from my life to yours

i don't know what inspired me to take up a pen and take notes for the next few days
we're on retreat and i thought wel maybe someone else with communal inclinations would
benefit from a session by session synthesis...and of course my own commentary...
the retreat conferences are being presented to us by   fr. timothy radcliffe OP   and just by way of atmospheric introduction he has regaled us already with good humour he struck a good note by allowing us to laugh at ourselves a bit....a communal moment of laughing at ourselves...how quaint....but somehow good





retreat conf.  #1



the man states flatly
to be christian is to be alive
we are called to be signs
of christ's abundant life

he then went on for awhile about how truly simple and beautiful the sacraments are and beyond any sort of anxiety the greater church might be having about the worth of sacraments in their 7 ordered tiers of simplicity they are about life and death and drama of life of birth of sex of illness of commitment of pain of service

to be vividly alive in the sacraments
is to be involved in the dramas
of  peoples'  lives

immediately i found myself reflecting on moments in life when the sacraments served and people served me in struggle we all have for life giving life to life and the sacraments have made time and again a vivid impression of the oranic mysteries of actually being human...how do we choose to sacralize our lives??   recently if my memory serves me just recently i was engaged in a very intense moment of sacralization of someone's life.....who was that?????....o it will come to me

holiness is enmeshed in hearing
by HEARING
the god who calls us to life
and this is  his endless task to express
ever anew the call to each of us to have life in him



(hear i wish to point out that i struggled this whole time about 20 minutes with a high-pitched electric frequency emanating from the PA system and found it oddly ironic that we were on such a topic as   hearing of all things  )



the thing about christ he said
was that the man had a life to give away
he gave it in prayer he gave it in compassion
he gave it in hanging out and walking and fishing with his friends boating etc
drinking wine he gave it away to women who needed him he gave it and gave it
to be fully alive is to have a life to give

a dominican miracle story
a famous dominican preacher returned one night
to his residence which was just a ways up the road
from a dominican sisters priory and it was late but he stopped
and rang the bell at the sisters place and yelled
come along sisters come one and all i had a wonderful day preaching
and i want to celebrate with you
the sisters all gathered round in wonderment and he said
here  join in a big cup of wine i have a jug here let's have a drink for god
and all his creation
so he passed the cup amongst a goodly number of sisters and
it returned to him completely full

and all were happy as could be


we are to be that joyous cup of wine
that never goes empty

from here the  (now completely beloved)   retreat preacher
addressed the religious life in general

he said to us he said he did he said
being a religious isn't just a good life...
it is that for sure it's proven itself in countless ways through the centuries of nurturing some absolutely extraordinary human beings in every possible walk of life and some that haven't been tried much yet

ultimately if it's working
it is a way of being a way of saying
with ones existence  ---  it is glorious to be
a human being
glorious in the way everything else in the world just is
and each thing is glorious by virtue of its existence alone
the human distinction is

WE ARE CALLED BY NAME
OURS IS THE EFFORT TO HEARKEN TO THE GOD WHO CALLS US

this happens to fly in the face of
the notion of success
this is a way of god saying
all you have to do is BE
to find ourselves content in our being
content  in  the  miracle of our existence

it is a way of saying back to god
YES
i wish to say yes with my life
each human life is urged somehow
to hear the voice calling singing whispering beckoning
by name

he invited us then to simply BE for a few days
do as little as possible just BE

i think i can do that    :)

well at this point my  TESP  radar went up with
exemplary proficiency for he began to use the word

LOLL

this dominican is telling this room full of benedictines
 they have to (  we all have to  ) learn to LOLL

( i guess if i were in china i'd have to learn to lock and loll)

the culmination
of the human vocation
is to
rest in God

a simple question to ask oneself
AM     I      ALIVE   ?








i shall plan to make a review of the retreat conferences as they are given this week thereby extending by word in a somewhat of a wavelength manner some sustenance that might be gained by the many and varied pilgrims surfing the cosmos










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