Retreat Notes for Day 1
Monday, February 22, 2010

Retreat Readings
Readings of the day (optional)
Thoughts from Where Your Treasure Is...
 
Where We Are

Reflection: How often do we think "When the kids are grown..."; "When I get a better job..."; "When I finish school..."; "When I am feeling better..." implying that life is on hold until we get there. Certainly we need to look ahead, but when we see what we are doing now only in light of the future, we miss a significant part of the picture. We can be so driven that we lose sight of the beauty and meaning of the present moment.

Sharing: You are invited to look at your own experience, responding to one or another of the following:

  • I'm looking forward to the day when...
  • In the midst of being busy, who or what helps me focus on the present moment?
  • A time when I discovered joy or meaning in an ordinary moment was...
  • Looking back, I realize that by being so caught up planning for the future I missed...
  • A routine task that helps me to focus on the present is...
  • A time when the significance of the moment broke through my busyness was...

From Our Tradition:

  • from Brother Lawrence:
    The time of business does not with me differ from the time of prayer; and in the noise and clatter of my kitchen, while several persons are at the same time calling for different things, I possess God in as great tranquility as if I were upon my knees at the blessed sacrament. (The Practice of the Presence of God, Fourth Conversation)
  • from Brother Lawrence:
    Pray remember what I have recommended to you, which is, to think often on God, by day, by night, in your business, and even in your diversions. He is always near you and with you; leave Him not alone. You would think it rude to leave a friend alone who came to visit you; why, then, must God be neglected? (The Practice of the Presence of God, Tenth Letter)
  • from Karl Rahner:
    If it's true that I can lose You in everything, it also must be true that I can find You in everything. . . . Thus I must seek you in all things. If every day is "everyday", then every day is Your day and every hour is the hour of Your grace. (Prayers for a Lifetime, sec. 3)

Focus:
We can be tempted to assume that we can only meet God in a future heaven, a set-apart place, or on our knees. Jesus came to proclaim that the Kingdom of God is here and now, within us and among us. God is present in every moment and every place; we are the ones who are not aware. It is in the events of our everyday lives that we encounter God.
Reading 1: Psalm 139:1-18 (NAB)

LORD, you have probed me, you know me: you know when I sit and stand; you understand my thoughts from afar. My travels and my rest you mark; with all my ways you are familiar. Even before a word is on my tongue, LORD, you know it all. Behind and before you encircle me and rest your hand upon me. Such knowledge is beyond me, far too lofty for me to reach.

Where can I hide from your spirit? From your presence, where can I flee? If I ascend to the heavens, you are there; if I lie down in Sheol, you are there too. If I fly with the wings of dawn and alight beyond the sea, Even there your hand will guide me, your right hand hold me fast. If I say, “Surely darkness shall hide me, and night shall be my light” — Darkness is not dark for you, and night shines as the day. Darkness and light are but one.

You formed my inmost being; you knit me in my mother’s womb. I praise you, so wonderfully you made me; wonderful are your works! My very self you knew; my bones were not hidden from you, When I was being made in secret, fashioned as in the depths of the earth. Your eyes foresaw my actions; in your book all are written down; my days were shaped, before one came to be. How precious to me are your designs, O God; how vast the sum of them! Were I to count, they would outnumber the sands; to finish, I would need eternity.

Reading 2: Isaiah 43:1-7 (NAB)

"But now, thus says the LORD, who created you, O Jacob, and formed you, O Israel: Fear not, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name: you are mine. When you pass through the water, I will be with you; in the rivers you shall not drown. When you walk through fire, you shall not be burned; the flames shall not consume you. For I am the LORD, your God, the Holy One of Israel, your savior.

I give Egypt as your ransom, Ethiopia and Seba in return for you. Because you are precious in my eyes and glorious, and because I love you, I give men in return for you and peoples in exchange for your life. Fear not, for I am with you; from the east I will bring back your descendants, from the west I will gather you. I will say to the north: Give them up! and to the south: Hold not back! Bring back my sons from afar, and my daughters from the ends of the earth: Everyone who is named as mine, whom I created for my glory, whom I formed and made."

Reading 3: Ephesians 1:3-14 (NAB)

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavens, as he chose us in him, before the foundation of the world, to be holy and without blemish before him. In love he destined us for adoption to himself through Jesus Christ, in accord with the favor of his will, for the praise of the glory of his grace that he granted us in the beloved.

In him we have redemption by his blood, the forgiveness of transgressions, in accord with the riches of his grace that he lavished upon us. In all wisdom and insight, he has made known to us the mystery of his will in accord with his favor that he set forth in him as a plan for the fullness of times, to sum up all things in Christ, in heaven and on earth.

In him we were also chosen, destined in accord with the purpose of the one who accomplishes all things according to the intention of his will, so that we might exist for the praise of his glory, we who first hoped in Christ. In him you also, who have heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and have believed in him, were sealed with the promised holy Spirit, which is the first installment of our inheritance toward redemption as God’s possession, to the praise of his glory.