12 — SEEKING GOD IN PRAYER

Presence of God. — I leave every occupation and earthly care and recollect myself in the little heaven of my soul to place myself in intimate contact with God.

Meditation

1 — “When you want to pray, enter into your room, shut the door, and pray to your Father in secret” (Mt. 6, 6).

Exterior solitude, materially withdrawing from noise, from occupations and preoccupations of this life, is a great means—indeed, at least up to a certain point, an indispensable means—for a serious interior life.

Every rule of religious life, even that of a simple secular institute, prescribes fixed hours of prayer, in which one must know how decisively to cut off every occupation and withdraw into solitude to restore the spirit in a more direct and more intense contact with God.

Without these “pauses of waiting,” it is a true illusion to claim to live not only a serious, but even the most elementary interior life.

Every activity, however important and urgent, must therefore be suspended at the proper time in order to concentrate all strength in the supreme activity of prayer. These hours are sacred. And a soul consecrated to God cannot, on its own initiative, take from them even the smallest part, under penalty of seeing its spiritual life grow sad. Here the great word of Jesus applies: “Seek first the kingdom of God” (Mt. 6, 33), and this kingdom, by now we know, is within us; to find it we have absolute need of these moments of recollection, of solitude, of total withdrawal from creatures, affairs, occupations. In these moments we can and must effectively “go out” from all things, “withdraw” from all creatures to seek God hidden in us.

2 — To the Samaritan woman who asks in what place one should adore God, Jesus answers: “God is spirit: and those who adore Him must adore Him in spirit and truth” (Jn. 4, 24). The divine Master makes us understand that, even more than the “place” in which to pray, the interior spirit is necessary, since only from it can true “adoration” of God, who is “spirit” and truth, spring forth. Although retreat and material solitude have great importance for prayer, they would not be sufficient if they were not accompanied by interior recollection.

St. John of the Cross says: “...having shut the door behind you, that is, having closed the will to every thing, you will pray in hiddenness to your Father” (C. 1, 9).

It is not only a matter of shutting the material door of one’s room; one must close the will to every thing; that is, the Saint says again, close “all your faculties to any creature.”

To find God in prayer, it is necessary to begin it with this decisive act of the will: set aside every thing, every care and human preoccupation in order to concentrate the powers of the soul on God alone.

St. Teresa of Jesus exhorts: “If from our time we resolve to consecrate a little to God in prayer, let us give ourselves to Him completely, free from every earthly thought; let us consecrate that time to Him generously, resolved not to take it back from Him, despite trials, contradictions, and dryness” (Way, 23, 2).

Many times we give prayer the material time, but we do not give the heart, which remains wholly occupied by earthly concerns; we withdraw into chapel or room, but we do not know how to withdraw from the thoughts and cares of life, and therefore we cannot reach the intimate interior hiding place where God conceals Himself.

Colloquy

My God, teach me to seek You in prayer, to place my heart in contact with Yours, to know how to withdraw not only materially but also spiritually from all the things of this earth. How many times I am on my knees, but my spirit wanders along the roads of the world!

And You are here, O Most Holy Trinity, in the depths of my soul, here to manifest Yourself to me in the intimacy of prayer; You are here to draw me into the secret hiding place where You conceal Yourself, but You do not do so because my spirit remains outside, still immersed in things and human concerns.

Even if, given my native weakness and the deficiencies of my poor human nature, it is not always possible for me to stop the movement of thought, it is always possible for me to seek You with the heart, with the will. And this is precisely what You ask of me.

Make me understand how the essence of prayer “does not lie in thinking much, but in loving much” (T.G. M. IV, 1, 7). Help me to free my heart from creatures, so that in prayer I may freely employ it in seeking and loving You alone. Lord, grant that my will may be resolved to leave everything in order to belong to You alone: give me strength to resist, to continue seeking You despite tormenting wanderings of thought, dryness, impotence... “The kingdom of heaven is won by force” (Mt. 11, 12), and with this word, O my God, You tell me that even to conquer that kingdom of heaven which is within me, that is, to find You in me, it is necessary that I do violence to myself.

When You Yourself, O Lord, draw me, then every difficulty disappears; but when You hide Yourself, then my poor mind goes about restless, not knowing where to take hold, and every slightest call or remembrance of creatures is enough to distract it. O my God, come and fix my mind and my heart in You!

“O my God, Trinity whom I adore, help me to forget myself completely so as to establish myself in You, immobile and tranquil, as if my soul were already in eternity! May nothing disturb my peace, nor draw me out of You, O my Unchangeable One, but may each instant carry me deeper into the depth of Your mystery! Pacify my soul, make it Your heaven, Your beloved dwelling and the place of Your rest: may I never leave You there alone, but may I be there all entire, ever awake in faith, ever adoring You, wholly abandoned to Your creative action” (E.T. El.).