Transcript of Abbot Clement
=s Talk on Monday, May 9, 2005Because we are not married and don
=t have children we don=t have the kinds of problems and difficulties that married life entails. Responsibility for raising children today is not easy and we don=t suffer the kinds of problems that parents have to deal with. Some can be rather devastating. Especially when the teenage level of suicide is up. It must be very hard for parents to deal with these things.Nevertheless the Lord moves us toward the kingdom. Therefore the journey for us is still, like for everyone else, a question of the cross. Where
=s the cross in our life? It depends on each individual. It=s not all the same, but surely the fact is the Lord leads us to the desert. The Lord leads us to a journey of some kind of dryness, maybe darkness, maybe a struggle with things we thought we were able to conquer and we find we can=t conquer them on our own. Sooner or later we come to realize this and we see that the Lord is really leading us deeper through this very difficulty.St. John of the Cross tells us that if we are really going to be serious about following Christ then we must cling to him and not to our feelings. That
=s the first kind of renunciation that is rather universal in a number of senses, but especially in the sense that all our life we have to make sure that it=s not our feelings that are running our life. So what do we do? How do we really unfold this question of clinging to Jesus and not our feelings?One of the first things we have access to is our spiritual director. But that presupposes that we have a director who can challenge our behavior and it presupposes that we
=re open enough to that spiritual director to talk about the behaviors of our lives and what really moves us so that the director can say, Athat doesn't sound like a Christ-like action. That sounds like selfishness. Or that sounds like you=re looking for comfort.@ So the spiritual director is an asset but it requires what I call a reality check. A spiritual director should keep you on the journey. He should be knowledgeable enough to show you the behaviors you reiterate or talk about are or are not in conformity to the imitation of Jesus.The second thing we have is scripture and theology. That is, we need the deeper faith and we need the scriptures to remind us of the truth of our faith especially in the journey when things are getting difficult because we don
=t see. St. John of the Cross reminds us that "we go to the way we do not know by a way we do not know". Therefore we must live by faith. So one has to pick and develop or deepen ones theology and ones grasp of scripture. For myself, one of the things I use when I get in darkness and I don=t seem to get anywhere is I remind Jesus that he=s the Savior. That there=s nothing in this world that he cannot save us from. That is one of my themes it=s not the only one, but it=s one that I find a very rock-like place that I can go to when I=m in total darkness.In scripture you can pick different passages that help you at these times. Another one that I kind of like was when Jesus said: "Heaven and earth will pass away but my words will not pass away". So I remind him of a word of his mercy or something and remind him that his word will not pass away. So you have to pick your own modes and titles and insights into the presence of Jesus to enable you to walk the journey in these moments.
Another one is what the Rule says what you do with temptation, you gather it and throw it at the feet of Jesus. Learning how to pray at the time of darkness and apparent loneliness or nothing seems to be working or being stuck it
=s an important growth in the spiritual life and therefore to learn how to pray at those times is crucial.Last, but not least, we have the lives of people who have gone before us. The lives of saints who confer that the journey of the Cross is indeed the path to the fullness of life. We need to read them as we do at noon prayer, so that we would see that there are many nuances, and many different kinds of suffering, and many different kinds of things we may have to pass through and therefore find in them the kind of confirmation, guidance, and strength we may need. And maybe simply the need to see that we need to be encouraged to continue the struggle.
It
=s very interesting to me, for instance, in the life of Fr. Walter Ciszek, S. J., in his book AHe Leadth Me@, in the chapter on humility he talks about how long it took him to really sense that God was guiding his life and what it took for him to surrender. He had done an awful lot of good things and in and through all those difficulties slowly by degrees the Lord taught him how to surrender his life and the Lord transformed him. In his old age he was a very peaceful, loving, and life-giving presence.