S
springbreeze
Guest
Dear friends
A meditation for those who might like to have a read at it
**Can I Practice Mental Prayer?!
By the late Father Kilian McGowan, C.P. Used with permission, from the Passionist Priests, to help spiritually guide the layman.
Everyone can practice mental prayer-and he should! Mental prayer is for stenographers as well as religious sisters, for parents as well as priests, for workers in white collars or blue. Mental prayer is for anyone willing to pay the price of having a mind and heart like that of our Lord. And don’t let the word scare you-it’s not as hard as it looks.
Mental prayer is a lifting up of your mind and heart to God in loving conversation. It calls for a few simple acts of our mind and heart. Its chief purpose is to form a framework for personalized heart-to-heart conversation with Christ. It is a spiritual process that cultivates and safeguards your conversation with God.
In this conversation, you talk to God using the thoughts of your own mind and sentiments of your own heart. Putting your missal or your prayer-book aside, you approach and speak to God with the thoughts and actions of your own soul.
Mental prayer, then, is that interior prayer when you recall to your memory the words and deeds of our Blessed Lord-when your mind prayerfully reflects on these mysteries-and when your heart bursts forth in its own expressions of love, gratitude and sorrow. Sometimes, you’ll use words in your conversation, and at other times you’ll be wordless. But, through it all, your soul is in contact with your God.
Some find the different terms “Mental Prayer” and “Meditation” rather confusing. Meditation is actually only one of the parts of mental prayer. It is the thinking part of this conversation, and is the build-up for the true prayer. You are meditating, for example, when you prayerfully reflect upon the sufferings of Christ crucified as depicted on the Way of the Cross. But when your heart begins expressing to God its gratitude, it’s sorrow for sin, etc. - then you are actually praying!
Thus, you can see that mental prayer is different from vocal prayer, which uses such patterns of prayer as the “Our Father” and the “Hail Mary” - wonderful and highly indulgenced as they are. Naturally, our mind and heart also play a part in vocal prayer else they would not be prayers at all. But, in vocal prayer we use the formulas of someone else, whereas in mental prayer we use our own words. If your prayer-life is limited to merely vocal prayer-essential as it is - there is danger that your contact may be superficial. The more intimate contact with the Mind and Heart of Christ-that is the special dividend of mental prayer-may never be achieved. It’s imperative to keep in close union with our Lord at all times and throughout all the stages of the spiritual combat. It is mental prayer that solidifies and intensifies this union.
In mental prayer you stand in the Presence of God and expose your mind, heart and soul. And during that spiritual encounter with the Godhead, Christ gradually transforms the thoughts, desires and affections of your soul into the likeness of His very own. It’s no wonder then that it causes an amazing change in the life of the one praying.
It’s no wonder either that those who are afraid to face God-or themselves-never dare to pray like this!**
God Bless you and much love and peace to you
Teresa
A meditation for those who might like to have a read at it
**Can I Practice Mental Prayer?!
By the late Father Kilian McGowan, C.P. Used with permission, from the Passionist Priests, to help spiritually guide the layman.
Everyone can practice mental prayer-and he should! Mental prayer is for stenographers as well as religious sisters, for parents as well as priests, for workers in white collars or blue. Mental prayer is for anyone willing to pay the price of having a mind and heart like that of our Lord. And don’t let the word scare you-it’s not as hard as it looks.
Mental prayer is a lifting up of your mind and heart to God in loving conversation. It calls for a few simple acts of our mind and heart. Its chief purpose is to form a framework for personalized heart-to-heart conversation with Christ. It is a spiritual process that cultivates and safeguards your conversation with God.
In this conversation, you talk to God using the thoughts of your own mind and sentiments of your own heart. Putting your missal or your prayer-book aside, you approach and speak to God with the thoughts and actions of your own soul.
Mental prayer, then, is that interior prayer when you recall to your memory the words and deeds of our Blessed Lord-when your mind prayerfully reflects on these mysteries-and when your heart bursts forth in its own expressions of love, gratitude and sorrow. Sometimes, you’ll use words in your conversation, and at other times you’ll be wordless. But, through it all, your soul is in contact with your God.
Some find the different terms “Mental Prayer” and “Meditation” rather confusing. Meditation is actually only one of the parts of mental prayer. It is the thinking part of this conversation, and is the build-up for the true prayer. You are meditating, for example, when you prayerfully reflect upon the sufferings of Christ crucified as depicted on the Way of the Cross. But when your heart begins expressing to God its gratitude, it’s sorrow for sin, etc. - then you are actually praying!
Thus, you can see that mental prayer is different from vocal prayer, which uses such patterns of prayer as the “Our Father” and the “Hail Mary” - wonderful and highly indulgenced as they are. Naturally, our mind and heart also play a part in vocal prayer else they would not be prayers at all. But, in vocal prayer we use the formulas of someone else, whereas in mental prayer we use our own words. If your prayer-life is limited to merely vocal prayer-essential as it is - there is danger that your contact may be superficial. The more intimate contact with the Mind and Heart of Christ-that is the special dividend of mental prayer-may never be achieved. It’s imperative to keep in close union with our Lord at all times and throughout all the stages of the spiritual combat. It is mental prayer that solidifies and intensifies this union.
In mental prayer you stand in the Presence of God and expose your mind, heart and soul. And during that spiritual encounter with the Godhead, Christ gradually transforms the thoughts, desires and affections of your soul into the likeness of His very own. It’s no wonder then that it causes an amazing change in the life of the one praying.
It’s no wonder either that those who are afraid to face God-or themselves-never dare to pray like this!**
God Bless you and much love and peace to you
Teresa