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Life Ways Listening and Loving:
excerpted from Poetry As Prayer: Jessica Powers, by Robert F. Morneau Prayer is both unique and universal. Individuals and communities have their specific way of praying based on culture and traditions. Yet the underlying structure of prayer remains the same: the rhythm of listening and responding. As Hans Urs von Balthasar reminds us: "Prayer, as we can now see, is communication, in which God's word has the initiative, and we, at first, are simply listeners." Jessica Powers was a pray-er. She lived forty-seven years as a cloistered religious, spending many hours each day in prayer. She wrote out of her experience of encountering God in liturgical and personal prayer, in community and in her experience of life. We, as beneficiaries, have access to some of her insights and encounters with the Lord. By reflectively meditating on her verse, we have an opportunity of encountering the Lord in our own unique way. How To Begin Take a period of no less than twenty minutes and begin by slowly reading the poem suggested. If possible, read it out loud and several times. Watch for images and metaphors that speak to your heart. Note any call to action that the Lord offers you. The goal is union with the Lord and a drawing forth into a life of fuller love and responsibility. If the poem speaks to you, there is no need to move on to the commentary and suggested prayer, but they are provided as an additional help. Ten themes for prayer have been chosen, each followed by several suggested prayer periods. Since freedom is such a treasured value in our society, it is well to look at this gift from a spiritual point of view, for true freedom arises from a virtuous life. Mercy, another great gift from God, is the source of confidence and trust. God, who is rich in mercy, invites us to clutch his holy garments. Spirituality, according to our poetic guide, is about listening and loving. We live in God's Spirit to the extent that we are listeners and lovers. Poets speak of life and death. For Jessica Powers, death is seen as a homecoming, one filled with surprise and delight. A fifth theme for prayer is God's will. What is the Lord asking us to do and how do we come to sing God's loving song? Providence is one of the most complex theological issues. Are we under regard? Does God care? What about evil? One of the most significant expressions of God's providential love is the gift of the Eucharist. Divine bread has been given to feed the hungers of the soul. The last three themes are the person of Jesus, simplicity and community. Christian prayer centers on the person of the Lord. "Who do you say the Son of Man is?" (Mt. 16:13) still must be answered. Jesus calls us to lives of simplicity, that we might know the one thing necessary; no easy task in a world of great complexity. Go to Poetry as Prayer: Jessica Powers in our online catalog.
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