In the midst of preparing notes for a teaching stint in a local church I have to examine one more time what I think and believe prayer to be, or rather, not what I think but what does THE TRUTH say about it.
Every time I do this I am challenged to change my thinking in some area or another. At the very least my understanding is deepened by this challenge with the hope that those on the receiving end are going to benefit in some way!
In the preparation and my personal reading I came across a gem from Thomas Merton, a Trappist monk with a great gift of communciation that helps us understand the monastic life of prayer, its benefits and its trials. So here, in case it blesses someone else in their search, is a quote from "The Sign of Jonas" by Thomas Merton.
"Contemplative prayer is the recognition that we are the sons of God, and experience of who He is, andof His love for us, flowing from the operation of that love in us. Contemplative prayer is the voice of the Spirit crying out in us 'Abba, Pater'. In all valid prayer it is the Holy Ghost who prays in us: but in the graces of contemplation He makes us realize at least obscurely that it is He who is praying in us with a love too deep and too secret for us to comprehend. And we exult in the union of our voice with His voice, and our soul springs up to the Father, through the Son, having become one flame with the Flame of their Spirit. The Holy Ghost is the soul of the Church and it is to His presence in us that is attributed the sanctity of each one of the elect. He prays in us now as the Soul of the Church and now as the life of our own soul - but the distinction is only real in the external order of things. Interiorly, whether our prayer be private or public it is the same Spirit praying in us: He is really touching different strings of the same instrument.
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