"Lord, I am not worthy that should come under my roof" Matthew 8:8 For myself there has been this ideal of living the Christian life. Most of what it consists of in my mind's eye is daily prayer, striving to obey God's commandments, participating in the Sacramental life, attending Mass as often as possible, Eucharistic Adoration, helping the poor, serving the Church and others. Those actions describe the exterior Christian life, but what I am discovering through spiritual direction is that all of those actions I describe must be guided by an interior spiritual life. St. Paul speaks of "For the good that I want, I do not do, but I practice the very evil that I do not want." The will to do good and live that ideal Christian life often fails me. In my failure I have been discouraged and distracted. This is precisely what the Evil One wants. That is why dependence on oneself will always fail you. I now think that what is necessary is to prepare a room in my heart for Christ. I think in this manner, suppose you were to have a very special guest visit and stay with you. You would begin by cleaning your house, freshening it up with new drapery and flowers. Your desire is to make your guest comfortable and feel that your home is truly his or her home. You would be so excited anticipating their arrival. In the interior of my heart I wish to prepare a room for Christ. He is my special guest and there is much to do in preparation of His arrival. In contemplating His arrival, I can search myself and see what I am doing to make Him feel wanted. By examining my actions daily, I can see whether it is a clean house He's coming to or is it messy with all the junk that I've put into it, feelings of inadequacy, anger, impurity, selfishness. My invitation has been sent, I desire Christ to enter my house even with my unworthiness. It is only by uniting my will to His can I do anything worthwhile.
Pope Francis
Wednesday, August 12, 2009
Preparing His Room
"Lord, I am not worthy that should come under my roof" Matthew 8:8 For myself there has been this ideal of living the Christian life. Most of what it consists of in my mind's eye is daily prayer, striving to obey God's commandments, participating in the Sacramental life, attending Mass as often as possible, Eucharistic Adoration, helping the poor, serving the Church and others. Those actions describe the exterior Christian life, but what I am discovering through spiritual direction is that all of those actions I describe must be guided by an interior spiritual life. St. Paul speaks of "For the good that I want, I do not do, but I practice the very evil that I do not want." The will to do good and live that ideal Christian life often fails me. In my failure I have been discouraged and distracted. This is precisely what the Evil One wants. That is why dependence on oneself will always fail you. I now think that what is necessary is to prepare a room in my heart for Christ. I think in this manner, suppose you were to have a very special guest visit and stay with you. You would begin by cleaning your house, freshening it up with new drapery and flowers. Your desire is to make your guest comfortable and feel that your home is truly his or her home. You would be so excited anticipating their arrival. In the interior of my heart I wish to prepare a room for Christ. He is my special guest and there is much to do in preparation of His arrival. In contemplating His arrival, I can search myself and see what I am doing to make Him feel wanted. By examining my actions daily, I can see whether it is a clean house He's coming to or is it messy with all the junk that I've put into it, feelings of inadequacy, anger, impurity, selfishness. My invitation has been sent, I desire Christ to enter my house even with my unworthiness. It is only by uniting my will to His can I do anything worthwhile.
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