Project of Life

Day 6: Talk 2: Concluding Talk:

PROJECT OF LIFE / SPIRITUAL PLAN (FROM HERE WHERE?). Retreat to the FMAs, Bellefonte Outreach, Shillong.

What will you do when you reach the community? What should you do? These are secondary questions. The first questions are: Am I interiorly at peace here and now? Am I spiritually okay now, to deal with this situation? Am I able to see God here and now, in this situation (positive and negative)?

From here where? The most important phase of the rocket/space-craft is the re-entry into earth’s orbit. Very crucial, it can get burnt. The same way the important import part of the retreat is returning to your community and your mission. You can easily lose the path as soon as you go into your normal life. That might happen, that will happen. It’s like the Transfiguration experience, if you like. You need to go down to the plains from the mount. The hardships of life will encounter you all the more. You can’t be in coma. If you need to reap the benefits of the foregoing six days, then you need to take a few steps, concrete steps. And keep learning every day. Another caution: you will meet with scepticism both inside you and outside you. “There is nothing new under the sun.” There are many foxes jumping on your shoulders to whisper this lie. Do you want to believe them or believe in the one who makes everything new. “Behold, I make all things new.”

To start again and again. To start anew, to start afresh is the first important thing in our spiritual life. To start now. To be converted again and again. We need to be born again and again and again.

There is a definition of insanity: doing the same things again and again, and expecting different results every time. Need to live life, enjoy life. You’ll surely make mistakes, but don’t stop living or enjoying. God is there for you! Basic message of Christianity–Jesus goes ahead of you. He is already there in the Galilee of your communities and your missions, waiting for you. Mark 16:7.

God comes to you disguised as life. Be joyful in life.

Spiritual joy has nothing to do with anything “going right.” It has everything to do with things going, and going on within you. It’s an inherent, inner aliveness. Joy is almost entirely an inside job. Joy is not first determined by the object enjoyed as much as by the prepared eye of the enjoyer. [Rohr, The Divine Dance, 86.] Joy is the result of our choices. (Happiness is an inside job!)

Joy is essential for spiritual lives. When we are not joyful, our thoughts and words cannot bear fruit. Don’t be a big kid without any fun inside. Jesus reveals to us God’s love that our joy may become complete.

Joy does not mean absence of sorrows. Joy is not about optimism. Joy has nothing to do with all the predictions that life will be better, or our economy will develop, or we shall have a better superior, a better world tomorrow. On the contrary: the best is already here and now. [Nonsense: Youth are the pillars of tomorrow. Or to a kid: What do you want to become in the future?] The world is good as it is. It is the best. This moment is the perfect moment. That’s why we plan for the present… for today… for every day. Not future. Tomorrow never comes.

Planning: an important part of life. To design our life we need timetables, plans, and of course personal plans and projects too. Failing to plan is planning to fail. That’s very much true with regard to our spiritual life too. (We can’t plan our own salvations, but we can only prepare for it. We can only prepare the soil.) When the student is ready the teacher will arrive. Planning is about “being” ready. (You cannot “get” here, you can only “be” here.)

An example of a spiritual plan – Daily spiritual project of St John XXIII, pope – who was known as the laughing pope, etc.

The Daily Decalogue of Pope Saint John XXIII

1. Only for today, I will seek to live the day positively without wishing to solve the problems of my life all at once.
2. Only for today, I will take the greatest care of my appearance: I will dress modestly; I will not raise my voice; I will be courteous in my behaviour; I will not criticize anyone; I will not claim to improve or to discipline anyone except myself.
3. Only for today, I will be happy in the certainty that I was created to be happy, not only in the other world but also in this one.
4. Only for today, I will adapt to circumstances, without requiring all circumstances to be adapted to my own wishes.
5. Only for today, I will devote 10 minutes of my time to some good reading, remembering that just as food is necessary to the life of the body, so good reading is necessary to the life of the soul.
6. Only for today, I will do one good deed and not tell anyone about it.
7. Only for today, I will do at least one thing I do not like doing; and if my feelings are hurt, I will make sure that no one notices.
8. Only for today, I will make a plan for myself: I may not follow it to the letter, but I will make it. And I will be on guard against two evils: hastiness and indecision.
9. Only for today, I will firmly believe, despite appearances, that the good Providence of God cares for me as no one else who exists in this world.
10. Only for today, I will have no fears. In particular, I will not be afraid to enjoy what is beautiful and to believe in goodness.

Indeed, for 12 hours I can certainly do what might cause me consternation were I to believe I had to do it all my life.

“I want to be kind, today and always, to everyone.”

Just For Today – AA/NA

Just for today, I will try to live through this day only, and not tackle my whole life problem at once. I can do something for twelve hours that would appall me if I felt that I had to keep it up for a lifetime.

Just for today, I will be happy. This assumes to be true what Abraham Lincoln said, that “most folks are as happy as they make up their minds to be.”

Just for today, I will try to strengthen my mind. I will study. I will learn something useful. I will not be a mental loafer. I will read something that requires effort, thought and concentration.

Just for today, I will adjust myself to what is, and not try to adjust everything to my own desires. I will take my “luck” as it comes, and fit myself to it.

Just for today, I will exercise my soul in three ways: I will do somebody a good turn, and not get found out. I will do at least two things I don’t want to—just for exercise. I will not show anyone that my feelings are hurt; they may be hurt, but today I will not show it.

Just for today, I will be agreeable. I will look as well as I can, dress becomingly, talk low, act courteously, criticize not one bit, not find fault with anything and not try to improve or regulate anybody except myself.

Just for today, I will have a program. I may not follow it exactly, but I will have it. I will save myself from two pests: hurry and indecision.

Just for today, I will have a quiet half hour all by myself, and relax. During this half hour, sometime, I will try to get a better perspective of my life.

Just for today, I will be unafraid. Especially I will not be afraid to enjoy what is beautiful, and to believe that as I give to the world, so the world will give to me.

 -Kenneth Holmes.

Those were two examples of having a life plan. Now we want to see the plan of plans, the project of projects given to us by the Lord, and is called the Lord’s prayer.

Similar to: A woman’s song: One day at a time, sweet Jesus.

OUR FATHER

James Pullickal, in exile, hijacked by the extremists - New Testament - Our Father - tears. God is our Father, we are His children. Story: A kid and his father at a mela (fair). I want that ice-cream, I want that toy-car, etc. Gets lost in the crowd. Reaches the same shops, crying. I don’t want the ice-cream, I don’t want the toy, I want my dad.

As prayer itself, the pattern of all prayers. It contains praise and thanksgiving, it contains intercessions, etc. But above all it is a programme of life. Not just pattern of prayers or prayer in itself. It lends itself to be a project of spiritual and Christian life, that each and every one of us can follow. Let us see it upside down; from down upwards.

Our Father who art in heaven	“Abba” experience
Hallowed be thy name	Sacrifice of praise
Thy Kingdom come	I seek his things, his kingdom.
Thy Will be done on earth as in heaven	No more ego
Give us this day our daily bread	Listening is prayer; God’s word is nourishment.
Forgive us our trespasses	Forgive me, Lord.
As we forgive those who trespass against us	Lord, help me to forgive!
Lead us not into temptation	No to the sensational
But deliver us from evil	No to sin

Not chronological strictly; but usually the basics are down at the bottom; the excellence is on top. Sometimes, we might concentrate one above the other.

Deliver us from evil

No to sin. Any spiritual life starts with a no to evil, no to sin. Our sins are the best teachers. Don’t let go of a sin until and unless you have learned from it. Otherwise seven worse demons will come along with it back. Acknowledging that your are sinful, that you have been evil, itself is a starting point of healing and conversion. Here you may have to start again and again, be converted again and again. The flame is cleared of all ashes so that it can burn freely. A retreat experience or another’s word/deed can stir up our affection – catch hold of it. Enflame it. Fire is the symbol of the Holy Spirit.

All of us have this spark within us. This point of nothingness. We can’t do anything about it. Only God can dispose of it. Immortal Diamond. Divine DNA. Image of God. Belovedness. Rediscovering this spot is what will make us receive or give love: from/to God, others, myself. The True Self is discovered by dying to one’s false self.

Lead us not into temptation

Temptations arise from our human condition. There are three basic types of temptation (as seen clearly in Jesus’ life): (1) I am what I do: success; (2) I am what people say or think about me: popularity; (3) I am what I have: power. Jesus was asked to prove he is successful by changing stones to bread; he was asked to prove he is popular by throwing himself from the temple tower or by coming down from the cross; he was asked to prove he is powerful by accepting the kingdoms of the world or by accepting kingship. But Jesus didn’t have to prove to the world that he was worthy of love; he was already the Beloved.

We too have these three temptations in our lives. Temptations for success, popularity and power. Temptations to do the sensational or to say the trendiest thing. Temptations to identify ourselves with the worldly values. But like Jesus if we are attentive to the voice that calls us the Beloved, then we don’t have to prove to others that we need love from the wrong places—we are already His Beloved daughters and sons, we are intimately connected to him by our very existence.

I myself can do nothing; without the Lord I can do nothing. It is the Lord who leads me, he is my shepherd.

As we forgive

Lord, help me to forgive! Lack of forgiveness is a block to prayer. The central aspect of the Lord’s prayer is forgiveness. The only condition to receive mercy is to be merciful in turn. We ourselves are putting the condition: “as we” forgive. The central portion of this programme of life is to forgive and to receive forgiveness. The flow should continue. From outside (from God) into my heart, and also from my heart out into the world, to others. The moment I block the flow, life and love becomes stagnant. There is no life, there is no love.

Very often it is by forgiving others and their evil that we can fulfil and complete our otherwise subtle (or not so subtle) work on our own selves. Both these acts, therefore, take real and lasting courage. We must embrace our enemies just as much as we must welcome our own shadows. [Rohr, “Courageous Nonviolence,” Nonviolence, Meditation of September 20, 2017.] Jesus Christ is our enduring example and inspiration for forgiveness. He not only preaches forgiveness, he does it even when it is really difficult for him: he forgives his persecutors from the cross. And then, after resurrection too, the first words of Jesus to his disciples are: “Peace be with you” (Jn 20:19). There are no past stories or betrayals remembered, but only peace, only forgiveness. Even for Jesus as a human person it would have been very difficult to forgive his disciples. Though it might have been comparatively easier to forgive the Romans and the Jews, even those who ill-treated him and crucified him, to forgive his own disciples would have been more difficult. They were his own friends who betrayed him and ran away from him just when he needed them the most. But to forgive them, he did it.

What is more important here is to live and experience the forgiveness of God. Unless I experience the mercy and forgiveness of the Lord I will not be able to transfer or do the same to my fellow beings. That is what we hear from the lips of Jesus when he praises the woman who was a sinner, who anointed him: “Her sins, which are many, are forgiven—for she loved much. But he who is forgiven little, loves little” (Lk 7:47). This is clear in the parable of the unforgiving servant (Mt 18:23-35), where that wicked servant though fully forgiven, was not ready to do the same. He has not experienced the forgiveness. The parable seems very logical, but to the wicked servant there are no logical connections. What we expect him to do, he does not do it. This situation may be same with us, that is, we too can become unforgiving if we don’t experience the loving mercy and forgiveness of the Lord in a personal and felt way.

Forgiveness is central to the Lord’s prayer or the Christian programme or plan of life. Forgiveness seems to be a condition, the only condition for prayer, for relationship with God himself. Negatively, unforgiveness is the only block for prayer to be effective. At any rate, forgiveness is central for our relationship with others and with God. Thus we can say that a spirituality that does not hinge on forgiveness is not really spirituality.

Spirituality thus is also to acknowledge that I am only marginal to this universe. I am not the centre of the world. This is God’s world. From being childish, self-centred and self-oriented in my infancy, I move to a world where God is its centre, not me—I am not the centre of this universe. However, even as an adult I regress into being selfish and childish. Recognising this tendency and decentring myself is a process of spirituality. Rohr would talk about a “well-hidden narcissism” that needs to be dealt with. [Rohr, “Human Development through Scripture,” Prophets, Meditation of September 10, 2017.] Forgiveness in this sense is decentring myself, letting my ego or the false self die, and placing God at the centre of my life. To forgive my brother or sister is to die to my false self.

Forgiveness accepts the dark past with an attitude of gratefulness. It can accept contradictions and darkness that we have encountered in our lives.

Further, loving everyone is also a matter of forgiving everyone, forgiving everything, forgiving every time. A tall order. Love is not about eliminating evil or eliminating differences, even when contradictory. It is not even about excluding or ignoring the evil-doer, it is rather about including the evil doer and her actions. “To exclude anything that appears in your universe is not love. Love joins everything.” [Byron Katie, with Stephen Mitchell, A Thousand Names for Joy: Living in Harmony with the Way Things Are (New York: Random House, 2008), 72.] Love connects everything, even what seems strange and dark. Everything belongs in love. Even sin and disorder.

Forgive us

Forgive me, Lord. Tears in prayer. The Lord purifies me. Here I’m ready to receive forgiveness, my heart is light, unburdened. Confession of sins is always in a context of love; without love we don’t dare to look into our faults and mistakes. He gives us the courage to look intently at our shortcomings, and eventually correct them. So the term confession is more for praising God, rather than of confessing faults. Only in a forgiving embrace of a loving father can the prodigal be restored to true unity, only then can a true repentance come (see the reflection on the Prodigal Father).

Give us our bread

Listening is prayer; God’s word is nourishment. I don’t need many words for prayer – more silence than speaking. So far I’ve been speaking, now I listen to God’s voice. Prayer is listening to God calling me the Beloved. I am His Beloved, I realise this in silence and trust. Increasing simplicity and passivity in prayer (Lonergan, Method in Theology, 240).

“Daily”: “Today”: Just for today, everyday you will give us… just for today, give us our bread. Trust in providence and God’s goodness, because he is our Parent, our Father and Mother. I don’t have to hoard or be overworried about tomorrow. Only for this day.

On Earth as in Heaven

As above, so below. As within, so without. The universe is a holon: simultaneously a whole and a part. Each part contains and mirrors the whole. We are wholes within wholes. As now, so later. Heaven is surely now, that’s why it’s later also. Earth is crammed with heaven. Every bush is a “burning bush.”

Thy Will be done

The flame is burning freely and it burns away all evil, sin, selfishness. No more ego. God’s will and his kingdom is primary. There are wounds, but they give me joy. Wounds for the Lord. Remember Jesus’ prayer at Gethsemane. Prayer and suffering are united. Mother Teresa of Calcutta: terrible darkness.

Thy Kingdom come

There are no more ‘my’ joys, ‘my’ pleasures. I seek his things, his kingdom. God is my King, my Master, my Lord, my God.

Hallowed be thy name

This is a sacrifice of praise; my life is for the glory of God. Could learn from charismatics, pentecostals, other denominations: Thank Him always. We cannot pronounce his name. Unspeakable. Only breathe his name. YHWH. We breathe holiness in and out.

Our Father

“Abba experience” – God experience – Jesus experience; mystical prayer, contemplation: a gift. Religious experience is being grasped my ultimate concern. It is falling in love in an unrestricted way; falling in love with God who is our mother and our father, who is concerned about me more than I’m concerned about myself. Familiarity with God, J. Jeremias = Abba. God is my Parent, Transcendent and Immanent. He takes care of me: faith, trust, child-like confidence.

Image of God: Positive or negative? Without Him we will fall into nothingness – my Creator; means that at this moment I need Him.

Prayer becomes increasingly simple, even passive. To be simple, to live simple is not that easy: because the world teaches us to be more and more, to do more and more, buy more, consume more, climb the ladder – defeat more and more people, more and more people need to be below you, etc. That’s why a simple life is not that easy. It is a matter of saying enough, I have enough, I don’t want more.

Religious experience is the same as religious conversion, conscious but not known, dynamic state of being in love. Our call to Abba experience is mysticism, being united like the branches with the vine, a call to contemplation. The divine in me sees/meets the divine in the world.

The way up

Cooperative grace. Our prayer is only a response to God’s initiative. Prayer is more what is done to us, than what we do. (Increasing passivity.) Rom 8:26 “It is the Spirit that prays in us with sighs too deep for words.” Our desire for God. All other desires are to be ordered around this desire for God. Our being is desiring. (See the introductory talk.) Our desire for God is itself a gift from God. “No one can long for God unless God is present in his/her heart.” The movement of our spirit towards God. “Did not our hearts burns?” The way up stands for my efforts, but only as a loving response to God’s invitation to be love. Starts with no to sin. Or self-control, a fruit of the Holy Spirit. Self-control, through gentleness, faithfulness, goodness, kindness, patience, peace and joy, to LOVE. But God’s gift is way down, from LOVE through joy and peace ... to self-control. (Gal 5:22) See Rom 5:5 “Love of God has been poured into our hearts by the Spirit who has been given to us.” Grace is both a gift and an effort. Never separated from each other. “The God who created you without you will not save you without you.” (St Augustine) You take one step towards God and God takes ten steps towards you, or rather, you realize He has taken so many steps towards you even before you think about returning to God. The heart of stone has been plucked out to replace it with a heart of flesh to love alone. The heart of flesh can now cooperate with God’s plan, with God’s grace to express itself in good deeds, words.

The way down

Operative grace. God’s desire for us. God’s thirst for us. That is, the Holy Spirit. Abba experience. This is the primary way. Christ on the cross is the symbol of God’s hunger and thirst for us: “I thirst.” In Jesus Christ, all the contradictions and opposites meet: “He has a masculine body, with a feminine spirit; he is God and Man; he is dead and gives life, lives forever; the shame of the cross becomes the symbol of salvation; in his desperation we have hope and trust; he the Sinless One becomes ‘sin’ for us; he is weak and he is strong and powerful; human yet divine; heavenly yet earthly; physical yet spiritual; killed yet alive; powerless yet powerful; victim yet victor; failure yet redeemer; marginalized yet central; singular yet everyone; incarnate yet cosmic; nailed yet liberated. Jesus is the living collison of all opposites, he is the very template of total paradox.”

The people who hold the contradictions—and resolve them in themselves—are the saviours of the world. They are agents of transformation, reconciliation, and newness. That’s when they fulfill Isaiah’s prophecy: “The wolf will live with the lamb, the leopard will lie down with the goat, the calf and the lion and the yearling together; and a little child will Holding creatively the contradictions and inconsistencies, and the tensions created by them thus seems to be an essential task of spirituality. “We are better persons when we carry tension, as opposed to always looking for its easy resolution.” Carrying a creative tension.

Family, friendship, companionship, fellowship, marriage, religious life, and umpteen other ways are lived pre-reasoning. God provides, cares for us in 101 ways. The divine may remain anonymous. But this is the primary way, not the way up. 95% or even more of our lives, dealing with others and the world is via this way.

Grace and Holy Spirit

Grace means light and strength; Holy Spirit is light and strength. Grace is not a thing, not just a gift, not in the plural, but grace is the person of the Holy Spirit. Grace is everything, everything is grace. If I am attuned to the movements of the Spirit in me, then I can discern the same Spirit indwelling in others, I can discern the movements of the Spirit in the world. Christian de Cherge in his final letter: “Even the one who kills me is helping me to do His will.” (See Stephanie Saldaña’s article.) We are fused into reality, similarly, we are fused into grace. All around us and within us is grace, above, below, front and back, within and without, everywhere and everything is grace, nothing but grace.

Grace builds on nature; it does not avoid or destroy nature. It perfects nature.

Conclusion: Any dream will do. “If your only goal is to love, then there is no such thing as failure.” I’d want you to carry one gift for your community, even for your mission. What is it? The gift of vulnerability. Vulnus = wound. There is a possibility of hurting you back. There is risk. Shadow. Remove your mask. (One mask at a time, one wound at a time. Wounded healer.)

Alcoholic - worst possible thing - ruined his marriage, lost his children - but it is the greatest thing that ever happened to me - everything belongs. When an old drunk can say alcoholism was the greatest gift God ever gave him, then everything surely belongs. Logically that doesn’t make sense, but theo-logically it does. (Teacher to student: 2 mangoes + 2 more mangoes = 5 mangoes. But strawberries correct answer. One hidden mango – in the bag. Student practically correct; teacher technically correct.)

Another way to see the “Our Father” is that it is a positive rendition, or a prayerful rendition of the ten commandments. (Remember laws are negatively put, but in prayer, it is made postive. So instead of “You shall not profane the name of the Lord,” we have “Hallowed be thy name/let your name be holy” in a positive, prayerful mood.) This also proves that this prayer of Our Father is more than a prayer, but a spiritual project, to live well, to live according to God’s will and God’s word. Matthean gospel will give us the full meditation of this “You have heard it said, but I say to you...”