“Listen carefully, my son, to the master’s instructions, and attend to them with the ear of your heart.” This is the very first sentence of the Rule of St. Benedict. For several reasons, it comes to mind as I look at the Scriptures for today.
One reason it comes to mind is a wonderful retreat I attended last week at St. Meinrad. The retreat came out of Abbot Kurt’s longtime practices of the form of prayer known as lectio divina, a way to listen to God so you can see what God is saying. The Gospel for A Cycle today is the story of Jesus and Bartimaeus, a man Jesus healed of blindness. I believe that the practice of lectio divina can and does heal spiritual blindness. My goal today is to get you to try it.
What is lectio divina?
Literally, lectio divina means “holy reading.” It is a method for prayer that is intended to let God speak to each and every person, matching exactly who and how and where they are on their faith journey on a particular day. It is God present to YOU today to feed you as He fed the Israelites in the desert on their journey. He gave them bread and meat. Just as God makes Himself available to us every day through the Eucharist (his bread), He also makes Himself available to us every day through holy reading (meat). The prime source of content for holy reading is Scripture, though other profound books, nature, art, and events in life can also provide the content.
Jesus and Bartimaeus
For today’s reflection, I’m going to invite you to take some part of one of the readings and do lectio with it. I am going to use some of the last verses of the story of Bartimaeus. These are the verses from Cycle A readings. Bartimaeus was born blind. Jesus healed him, and his troubles begin. Because he now believes in Jesus, he is grilled by religious authorities, not quite supported even by his parents, and thrown out of the synagogue. We pick up the story there.
When Jesus heard that they had thrown him out,
he found him and said, “And do you believe in the Son of Man?”
He answered and said,
“Who is he, sir, that I may believe in him?”
Jesus said to him,
“You have seen him,
the one speaking with you is he.”
He said,
“I do believe, Lord,” and he worshiped him.
What follows now is how I used the lectio divina prayer practice with this Scripture. My hope is that as you see it, you also see how you can do it and that you will try it to as a way to listen with the ear of your heart.
You, of course, will notice something different from what I noticed, because lectio divina lets God speak to you just where you are. If you, like me, often survey what other people have written about daily or Sunday readings and find that, some days, nobody says what you need–that may well be a sign that it is time to “learn to fish” through lectio divina. What follows here is not “the right thing” to get from today’s readings. It is an example of one of many truths God has ready for you and others.
Lectio (Reading) Acquaintanceship
- Read the Scripture
- Gather the facts
- “Listen” to God’s word
- “What word/phrase speaks to you?”
- Allow 1-2 minutes of quiet time
Read slowly—maybe even out loud. Where is your attention drawn? See a detail that fascinates you today. Or attend to an emotional response to some word or phrase. Or notice something stands out, as if it is printed in bold print.
That is where God speaks to you today. For me, today, it is “he found him.”
Meditatio (Meditate) Friendliness
- Read the Scripture again
- Let Jesus speak to you.
- Reflect on the message.
- “What is God saying to you?”
- Allow 3-4 minutes of quiet time
Sometimes the second time through a different phrase jumps out. Not today. I reflect. I recall yesterday when we read Pope Francis’ Act of Consecration of Russia, Ukraine, and the world to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. The words yesterday touched me, especially in the first page of the prayer. I was deeply aware of how hungry I have been to put the war across the world in the context of worldwide fear and selfishness. I felt found by God when I prayed it yesterday. Even though I had to face myself and I saw I am not innocent, it was God who found me in those words and I felt an embrace of both truth and mercy (as the Prodigal Son feels today in the Cycle C Gospel). I thought, too, of a visit I made yesterday to a person who lives near me who can no longer attend mass. She is my neighbor, I had seen her at mass, I knew her name, but I had never had a real conversation with her. I honestly would not have visited her, except the students at school had created care bags to some of our oldest members. A teacher asked me to help deliver. We had a lovely visit. I got to know her well enough in an hour that I very much want to visit again. I hope to take communion to her now. All these thoughts lead me to, “What is God saying to me?”
Oratio (Prayer) Friendship
- Read the Scripture again
- Let your heart respond to God
- Trust God enough to become emotionally involved
- “What do you want to say to God?”
- Allow 4-5 minutes of quiet time
Meditatio and Oratio run together for me. But, generally, this is what my head and heart say to the thoughts that have come. Today it is gratitude for the visit with my neighbor. Making communion calls was a great joy for me before covid. It has been on-again, off-again during covid. Some of my communicants died—of covid or other causes. I’ve been anxious, worried about possibly carrying an infection. Short visits with masks lose something. I have, more times that I would like, decided not to go. I have even thought of giving up carebound communion ministry. As I prayed, I faced all that—and was glad that God found me. I was glad, too, that yesterday I found my neighbor!
I was glad God found me where I was with the Consecration of Russia prayer and the experience of saying it aloud with 50 or more others in my parish. That experience was healing for me. It was good to pray from the position of one also in need. I had a solidarity that I have lacked in my prayers over previous days.
Contemplatio (Contemplation) Union of Life
- Read the Scripture a final time
- Surrender to God’s Presence.
- Rest in God beyond concepts, feelings, and particular acts.
- Allow 5-10 minutes of quiet time.
This is the part of Lectio that is sometimes hard for me. I must admit that when it is, I pull from my charismatic side and sing or listen to a worship song. That helps me then simply rest in God, sometimes through the song, sometimes in the quiet after.
Prayer
Conclude with an Our Father…. The steps and process of lectio divina used here come from an Oblate prayer card from St. Meinrad. I hope this example invites you to try this form of listening to God so you can see what God is saying to you today.
