body. Without that co-operation, there would nothing Christian to our being. Our task is to recognise and accept this Divine arrangement, to surrender to it.

True Devotion to Mary means entering into a Contract and making Covenant with her. A Contract is an exchange of goods as we say: All I have is yours. A Covenant is an exchange of Persons as we say: All I am is yours. It is like a marriage which is not only a giving of gold and silver, but a mutual giving of persons to each other.

By reason of the contract and the covenant we have entered into, Mary’s answer is: “Beloved, I am all yours and all I have is yours..”

Rosary reply

Dear Sister,

Your experience with the Rosary, prompts me to jot down a few thoughts that have been revolving in my head for some years. Ever since hearing the story of Fatima, the Rosary has been my life-line. For more than sixty years I have prayed the Rosary as many as three times a day. However I have never become obsessive about it. If I’m tired or unwell, I am content to simply rest in the Lord. I never liked the idea: You must. That kind of thing tends to become musty!

The late Fr.Conleth Kearns whose wisdom we all treasure, told me about St. Catherine of Siena. When moved to do so, she would drop her Paternoster beads and just rest in the Spirit. When the time came she would resume the bidding of her beads. I felt welcome to the club, as indeed I welcome you likewise.

Once when researching the history of the Rosary, in San Clemente, I came across an ancient and rare book entitled: Le Triple Rosaire, where the author, Pere Bernard of Toulouse referred to the three stages of attention in prayer:
To the words,

to the thoughts and

to the presence or the person.

Something of the kind happens in ordinary conversation: When we are with strangers, words seem necessary and we are careful about how we choose them. With friends or colleagues we exchange thoughts of business or pleasure. But with the Beloved our heart, it is enough to sit in silence. Being totally present to each other is what matters.

On visiting the Carmel where Sr. Elizabeth of the Trinity lived, I was told by some of her community, that the saint could not cope with the Rosary, as it did not sit well with her contemplative spirit. I believe that the Little Flower also found it a difficult prayer to manage. So, dear Sr. you are indeed in high company! Only,-- I would invite you to take the pressure off. It is not that you can’t think or concentrate or even meditate. It is that you are gone beyond those stages. Listen to Pere Bernard: "When summoned to the royal court, do not dally along the corridors and antechambers looking at pictures of King, but walk calmly on into his presence."

Much of this wisdom has come back to me, since getting involved with the John Main meditation Group here in Tallaght. Here, they instruct us to put aside all words, all images, all thoughts—even holy ones. We are to just sit still and silently interiorly recite the prayer word.

This enlightenment came to me at the time I was taken off the Apostolate of the Rosary which had filled out over fifty years of my life. I was feeling bereft and bereaved, as indeed many must feel at a time of upheaval in life. I felt as if on the scrap-heap. As Bernadette of Lourdes remarked when the visions were over and she found herself in Nevers, it was “as if she were a broom now finished with and left behind the door.”

I found it hard to concentrate and could not get beyond the first words of the Our Father:
Thy name, thy kingdom, thy will. My own name mattered no more.My kingdom was over. My will had been thwarted. That is how it was, and perhaps how it was meant to be for so that I might have my own dark night experience. I could appreciate the lot of so many who were undergoing change or becoming redundant. The very pronoun— Thy was all I could manage and yet it was all that mattered now. For the past six years, it has become my prayer word, my mantra!

I have rediscovered the Rosary, as Pere Bernard taught it. I take up the beads each morning and pray the first Joyful mystery, slowly and almost silently, leaving myself open to the Lord’s Annunciation for this day. I do indeed say the Our Father and the ten Hail Marys, but they take a long time. All the while I linger in love over those words that are now engraved in my heart: Thy name, Thy kingdom, Thy will. I never venture out without my beads—heaven and the history of my heart locked together in my pocket. When the time is right, I pray the other mysteries. But deep down there is only one mystery -- the mystery of the Divine presence.

Looking again to the John Main experience, I observe that following the example of their mentor, there is usually a teaching at the beginning of each session, when direction is given. At the end of the formal instruction, one is told to put even these sacred thoughts aside and enter into the apophatic stillness. If one takes this model on board, it would seem that in the Rosary, it might be wise, to at first pause and ponder the particular mystery of the Divine Humanity. Then pick up the beads and use the vocal prayers as a kind mantra, while resting in the void and not trying to think of the detail of mystery being celebrated. Certainly it is not so much a thinking in the head as a lingering in the heart.

In many of the Eastern forms of prayer, meditation is accompanied with the use of beads. For myself, when I meditate morning and evening as suggested by John Main, I hold the beads in my hand or around the neck. The very sense of touch gives an added dimension of presence to the person. It is something to hold on to, and in the full Christian sense, it is someone to hold on to.

Dear Sr. I hope I have not wearied you with all that I have set down here. Those who like to get prayers said, who in a sense have the lust for getting finished are in one camp and those who want just to linger in love are in another. It is like the distinction between those who go in for spiritual exercise and those who simply opt to sit in the sun and get well. There are the two spiritualities and perhaps we need a dose of both medicines.

I have enclosed the Brochure of Retreats in Tallaght, as Fr. Donagh O’Shea, the Director has invited me to conduct a Summer Retreat around the ideas floated to you in this letter. If you can help out with any of your own insights they will be most welcome. It is your
query that has already prompted me to set something on paper.

Lourdes Novena

I once received a delightful invitation to a friend’s house party. It read:

"Don’t bring anything—just yourself." When I hesitated, the reply came back: “No need to dress up. Come as you are. No gifts or presents—just your presence.” The distinction may not be clear in speech. So let me spell it out: Not PRESEN-TS but PRESEN-CE

It is this presence of Our Lady, that makes Lourdes so special. There are prayers and processions, cries of petition from priests and people. But it is the presence of Mary herself in the Grotto that touches the heart and draws the teeming thousands from all parts of the world. We have prayers to say and things to ask for, but may I suggest to you that the most helpful attitude to adopt, is simply to be still and attentive to the persons of Jesus and Mary. To acknowledge their presence and to be totally present to them.

St Thomas speaks of three degrees of attentiveness in prayer.
1 To the words we say,
2 To the thoughts and desires behind the words,
3 To the Person in whose presence we are.

In this regard, Bernadette proves herself a trustworthy guide.
She too tells us three things:
The Lady looked at me.
She smiled at me
And said: Come closer

She stated that the Lady looked at her and that she in return looked steadfastly at the Lady in the Grotto. People observed this look, this silent gaze into the unseen and secret place and asked: "Did the Lady look at anyone else but yourself ? "

The child replied:
"Yes indeed she did. She looked all around the crowd and she stopped at some as if they were old familiar friends.

Mary is ever faithful to the royal command she received from the Cross: Woman—look thee is your son. Mary has been faithful to that task down the ages and you can be sure that she is exercising that very same mission on our behalf here and now. We in turn continue the work of the disciple: We behold our Mother. While we take up our beads and say your prayers and think over its mysteries, deeper and closer than anything we may say or think, lies this beholding, the simple attention to the heavenly person.

May we be among those familiar friends at whom Our Lady looks with eyes of compassion: Hail Holy Queen turn your eyes of mercy towards us. Lourdes is indeed the smile of heaven, that encourages to look and come closer.

Celibacy- a Way of Loving

A Celibate way of Loving-- my testimony

There are many today crying out for the abolishment of Celibacy as a way of living for the Catholic clergy. They say it leads to loneliness, to frustration and to sexual abuse. Might I add something of my own experience to the debate.

It came as a light in the darkness to discover that in Christian terms celibacy is not to be seen as a restriction, but as one of the charismatic gifts which has its source in divine love. Unless it continues to drink from that well-spring of grace, it may indeed be a legalistic burden and we might as well abandon it. The priest who is frustrated and angry with what he perceives as a mere legal requirement for priesthood is on a road to nowhere.

It may as well be noted that celibacy is not a way for religious and clergy only. The unmarried are bound by this same condition, and if married people are to live by the strict rule of their Church, they find themselves having to abstain from sexual intercourse for certain and often long periods of their lives. So this is a far wider issue than one might at first sight think. And over all this range of living,-- love and relationship must prevail.

Celibate clergy think of themselves as signposts to the Kingdom of God, pointing out the heavenly way. But they must not be wooden signposts with wooden hearts. Priests should be Princes of love showing a way to relationship that is at once totally human and authentically divine.

Christian celibacy lays down a clear distinction between sexuality and genitality. The celibate person is of course a sexual being and is called to rejoice in the wonder of his being, but with the grace of God and the discipline of a maturity, he does not stray into the area of genital sex. The lives of several Catholic saints tell of beautiful and holy celibate relationships between people like Francis de Sales and Jane de Chantal. Look up that delightful book: To Heaven with Diana -- the story of the two Dominicans, Jordan of Saxony, the successor of St Dominic and Blessed Diana. When he travelled to preach the Gospel, Jordan carried Diana in his heart and longed to get back to her. His love for her enabled him to be a loving presence to all he met on the way.

To everyone, single or married, cleric or lay, applies the basic text of Scripture: It is not good for man to be alone. That sacred word seems to go contrary to the one so many priests heard in the seminary: Nunquam solus cum sola-- Never be found alone with a woman!

A Dominican Provincial, Fr. Damian Byrne now gone from this world told me that he was fed up with alcoholics and workaholics under his care and wished that every of them had a good woman of God in their lives. Before all the world, I confess that while being madly in love with my Lord Jesus and rejoicing in my celibacy, I make no secret of the fact that God has sent such a woman into my life. And because of her, I love and relate to all others in an ever more delightful way. Because of her, I love the wider commuity and experience being loved by others in a holy and wholesome new way.Cherchez la femme. -- Look out for the woman should no longer strikes a note of trouble, but be seen as divine command and bring with it a fruitful blessing!

Some time ago, wanting to develop the above theme, I had the nerve to write a book entitled: A Celibate way of Loving. Not being able to compose a whole treatise, like St. Francis de Sales, I hit on the idea of putting it in the form of short pieces with the subheading: Letters to the Beloved. If you can't find it in he bookshops, I would happily send you a copy. Contact me at: The Dominican Priory, Tallaght Village, Dublin 24, Ireland or at: 15 Brett Ave. Lurgan Northern Ireland BT66 6HZ

The Souls of our Departed Legionaries

Handbook:Page 103

As we prayed around the grave of Fr. Herman, the much loved Spiritual director of this Curia, I mused that: More than most perhaps, Legionaries pray: Holy Mary Mother of God pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death. The Handbook reminds us that “through all eternity—Legion membership will last. ‘Now at last confirmed in Legionary service.”
What a tribute! What a reward! Well done good and faithful servant. Enter into the joy of your Master.

In one of his talks on the subject of Death and the hereafter, Frank Duff asks himself why people are afraid of death. It must be he suggests they are motivated by fear rather than by the goodness and the love of God. They may too think that heaven excludes the pleasures they knew here on earth and that all there will be to do in heaven is to play harps and sing hymns. “I have to confess,” he says that if I were thrown back on these employments, I would not feel any attraction to Heaven myself. I cannot join any more in that popular item; I’ll sing a hymn to Mary, because I have now sung it ten thousand times and I’m tired of it.”

From his experience in the Morning Star Hostel, he discovered that the men there might not have thought heaven to be a place they feel at home in. He came across a group of them looking at the notice board with the record of the former residents who had died: One of those peering at the list cried out: “If all them fellas is up in heaven, it must be a hell of rough joint !”

Frank goes on to say that anything that gave us real joy here on earth will be present in heaven but in a higher and more refined and beautiful manner than we could ever dream of. He places particular stress on the ardent longing to meet our beloved ones again. “We will embrace our again in a union that will never cease or grown stale--- no distress or departure—nothing but a blissful encounter that will last for all eternity.

The final remark Frank makes is indicative of his understanding of the divine power that he brought to bear on his own Legionary service here on earth, and which he holds out to every true Legionary: We will see all, know all, have all. We will be able to do all, because living in God we will be given entry into his power. We will play with his power as a child would play with toys.