Affections and Affective Prayer

[Doc_Thunder]

I’m reading a book called “The Ways of Mental Prayer” by Vitalis Lehodey. It was written in the early 20th century and discusses - what else - mental prayer.

The author presents a number of activities, or steps, that he recommends we should go through in order to advance spiritually and make our prayers more effective. For example, when performing mental prayer he suggests that after reccollecting ourselves in the presence of God, we move on to considerations (meditation on a Holy topic or virtue). These considerations should move us to affections which will ultimately lead to a firm resolution of some sort.

I enjoy the book and am getting a lot out of it. However, I don’t quite grasp what the author means by “affections”. I have seen this same word used by other mystical writers, particularly those from medieval times, also without definition. My guess is that they are talking about a movement of the soul, love or longing, towards God, but I’m not sure.

There is supposedly another level of prayer beyond mental prayer called affective prayer. I am not sure what this means either ( I have not gotten that far in the book yet).

Can anyone here enlighten me as to what these writers mean when they use the terms “affection” and “affective prayer”?

 

[Monica4316]

I have the same book and its amazing here’s my understanding and what I was taught in our parish catechism class…

Mental prayer is divided into meditation and contemplation. Contemplation can be acquired or infused, which you’ll get to later in the book.

Affective prayer is a stage in mental prayer when intellectual considerations are replaced by ‘affections’. From what I understand yes they are movements of the soul to love God and can include acts of trust, humility, etc. They are in the will though they can affect the feelings.

Affections can follow considerations, as you said, or there’s a time when they predominate and the person may not be even able to make intellectual meditations. This is the stage of affective prayer and in that part, I think the author also describes what affections are if I’m not mistaken.

Hope that helps!

 

[Doc_Thunder]

Thanks! Glad to know I’m on the right track.

I agree, great book. It’s dense with spiritual truths and prayer advice, so I’m reading it slowly, only a couple of pages each day.

Though the author offers a step by step model of mental prayer, I’m finding that I am actually becoming less rigid with my process and the words I use. This, in turn, seems to be drawing more and more of my prayers from the heart.

Also, I find that I am focussing, perhaps for the first time, on the development of virtues which is having a monumentally positive impact on my life in many ways.

 

[Monica4316]

The typical advice I have read in these books is that the rigid process is good in the beginning, but should be changed once it no longer ‘works’. Eventually mental prayer becomes less rigid, and then more infused