God has called me his Beloved. I am His and He is mine. The Exercises began exactly where I left off in the cell of El Retiro more than five years earlier, feeling completely enveloped in the love of God and yet fearful of meeting God's deep loving gaze. The loving gaze of God was something to which I would slowly grow accustomed during the Exercises and learn to welcome. In the beginning, tears always accompanied this experience. Who was I that God could love me so deeply? This was followed by the hollowing out of my ego and sinful self to make room for the loving presence of God that would reside in me forever. These were days of extreme discomfort and unexplainable tears. When it had passed, my promise was to love, honor, and praise God in my words, thoughts, and actions. I began to say Yes following the model of Mary and I never stopped. Yes to daily prayer, yes to listening for the still, small voice of God in whatever form it took, yes to my loved ones, yes to the call - whatever it might be.
Throughout the Exercises I "heard" God in new and astounding ways. My weekly meetings with Kelly, my Spiritual Guide, taught me to pay attention to the little things, to words and phrases that I repeated n my sharing from week to week or month after month. The result was a primary teacher's Word Wall on my bathroom mirror reminding me daily of how God was working in and through me. God spoke to me in my dreams - a totally new experience for this deep sleeper who has always yearned to remember her dreams. God woke me with songs in my head - some that I hadn't thought of for 30 years and some not since my childhood. What started as a lyrical mystery to be solved soon just became a welcome reminder that God was with me at all times and nudging me into an awareness of that presence in new and beautiful ways. I entered the world of Christian, not specifically Catholic, music and will never be he same. Prayer took over my life as a constant conversation with God. Each morning I started with my email devotionals as I always had but not until I had wished my Beloved a good morning and entered into deep gratitude for what may lie ahead in this day. I delayed my rising just to be in the loving presence of God. I felt his love surround me as I lay in the hollow of His cupped hands. I never found a systematic prayer time for the Exercises but I looked forward each day to sitting in my prayer chair and saying Hello to the God who was always waiting for my greeting. I learned to begin with quiet music to calm my head and after a few minutes would look up to hold God's loving gaze, the small act that would lead me into new and deeper understandings of my faith, my love, and myself. Ignatian Contemplation did not come easily to me but as I stuck with it (thanks once again, to encouragement from Kelly) the world of scripture as I had known it was broken wide open. Readings I had heard in church for decades, had read numerous reflections about , and had even taught in Religion classes suddenly held great epiphanies of what Jesus was all about and on a personal level, God's plan for me. As I traveled with Jesus during his ministry, God revealed to me what my own journey had been and what He still had in store for me. God spoke to me in my thoughts but they were easily recognizable as being of and from Him. He was now in my head and heart and spirit. My daily walks became time to give thanks for creation; I learned to slow down and embrace all that had been given to me; to give thanks to be in this place in this time. My days were filled with gratitude and I was finally learning to live in the moment and to be intentional. I could feel God's presence throughout my day and at times it was overwhelmingly powerful. Just as I started my days with God I looked forward to ending them there as well. In the daily Examen, God and I went through the day together, sharing all the people and events that held grace for me and were messages of where God was leading me. I finally understood the power of this simple prayer and how it leads to discernment ever so gently and assuredly day by day.
The urge became stronger and stronger to return home to the loving embrace of my family and friends, to my spiritual home of the Mission Church, to the work that had been left unfinished at Sacred Heart Nativity School. The voices were many; Lucia, my granddaughter whose dreams I will never again doubt, my mom who constantly found new ways to say she didn't need me in Florida and it was OK to leave, my friends who revealed to me that my presence would be a loving balm to their wounds; but more than all of these was the call of Jesus to return to the Eucharist. The only thing that all of these voices shared was their location - HOME. So the release began. I opened my tight fisted-hold on my home, my possessions, my plan and embraced the unmarked trail that was God's plan for me and me alone. I learned, for the first time in my life, to put my complete trust in a presence beyond that of my head or heart. I embraced Ignatius's prayer, the Suscipe and it became part of my daily mantra. (Take Lord, receive all my liberty, my memory, my understanding, my entire will - all I have and possess. You have given all to me, Now I return it. All of it is yours. Dispose of it according to your will. Give me only your love and your grace, that's enough for me.) I took on the easy yoke of Jesus and learned to love as He did, to leave my possessions behind and follow Him, and to look at the world through his compassionate eyes.
The me that I was, has been, and continues to change. I look forward to what God has planned for me as I listen for His voice in prayer, contemplation, music, and my dreams. I sit back and wait patiently, knowing that all God has planned for me is goodness. I was reminded of this at a recent homily about how God answers prayers - he responds with yes, not yet, or I have a better idea. I am trusting completely in all three of these answers as I discern God's plan for all the grace and blessings that wait for me in the days and years ahead.
