Simple silence of a plain white wall

Wednesday, April 24, 2024

(click here to listen to or read today’s scriptures)

Simple silence of a plain white wall

Whoever sees me sees the one who sent me. I came into the world as light, so that everyone who believes in me might not remain in darkness.

Jesus the Son, Jesus the sun. Light in the darkness. When I close my eyes and pray, listening and watching for Jesus, much more light fills my mind than when I look elsewhere.

Sitting in my cluttered bedroom this afternoon I realized that all my books and paintings and boxes and bags require some measure of my mind, just to look at them without thinking. These are valuable, but not valuable enough to keep my mind busy, not when I’d rather quiet that mind and invite the light of Jesus.

So I close my eyes. And I remember the quiet, nearly empty cells I’ve stayed in for a few days at a time, at retreat centers like Cardinal Stritch in Illinois, or Gethsemani in Kentucky, or Saint Meinrad in Indiana. In those unadorned rooms I could breathe.

I will do my best to make my bedroom one of those monkish cells. Why not? Most of what I have in there can go elsewhere, or be given away.

There’s another retreat center where I’ve visited but never stayed – Loose Leaf Hollow outside Bardstown, Kentucky. Joe Zarantanello is the host and retreatmaster. He is a devotee of Thomas Merton and all Merton stood for while Merton was a monk for 27 years down the road at the Abbey of Gethsemani. Each week Mr. Joe sends a poem out to his friends which he calls, “Monday Morning Musings.” This week he wrote about the first and second halves of life:

(Acts 12, Psalm 67, John 8, John 12)

(posted at www.davesandel.net)

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