Lydia survived the operation and I visited her in the hospital several days later. Of course, she was still weak and recovering, but her mind seemed fully intact and she was grateful and seemingly at peace. I asked her how she was doing, how she felt? She said that she was in “God’s hands.” …
On Saturday, the final day of Lydia’s four-day spiritual care plan leading up to the day of her brain tumor operation, I saw the Holy Spirit at work. “Lydia, tell me about your other failures?” I asked She replied, “My marriage, I stayed in my marriage too long. I should have left when he started …
On Thursday, the second day of Lydia’s spiritual care plan, the point was made and accepted, at least intellectually, that Lydia’s mother, husband, and neighbors no longer had power over her. When fear arose within her, she was to repeat the name of Jesus over and over. On Friday, the focus was for Lydia to …
On Wednesday, the first day of Lydia’s spiritual care plan, the effort was to separate the offender from the offense. This is meant to forgive the offender, not the offense since only God can forgive the offense. In other words, we can forgive the sinner but not the sin. It seemed important to point out …
Before I had an opportunity to actually write down the four-day spiritual plan for Lydia, I met her daughter in a long, empty corridor joining two buildings at the nursing home. The daughter lived in the mountains of a Western state. From earlier conversations, I knew that she held a sort of “new age” belief, …
Whatever a person experiences in meditation, it is the repeated encounter with “self” in the meditative process that eventually leads to a “self-awareness” which is, at the same time, healing and transforming. The “turning within” leads to the encounter with the “true-self” stripped of all ideas or images of ourselves that we have developed …
At some point in my spiritual development, I can’t really recall when my prayer moved from my head to my heart. It is somewhat remarkable for me, for I have always been in my head, analytical, and not given in readily to emotion. I expect that it has to do with meditation in drawing …
The widely popular spiritual exercises of Saint Ignatius are focused on scriptural images. (Spiritual Exercises). Although I haven’t practiced the spiritual exercises in many years, I had some early experiences while attending retreats at a Jesuit retreat house, the White House, near St. Louis, MO. Under the guidance of the retreat master, I was …
Meditation and reflection on scripture have been powerful tools for me as a chaplain working with groups of people in various healthcare and residential facilities and hospitals. In order to measure progress within the group, I developed an assessment tool that measured ten factors of participation, relationship building, and spirituality on a scale of one …
There are many paths to spiritual growth through various forms of prayer and community. Similarly, there are multiple paths to a deeper spirituality through meditation. Meditation and reflection on scripture (e.g., Lectio Divina) is one of the earliest forms of meditation practiced in the early church and has had a resurgence in recent years …