Catholic Hermit: A Hermit's Redemption

Today, being the Second Sunday in Advent and also December 8, is the vigil of the solemnity of the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin Mary.  It also is the day celebrating a hermit, new to me:  St. Patapios of 4th c. Thebes.  I'm asking intercessions of this hermit, and as ever, of the Blessed Virgin Mary.  They know my needs and the prayers of my heart, and I know their prayers already are helping.

Waking in the morning is increasingly difficult for me, with this amount of pain.  I also am grieving losses, and I recognize the emptying out as a needful aspect for my mind, heart, and soul; yet it feels as if being crushed and then also squeezed of whatever remnants remain of what was or is my self.  

As for the post I wrote yesterday, of the person who yet again derided in her blog post, and has been an on-going discrediting of my validity as a consecrated Catholic hermit, her action is not lost on me as a marvelous opportunity in penance.  I tell the Lord that I realize such a type of persecution is deserved for I had myself written of others, and described situations of which those persons could and did feel persecuted.  I suppose a difference is in my not revealing identifiable information; but of course the persons, if they located my site, could see themselves in my thoughts and feelings.   I also apologized, asked God's forgiveness, repented with remorse, and once more strive to do as Jesus says: "go and sin no more" (John 8:11).

Anyone of us could see aspects of ourselves in parts of what is shared; and I pray that even in this post, the sense of being crushed and then squeezed to the last bit of breath is also relatable, or might be at some point in some reader's temporal life.  And by sharing the depth of loss, of grieving that is intertwined with tremendous suffering of body and soul, perhaps the Lord will help me through writing and sharing, the way to keep going in what is an increasingly narrowed path and series of portals--each one smaller and more difficult to squeeze through other than by my very being needfully crushed and squeezed to a point of total insignificance.

In this wrung out nothingness, not only the mind and heart, but the very soul weeps.  So incredibly difficult it is to not reach out to those I've hurt and wronged in ways I don't even know what it is, or was, other than bits of this and that and intermingled with remnants of what I think it might be or had been.  How many times must one apologize and ask forgiveness?

Once is enough, although even if seventy-times-seven we offer our mea culpas, forgiveness is the Lord's to grant.  Once is enough for God.  And only God is sure to forgive in a way that forgets and continues to love and be with us, always.  And only saints--highly evolved souls--are able to forgive and forget and continue to love and be with others because such souls have accepted, have agreed to, being crushed and squeezed out enough to the nothingness that begets the indwelling and infilling of His Real Presence.

I pray this for my being, that the Lord crush and squeeze to whatever more extent needed and purposeful to my redemption in Christ.  In this process, I can rejoice in the losses which become praises; and I trust all the more in the Holy Trinity to shelter what is of nothing remaining other than breath and heartbeat.

I must simply keep going for the sake of His Real Presence in me and His allowing my soul to be in Him.  Only in Christ will I endure; only His Real Presence can encourage me by His love and forgiveness, in His reality of purpose and meaning.  

What brought my crushed soul through the waking darkness, yet again this morning, were the words of a saint of long ago, named Augustine.  The Catechism of the Catholic Church quotes what he wrote:  "Man is made to live in communion with God in whom he finds happiness:  When I am completely united to You, there will be no more sorrow or trials; entirely full of you, my life will be complete (St. Augustine, Confessions, 10, 28, 39: PL 32, 795).

Next I turn to Christ in His Living Word.  Another saint, a sinner, repentant, who kept going after being crushed and squeezed out, and fully forgiven by Christ writes of his thoughts and experiences and of the triumph of Christ.  Paul, whose words in the Letter to the Romans, 15:4-6, fill in what the losses could never begin to revive, offers these inspired thoughts to me, to each of us, bereft of all but His Real Presence:

"Brothers and sisters:
Whatever was written previously was written for our instruction,
that by endurance and by the encouragement of the Scriptures
we might have hope.
May the God of endurance and encouragement
grant you to think in harmony with one another,
in keeping with Christ Jesus,
that with one accord you may with one voice
glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.

"Welcome one another, then, as Christ welcomed you,
for the glory of God...."

And who does such as a crushed and squeezed nothing soul living out what remains of temporal life--who does such as a nothingness welcome, in reality?  This nothing consecrated Catholic hermit welcomes and thinks in harmony, and with one accord with one silent voice, glorifies God the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ:  all souls yet living on this earth and those living in the eternity of what is beyond temporal suffering and imperfection of mortal existence.

This nothing of my self welcomes all, despite those unwilling, unable, not tangibly present.  This nothing crushed and squeezed out, between worlds, aligns and is aware of other presences, such as John the Baptist who reminds me of his great warmth for me as one who is different and knows what it means to be different, yet to simply keep going. 

John, who cries out as one voice of those of us in the bewildering wilderness of our nothingness:

"Prepare the way of the Lord,
make straight his paths." (Mt. 1:3).

Or the voice of the prophet Isaiah who foretold John the Baptist's words to all those crushed and squeezed out--nothingness awaiting and desiring union in Christ:
"Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand!" (Mt. 1:2).

John, another nothingness as one who agreed to and accepted being crushed and squeezed out so as to be filled in with Christ, exemplifies the desert way of the hermit soul.  "John wore clothing made of camel's hair and had a leather belt around his waist.  His food was locusts and wild honey"  (Mt. 3:5). 

All the people of Jersusalem and all Judea and the entire area around the Jordan River were at that time were going out to seek John the Baptist, to be baptized by him in the river--"as they acknowledged their sins." (Mt. 3:6).

"'Even now the ax lies at the root of the trees.
Therefore every tree that does not bear good fruit
will be cut down and thrown into the fire.
I am baptizing you with water, for repentance,
but the one who is coming after me is mightier than I.
I am not worthy to carry his sandals.
He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.
His winnowing fan is in his hand.
He will clear His threshing floor
and gather His wheat into His barn,
but the chaff He will burn with unquenchable fire'" (Mt. 3:7-12).

Such is the way, the path present and forward, of the crushed and squeezed out, the nothing mind, heart, and soul.  While the bodily pains bearing the sorrows and sufferings of temporal life sins and imperfections, a cross of many crosses, the nothing mind, heart, and soul of this nothing consecrated Catholic hermit continues on, awaiting the indwelling of the Holy Trinity, of the mystical yet quite Real Presence of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

The one family member nearby in locale has called.  I could not answer for must prudently be in better custody of the bodily pain that riverlike overflows in emotional and mental tributaries.  What can I offer if am not in possession of my temporal thoughts and emotions, of prayerful custody over the pain?  My nothingness must be within Christ's holiness of loving listening and response in order to welcome in one accord of the holy, unseen others present: for the glory of God!

I praise God for the blessings of what temporal means of helping subdue pain, and of knowing that each moment is blessed with His love and companionship, and that the earthly seasons that seem to cause more pain will pass.  This is Advent, after all, and a time of great preparation and waiting with expectation of Christ's coming!

Await redemption of this nothing consecrated Catholic hermit, of a suffering human being, of a soul!

God bless His Real Presence in us!

Catholic Hermit: Dear God in Heaven

No wonder the clerk at the nearby grocery (1.5 or so miles) started bagging for me and called a man to come lift and take me to my truck, Precious Blood.  I was fading rapidly from my first-effort at driving and getting a few groceries.  When I got back to hermitage, I saw in the mirror a face worse than I've ever seen--white with deeply sunk eyes, reddish gray around the sockets.  

I cannot prepare anything to eat so got crackers and a slice of cheese, and thanks to a gift of a rapid water boiler, a cup of herbal tea. Had to take extra meds; am down now, but pain knifing.  Driving home I could not get my truck lights to beam properly; was doing all to simply focus on following the next vehicle and get to where I could collapse on bed.  The light problem will resolve; probably something to do with the dead battery which has been replaced with new, thanks to yet another kindly neighbor.

Dear God in Heaven, this is quite horrible pain.  But coming home, praying for God's help as I needed help in way too hard to describe in what pain does to a person, I realized I am fine with it, for I consider that my sins are maybe being burned as just due.  And when I in another post wrote that I would of course admit and accept whatever judgment when I die from this body and earth, as I confess and ask forgiveness each time I recognize my sins and flaws, I suppose I cannot for certain know how I will respond at some unknown, future point.  But I think and feel that I will readily confess and admit any and all sins and wrongdoings that I have not done en route, while traversing this path of life.

My intellect and will in the center of my soul, as well as my heart's desire to love God and do good, would have to undergo some change between now and then for me to veer from accepting my wrongs shown me by my angel, the Holy Spirit, others, and Jesus when He returns for me to take me with Him and judges all aspects of my life and soul while on earth.

If an unconfessed mortal sin, or a sin I will not admit to--then the fires of hell await.  I tell you, while I was physically and mentally fading at the check out, and the checker Janet so alert and giving help and calling for help, and then in the short but agonizing drive back to Solus Deus, my body felt as if being already in the fires of hell.  The pulsating knife in a certain area of my spine continues, but thankfully it will subside in time.

And on another note, while on the walk today, I found myself praying the Jesus Prayer.  Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on me, a sinner.  (Sometimes when I've prayed this prayer I include after Lord Jesus Christ...the words, Son of the Living God...have mercy on me, a sinner.  Just another version of this prayer of origin in the 5th c. Egyptian desert fathers' and mothers' repeated oration.)

While praying as I walked, repeating the words, I had to laugh--for I realized that it could be similar to the man's story experience from repetitive focusing and following the intake and outflow of his breath which after many hours, brought him to a point of transcending physical pain.  (Wrote of this in previous posts, in addition to my working through the pondering.) 

That connection made, or at least the thought of a similarity of repetitive, rhythmic focus, brought reminder of the book The Way of the Pilgrim which relates the story of an 18th c [I think that the time period of the holy seeker] Russian pilgrim/hermit who passed through various phases of the spiritual life in his wanderings, detachment from the world, and also praying without ceasing, the Jesus Prayer.

Of course, while I found the similarity in repetitive thought, then heart, then soul focus between Randall's breathing and my praying the Jesus Prayer while walking, or the desert fathers and mothers praying that prayer or shortened version of Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on me,  I also reflected upon obvious differences.  

Breath as opposed to words, focusing on breathing compared to focusing on Jesus being God and us being sinners--but at some point in the Jesus Prayer, the words become wordless, the sentiment or truth settles into the heart, and at some point the mindless, effortless unity in Christ's mercy takes root in the soul.   Or such are the insights thus far.

Dear God in Heaven, with the first drive and grocery shopping attempt, this has been a poignant day of clear realities, of facing my hurtfulness of others, of admitting and accepting my sins and asking and accepting God's forgiveness.  It is a day of breakthrough in a written exercise asked of me by the man from parish who has developed the course including dreams, interpretation and discernment helpful in spiritual direction, based in Scripture and Carmelite spirituality, especially St. Teresa's dreams, visions, and locutions.  

I wrote it in email, and I dared also tell him he had come to me in a dream, and for fun, if he wanted, describe himself some; it is unlikely we will ever meet in person.  But I explained the dream, for on my walk and after, the Lord helped me grasp it is time for me to buckle down, to get all prongs plugged into the spiritual socket, into the Source of Power:  His Real Presence--God the Father, Jesus His Son, and the Holy Spirit.

Dear God in Heaven, a clear and pivotal day of reckoning and and also one of transformation by Christ's mercy and love.

God bless His Real Presence in us!

Catholic Hermit: St. Paul Says It Best

I know I remain rather fatigued, three months post-op, but also, it simply is pain that fatigues.  I've been praying for deeper conversions for self and others, plus praying asking favors of God for specific needs and desires of intentions people give to me.

Yet I continue to seek relief in escaping from the mind, from thoughts, from the fatigue.  I pray my guardian angel prod me to more walking, to even trying to tidy up a bit in the hermitage, as best I can, and to ponder these words of St. Paul, in his Letter to the Romans 7:18-25.  

St. Paul says it best, what I was trying to describe of this current phase, of what I'm feeling and of my wanting to do better in the Lord and for Him and others, yet continue to seek relief in escaping the mind and thoughts of that which seems heavy, laborious, or mentally challenging.

"Brothers and sisters:
I know that good does not dwell in me, that is, in my flesh.
The willing is ready at hand, but doing the good is not.
For I do not do the good I want,
but I do the evil I do not want.
Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it,
but sin that dwells in me.
So, then, I discover the principle
that when I want to do right, evil is at hand.
For I take delight in the law of God, in my inner self,
but I see in my members another principle
at war with the law of my mind,
taking me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members.
Miserable one that I am!
Who will deliver me from this mortal body?
Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord."

It is Saturday early afternoon.  I will myself by the grace of God to rise, use the energy He gives me to change into loose walking clothes, and go for a walk around the peaceful, quiet neighborhood.  I have thought about taking my rosary with me, but then I will not be as aware of the trees and turning leaves in this glorious autumn.  I will ask the Holy Mother of God to accompany me, for as I am in Christ and He is in me, His mother, our Mother the Virgin Mary, is with us, also, always facilitating deeper conversions to Christ.

In fact, in today's Mass Gospel alleluia, we read the verse taken from Ezekiel 33:11:

"I take no pleasure in the death of the wicked man, says the Lord,
but rather in his conversion that he may live."

I still might return after walking and doing whatever other before I am too tired or back pain too high--return to the icy pad on the bed and there distract myself with some temporal distraction.  I do not know.  Perhaps I will be able to read something less intense, such as St. Teresa of Avila's first volume of letters; the other day I brought the book from my bookcase and set it on nightstand.  

This is a beginning, a start.

A cousin called this morning.  Her kitchen repairs are complete from an upstairs' bathroom leak that caused the ceiling beneath to collapse.  Now she has the task of sorting through piles of "stuff" she's had stacked in her kitchen and on the table for a long time.  She asked me what is the name of the woman and the reality tv series that I'd heard of.  I told her, and then she expressed interest if there would be an audio book; my cousin realizes she'd like to have a tidier home, and this seems an enforced opportunity to try with taking on the kitchen while it is emptied out, with mounds of items from the kitchen piled in their living room.

I offered to do some research and send her some links to a possible audio book by the reality personality Marie Kondo.  I found a link to order the audio book involving the "tidying up" theme and pointers, plus there are some interviews on YouTube of the process of which the author and television personality has helped others plus made millions of dollars in the process.  

The book and televised techniques are a temporal success that is helpful to people who have lost control over material possessions.  The "clutter" of temporal items can reflect a cluttered mind, a cluttered spirit, a cluttered and out of control life.  The loss of control in our lives at whatever level of detail, are rooted in the very spiritual aspects that St. Paul writes of in the above Scripture selection.

We are trying.  Lord, we are seeking You and trying!

God bless His Real Presence in us!

Catholic Hermit Ponders Verse from Mark 9

"Everyone will be salted with fire."

I love this simple statement from Jesus.  It is yet another in the Living Word that somehow I've not "noticed" before--not in a heart-quickening way.

Today I will ponder the statement and the truth of Jesus' Word.  He does not mean only some people, but all of us will be salted with fire.

This morning the physical pain rises up in the body like fiery flames.  I've been pushing the body lately, trying to keep making progress with the manual labor here as my financial shelf life is nearing the end.  Yet probably the most significant increase of experiencing pain comes from ceasing pain medications other than an over-the-counter, strong aspirin in the morning and an occasional over-the-counter pain aid such as Tylenol or Aleve.

The new normal of pain experience and sensation takes much adaptation.  Distraction of thought and making the body get up and moving seems key to success.  But the pain yet has temporal effect in the body; more rest helps, and we will see if the pain sieges occur more frequently than when taking low dose prescription pain medication.

I can view that my body is salted with the fire of pain.  This morning I read a short article on the merits of suffering in that pain of all types can help make us more compassionate as well as empathic.  Compassion is being able to relate with those who suffer; empathy is being able to actually feel from experience what others suffer.

I consider that the greatest gifts of suffering have to do with the humility that comes from pain.  Suffering is an antidote to pride--true suffering.  Of course, a person could conceivably become proud in thinking he or she is a great and triumphant sufferer.  This pride, it would seem, is short-lived if the suffering is true and allowed by God.  Pain that is allowed by God knocks pride out of us.

Yesterday I did some electrical work.  The electrician had brought a "hot" wire into the attic garret room that this nothing consecrated Catholic hermit is transforming into a child's play room, a gabled, low-ceilinged, triangular prayer room, or a storage area.  From the one wire, there are two outlets, one light switch, and a light box installed.

First stipulation is to have the power to the wire, OFF.  For this double-check after flipping the breaker, one uses an electric wire tester.  Then it is a matter of bringing the main wire into a receptacle box that is nailed into a stud, then another wire is cut and brought up from that outlet box to a switch box that is also nailed to a stud.  Then another piece of wire is brought up from the switch box to a light fixture box that is also nailed into a stud.

From the original outlet box yet another wire can be strung through holes drilled in studs to go part-way around the room and through yet another socket box, nailed to a stud.  That done, I called the electrician who coached me and explained more concepts of electricity.  It all makes sense, once we are taught with explanation and can ask questions that are kindly answered.

Today I will begin the process of doing what is called a "pig tail" for the outlet box that has three lead wires coming into it or going out.  The black, white, and ground wires are stripped clean of sheathing at the ends, and the blacks, whites, and grounds are each twisted and capped with a "wire nut".  But in addition to each of those, an additional piece of wire is cut--a short piece--and the ends of the black, white and ground wires are stripped clean and also twisted into the wire nut.  This is the pig-tail wire, and it will be the one used for wiring into the actual socket mechanism that will provide power to the switch box, light box, and second socket box.

I suppose it could be said that electricity salts the wires--all wires attached in this effort.  Electricity is in a way a form of fire, and fire can be an outcome of electricity.

Yet Jesus' statement that everyone is salted with fire has far deeper and spiritual implications for our lives on earth and our immortal souls for all eternity.

Yes, I am going to ask Him questions today, similar to the way I asked the electrician questions as to the why and how and what of the basics of electrical wiring.  Somehow, Jesus' statement on being salted with fire is important--or it would not have sparked my mind to this degree of desire to know by learning what He means, deep down in and for practical application.  Probably rather a simple concept and answer will come of the pondering.  Jesus is so good to us with insights and explanations, freely given!

The electrician is certainly good, also, to have coached me two or three times on the phone in addition to letting me watch him while he worked doing all the other wiring in the hermitage.

Catholic Hermit: Soulbuster

Am right now too much in physical pain and fatigued to write about this mission of being a soulbuster, real and fascinating a mission as it is.

I've been at it with dealing with souls, after having gone along for month after month with the current caper, ongoing caper, until finally more and more truth gurgled to the surface from the murky, sledge-like cesspool.

On the surface, it has to do with cabinets.  Beneath the surface it has to do with souls--and now there are a couple souls in big trouble, one more dominantly in trouble than the other.  

And so it is that this nothing consecrated Catholic hermit once again has a mission to deal with.  Once again, I did not sense fully nor rightly the soul behind the facade of the person I've been dealing with for over two years.  Ah, yes, Lord--You duped me!

It is that way and has been in various capers requiring soul-busting efforts.  I don't realize what is going on, the Lord camouflages the situations and souls enough so that I do not see through initially and sometimes for awhile.  And why would He dupe me?  Well, He knows accurately enough that I would flee the situation if I saw the sick soul or souls involved.

The longer the interaction continues, the more energy, time, effort, and cost is involved, the more painful the outcomes--the greater the prayer and the reparation drawn out, the more heart and soul expended upon the soul or souls when their darkness vomits forth.

Then He dabs in some amazing encounters with some very good souls, letting me see right into them, into their largess, such as Kim at Home Depot who other people would immediately notice several front teeth missing.  Instead, I was shown her large and magnanimous soul.

Or the call at 3 a.m.--a misdial, and a woman's voice asking if I were awake.  Well, yes, now, but she has a wrong number.  I notice she is calling from the area code far away from whence I came three years ago.  Then she calls back a few minutes later.  Still wrong number, and she apologizes and says she must have gotten the number wrong again.  I don't mind, although once awake at 3 a.m., I cannot easily return to much-needed sleep.  The pain needs medicating, and it takes quite awhile to tame it.

So I see what the Lord wants, for it is the hour of mercy in the middle of the night--3 a.m.  And I marvel at this contact from a stranger, a woman, and consider the situation as a mission for souls.  Either she or the person she is trying to call, needs prayer!  So I begin praying then and there and mull it over as prayer, and consider the Lord's mercy, and even think through the simple refrain of the Chaplet of Divine Mercy, and that prayer of the pilgrim:  Lord, Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner.

In the morning, very tired (pain is fatiguing and often feels as if the body never gets rested) and on the way to civilization to a Home Depot where there is a certain size and type of tile, and enough of it in stock to tile a couple shower surrounds, the 3 a.m. phone call returns to mind.  There is a strong impulse to call that number and say that the person or whoever being called, is being bathed in prayer.

So I do this, and leave a voicemail, explaining while it may seem strange I just want the caller to know I was not at all bothered at being wakened (for I truly was not as I often waken from pain anyway), and say am no longer in that area but far away in a distant desert, but have a sense that she or the person she was trying to reach, needs prayer.  They are getting it!  And I'm happy to do so.

Then on to Home Depot where I encounter the marvelous soul, Kim.

A few hours later when in the Lowe's, dealing with the soulbusting mission which at that point was quite intense, my phone rings.  It is a man calling from that long distance number.  We talk, as I further explain why I felt compelled to call and leave that message.  Sure enough, it was his wife who had placed the call, trying to reach someone she knew as she was quite ill and could not go to work. He was kind of chuckling with amazement.  

Neither of us exchanged names.  No need to do that.  But he laughed and said it was quite something, and once again asked where I was and said where they were, and said his mom might think to pray like that.  Yes, it was something his mom might do, and he was pleased.  Well, his wife got the prayers; and I pray today she is well enough to continue on in her daily life.

These are the fun missions, the ones that leave this hermit with a joy that passes all understanding.  These are the occasions in which I can truly live my rather ironic name of Joyful Hermit.  For much of the time, with the work of souls and of soulbusting, there is so much pain and anguish, so much suffering, so much emotional wounding--that our view of "joy" or being "joyful" would seem as far away from this hermit as I am from getting this hermitage finished.

It is all the further away now, for the truth has gurgled up, finally, and by Jesus doing the work in exposing it after I was fully invested.  The cabinets are so very flawed, and the employees knew it all along, and one honest employee--once away from Don her cabinet partner and away from Keith the cabinet manager with their lies--admitted that this line of cabinets was discontinued because they were flawed, and she had many, many customers who had problems with these cabinets.

That truth does not change the attitude of my adult daughter and her husband who spent a lot of time and energy helping to install these cabinets that then began to have evolving issues.  No, the fact that I would get to the bottom of the deceptions and even start returning the bad cabinets, is not pleasing to them.  They view the world perhaps differently than does a consecrated Catholic hermit who is also in the mission field of soulbusting.  

Just keep them, cover over the issues, hope that a future buyer does not try pulling out the drawers nor looks inside nor notices the warped doors, nor the mismatched cabinet because of more lies and deceptions by the souls in big trouble, those store employees, especially the one whose visage has actually become gray in the last several months.  Grayer and grayer, like some cancer is growing and taking over...or else it is just that the field of my inner vision, the Lord has cleared now that I was fully invested with the clerk and praying for him.

No, the cabinets, at great cost, effort, and suffering on my part, are being returned.  Would my daughter and her husband like to be tricked in a home purchase?  And, above any of that aspect, how could a hermit, espoused to Christ, who has consecrated this hermitage with the name Te Deum House (You, God!), keep that which is filled with lies and deceptions?  Right is always right.

So the more I have to struggle, the longer I must be here, the more cost in paying to have the heavy counter top lifted and then later replaced, the more money spent with loan rising to get cabinets that are not discontinued and faulty--the better the prayers for the souls in big trouble.  

It just works that way, weird as it may seem.  No, me, the hermit, the consecrated soul and heart to Christ's heart and soul, does not like it!  I have wept!  I am tired and in many ways would like to give up.  I wept on the Sabbath when removing the cabinets from the bathroom that took me two days to install perfectly, leveling every which way with shims, bolting into studs and bolting each together at the sides.  

There was the memory of all the delays when the drawers would not function properly, and all the tales from the employees, and more tales from the factory rep, and even how they tried to blame me rather than admit the problems were not just ones I experienced. It was cruel!  I had been cabinet raped; and the pain of that awareness hurt all the more because I had so trusted the cabinet employee all these months and months and had prayed for those who he said were ill or whatever as part of his deception.  Yes, that employee is to me as Judas was to my Beloved.

So, the mission remains as a soulbuster, and this man's soul is now opened to this hermit's full vision,. And while it has taken some tears and some arguing with God about the seeming unfairness, and has taken a whole lot more acceptance of the damage the situation has done with family relationships (and who can blame them in a way, even if this situation was not my fault?)--I am taking it on for what it is, and there are some souls in big trouble, and now I must do all the work and cost and effort as prayer for these souls who are in such big trouble.

It reminds me of the late bishop whose soul was finally and fully shown to me for its deceptions and meanness.  I had then exclaimed to the Lord and to my spiritual father:  This is a soul in big trouble!  Pray for the bishop's soul, for he could be snatched at any time now!  His soul is in trouble!  Sure enough, he was snatched--quickly, surely, taken by surprise to him and others.  Was no surprise to this hermit, though, nor the spiritual father, and we pray for his soul still, wherever is his soul, nearly four years later.

I guess I have just written about the mission of soulbusting.  The Lord did give me the energy now to write about it and share it, for soulbusting is a fine mission--if a painful one, at that.  Few would understand it or believe it, or see how it works.  And most important of all is to recognize that the mission of soulbusting has to do with one's own soul, as well.  For every soul in big trouble out there, once the case is cracked and the reparation is in motion, there is the soulbuster's soul to be considered.  

Am I pleasant and rejoicing about doing all the work and paying the costs in body and finances and emotions and relationships in order to do all for God and for that soul?  Do I do so with faith and strength, and see it from the spiritual view?  Do I still love that soul--can I love that lying, deceptive, hurtful soul?  (He yet makes faces at me when in the store, and other employees circle their wagons around him--until the day I told him we must move forward, and that I have no hard feelings.  What was not right from the beginning was never going to be right.)

It is not easy being a soulbuster for the Lord, to be that type of instrument of God on earth.  I admit this nothing consecrated Catholic hermit is not a struggling soulbuster, for if I were totally agreeable and eager to the tasks, the Lord would not need to dupe me in order to get me fully into the situations with these souls--invested, so to speak, and caring and loving them enough to suffer enough when their souls are fully revealed.

This has happened over and over in my life.  It is kind of the answer to the death experience 28 years ago, between back surgeries, in which I died and was sent back--sent back to rear my children and "to fulfill the mission."  This is the mission part.  It is a painful one, as this hermit's body is filled with pain.  Yet the pain is love at other levels and dimensions, and the Lord gifts the love to the full so that the efforts and the mission may continue, soul after soul.

Today I wash the excess grout off the bathroom floor tile and start to build the box for the recessed shower niche.  True, I've never done these things before, but the Lord is with me, and I pray my way through, and if I get two hours of manual labor in, that is two hours in.  These days, it is offered for the current souls in big trouble with some praises for the great souls I meet along the way.  Gifts and encouragements to us soulbusters, are these large and luminous souls who we encounter from time to time, amidst the souls in big trouble.

God bless His Real Presence in us!  Little children, let us love one another for God Is Love.  (And can we really love, anyway, unless it is God's Love doing the loving?)

Catholic Hermit, Severe Suffering, Confession

The severe spinal headache continues, off and on and mostly on.

There are life factors involved; the temporal and tangible does affect our bodies, our health.  We must try to cope as best we can when there is tremendous suffering.  Medication does not always work well, and then what?

For such times, when it seems desperate times require desperate measures, when it seems we can no longer pray, we simple "be."

Take whatever pain medications we are blessed to be given, try to continue on with whatever way we might distract ourselves from the intractable pain, and also consider that other aspects affecting our emotions--wounds to the heart--also can contribute.

In that, we remember that Jesus can heal all wounds.  Ask Him to do so.  Ask for strength, for fortitude.  Try to maintain the outer even if the inner is in total chaos and seems near to hopelessness.

Yes, it is quite difficult to take in much rejection, to face disappointments with those who say or do without realizing the effect it has on others.  We can quietly work through these issues, doing our best to seek justice, but also there is the aspect that we ourselves have possibly said or done what has created others to react.  We may not even know exactly; or it could be that our very lives somehow become (or at some point in the past became) too much for others to be able to cope with.

Then, of course, if consecrated to God, if Jesus has consecrated our hearts, we must factor in that this means our lives are not going to be lived via a more typical course.  The wounds are going to come and be felt, and we must let go of the struggle to try to self-correct the course, to try to veer onto some "normal" path--akin to those paths in lives we see around us.

For a consecrated hermit, this is particularly true.  And for a soul whose heart has been wounded by, has been consecrated by Jesus Himself, years ago, the reality of that supernatural experience that had physical and temporal "signs" with it, is well to remember.  It is an experience that is best to be held and turned and viewed in its various facets.

The reality, then, becomes that of "What can you expect?"  Of course there will be tremendous suffering to the point that the heart seems on the verge of breaking.  The physical pain will also throb, and one can wonder at such pain in the head--and then recall another time, perhaps, in which the Lord emphasized to "Think with the heart!"  It helps to make sense of the reality that the head is in such suffering, that it cannot think that well; the heart must think for it.

The world sometimes can present such challenges and obstacles that are so very painful in all their emotional and mental details.  And others can make such hardships and even create obstacles or rules all the more painful when one begs for leniency on some rule or other.  This may be the case, such as in a business entity in the secular world, that it becomes a temptation to do whatever, to say whatever, to simply have justice in some temporal aspect.

One thinks of Jesus and the guys, walking through a field of wheat on the Sabbath.  Hungry, tired (and tired of extreme rules of what one cannot "do" on the Sabbath), they pluck some heads of grain to eat.  Yet they do not involve others in any deception.  They do not fight evil with evil.  It is not evil to eat.  Do we need to fast when the bridegroom is present to us?  He says not.

What does a consecrated hermit, authentically living the life as God's hermit, do when a sin has been committed?  Even in desperation, even if the outcome is just, even if some person in some position in the "world" has caused a wrong, even if in need and something is terribly wrong with a policy and an exception ought to be made for justice's sake, what if an untruth is part of the means to obtain justice in the outcome?

To whom does a hermit turn to confess a sin committed?  If authentically living as a consecrated hermit, a religious eremite, existing in the silence of solitude--to whom is confession and contrition for a sin made?

We make confession to Jesus, to the Bridegroom, here in our presence, here in our cell.  The Lord already knows.  He knows the obstructions, the unyielding and unjustifiable rule that someone in the world made even more severe out of a certain pleasure of power.  The Lord knows the injustice of it, and the desperation and all aspects of the wounded heart and crown-of-thorns head that help derange the mind enough to consider and yield to fighting an evil with another evil.

But, for a consecrated soul, for one whose heart has been consecrated by Christ to Christ, that way of fighting for justice does not settle well.  What has it come to, to do a wrong against a wrong to achieve justice?  Of course, it is a rather minor thing in actuality, and the world is filled with far worse.  Yet a soul consecrated by Jesus Himself, years ago, will go to the Lord in the quiet and solitude of its cell, and will confess and ask for mercy.  

The Lord will determine the judgment, minor as it may be in some ways yet major to a conscientious soul and definitely wrong in the ways of the world's rules of minds no matter how unjustifiable in the particulars of this situation.  The Lord hears and will decide.  The soul's heart will know the decision.  The Lord is kind and merciful, slow to anger and abiding in His love.

Confession for a consecrated hermit, authentically living his vows in silence and solitude, is a holy sacrament available in any present moment.  The confessional is the cell, and that "cell" also may be the consecrated heart which rules over the mind's will, given over in obedience to His Real Presence.  The high priest is Jesus Himself, and absolution and peace is His to bequeath, Sacred Heart to consecrated heart.

God bless His Real Presence in us!  Let us love one another for love is of God!

Hermit's Reflection on Hebrews, Chapter 2

The Book of Hebrews

Chapter 2

If we place ourselves as the recipients of the Living Word (of which we truly are, for who else did God intend to speak and teach?), we find that although priests have far more responsibility in preaching and teaching and guiding souls, we each and all are called to more faithfulness.

All the more we must heed and enact what we are told by His Real Presence, the Living Word.  We know that the angels’ proclamations are accurate; those that fell receive their punishment, and those who obey receive reward.  Then likewise, we must not ignore the reality of what is our recompense if we disobey—nor what is given us in our obedience to God:  salvation.

Jesus taught all these realities to us in His Words and His actions.  We know also from the testimony of those people who were His companions as well as the general public who happened to hear Him or heard of Him.  God added to the truths spoken—of our just recompense in abasement or salvation.  The choice is ours.  God made these truths all the more noted through signs, miracles, acts of power, and bequeathing gifts to His Son and also then to His followers—gifts of the Holy Spirit—given according to God’s will.

God did not create the world for the pleasure and salvation of angels.  He created this world for us, each of us.  Yet we do not know how to live in this world as subjects of God.  So He sent His Son, Jesus Christ, to demonstrate for us, how it is to live in subjection to Him, to be subjects of God of which all things are to be subject to Him.

For us to grasp and learn, to approach some sort of understanding of how to navigate this world and to live as all the world is to live, in subjection to God—Jesus was made man.  He became our leader but not a political leader or a regime leader.  He is the leader of our  souls’ salvation.  He is the leader who demonstrates in every temporal and spiritual detail, how to live in subjection to God yet exist in this world, among people and creatures, plants and things.

What is it that differentiates this created world from heaven?   What is it that distinguishes our human lives and that of God’s existence?  It is suffering.  So even in suffering God partook of the toils and tribulations of what we experience here on earth.  Jesus, from His mortal birth onward, met with the various hardships and trials, the persecutions, the evils, the humiliations and sacrifices, the physical pain and mental torment, the emotional sorrows, and the heartbreak of shattering disappointments of deception.

Jesus’ existence as God and as man, seals our consecration.  God is the only One Who can consecrate, can make holy and sacredly divine our soul’s existence, to bind our soul in Him.  Through His Son, God consecrates us and gives us one origin: holy, in God.

That is how Jesus can call us His own, the children God has given Him, His brothers and sisters.  We are not only called as Christ’s own; we are made His own, become His own.  By the grace of God, Jesus tasted life and swallowed death, like us, doing so for everyone.

Each of us humans share with one another blood, flesh, thoughts, emotions, outer and inner senses, and even each have souls—so also did Jesus share each human aspect with us.  There is one major difference, though, and that is what we humans ought hold near and dear when we live out or lives on this earth, amidst earthly creatures and creation.

Jesus as God’s Son, in union with God and the Holy Spirit, as God has power over the one who causes pain and destruction, chaos and despair, tears and deception, in our lives: the devil.  It is all that can mean “death” in our lives that we people fear throughout life.  We fear death for ourselves and for others, as well, and we fear all the accompaniments of death that the devil begets in our daily lives.  

These deaths are wrapped up in our wickedness to others and to creation, our deception, our pride and willfulness, our selfishness and sinfulness.  The devil preys upon our weaknesses—physical ailments, emotional hurts, mental sickness, weariness, innocence, confusion, doubt, sexuality, doubts, age.  The devil takes advantage of any of our disadvantages.  The devil plants seeds of greed and various vices in our tired or tepid minds.  We become slaves to death rather than subjects of God and glory!

But through Jesus Christ, God made man, God came to rescue us, to help us, to give us a pathway—a means of consecration—to holiness and eternal salvation.  No matter what we humans may suffer or experience in this life and in this world, no matter the time period or country or under whatever earthly ruler, no matter the devil itself, Jesus has suffered likewise in each nuance and situation.  Jesus, the merciful and faithful high priest before God, expiates our sins.

One must hope, even when he devil seems to have won out over a soul in this life, that Jesus in His mercy and faithfulness expiates that soul’s sins.  Even when a priest, a minister of the Living Word, an alter Christus or anyone who espouses that he or she is a follower of Jesus Christ, falls short and fail but one or many of the various tests we face in life—we must have hope and faith that Jesus, the high priest, Son of God and One with the Father and Holy Spirit—expiates our failings.  He ever helps those of us who are being tested.

God grant us redemption and salvation.  Jesus, help us to endure this life.

Catholic Hermit Considers Obedience, Righteousness

In the on-going reflection (inspired by His Living Word this week!), this hermit received a phone call late yesterday while taping off another section of siding trim, readying to paint.

A daughter called and shared the debate she is having with her young son who persists in wanting material things.  He is at an age of being influenced and tempted by neighborhood boys whose parents have varying notions and practices of what matters.  (The topic is providential!)

At one point in what was a long day of explaining to and battling the lad--and holding firm--about what are priorities, what are prudent uses of money and what tend to be wasteful outcomes, the child declared he wanted a $100 pumpkin (huge one, obviously) like the neighbor boys were given by their parents.

What?  This all-ears Catholic hermit remained calm despite how shocking the notion of a pumpkin costing $100, no matter how immense.  The boy's mother explained that a large pumpkin will rot out the same as a small one.  What remains, then, of any enjoyment or use?  Then she had the insight to ask him to consider how many people he could help, with $100.  He replied he could help many, many people with that much money.

I asked the daughter to ask the grandson to make a list of what he thinks matters to God.  I shared the on-going reflection as to what matters to God and of first examining what are possessions--keeping in mind that possessions can vary and the bulk aren't even tangibles.  And to qualify as a possession they also tend to be those things, ideas, persons, or aspects that possess us, as well.

Who knows if the daughter will remember to ask him.  They are busy with schooling and various activities that lend to a balanced life for a child existing in our society today.  But she already had perched upon a branch of Jesus' teachings, and the boy was being challenged to consider what matters.

Now, what matters to us can diverge from what matters to God.  We need to merge into awareness and choices in what matters to God if we desire to be in union with His Real Presence.  Then, for sure, what the neighbor kids want and have won't be a priority unless they have attained spiritual union with God already.

Today's Scripture from Romans 6 presents pertinent fodder for growing and storing knowledge, understanding, and wisdom in spiritual progress and attaining union with His Real Presence.  It is all a process.  In considering what types of possessions matter to God as opposed to what we desire to possess or are possessed by, St. Paul uses the example of obedient slaves.

We can be slaves who obey or who disobey.  Obedience is key to being a good slave.  Slaves who disobey don't fare well.  Then, we can be slaves of someone or something or some thought that is either good or not good--and that can be according to what is good or not good in the world or what is good or not good according to God.  And sometimes what is good according to God tends also to be good in the world, although not always.  But what is good according to God is always good for us, regardless.

Then St. Paul weaves in a type of obedience that perhaps we've never considered, at least not consciously. This is obedience from the heart.  We can be obedient from our bodies and minds according to laws, according to what others ask of us, according to what others have or do, and according to our own desires--for good or ill.

But to be obedient from the heart inspires an obedience that comes from faith, hope, love.  It is an obedience that transcends temporal or natural or societal or cultural or even ecclesial laws in the sense that obedience from the heart suggests obedience from love and of the soul.  Obedience of the heart requires the gifts of the Holy Spirit and also a submission of our souls to God's laws, obeyed in love and for the sake of His love.

Obeying from the heart often times results in good when applied to laws of the temporal order and of categories mentioned above.  Yet in all of these considerations, heart-full obedience to God's laws and especially His law of love, will lead us to righteousness.  Obedience from the heart as to what matters to God is righteous obedience, righteous slavery.  We are led from "death" to righteous life.

"Do you not know that if you present yourselves
to someone as obedient slaves,
you are slaves of the one you obey,
either of sin, which leads to death,
or of obedience, which leads to righteousness?
But thanks be to God that, although you were once slaves of sin,
you have become obedient from the heart
to the pattern of teaching to which you were entrusted.
Freed from sin, you have become slaves of righteousness.

Although quite aching with pain and weary from painting hermitage exterior (right arm numb in the night!), I will continue praying for understanding, knowledge, and wisdom as to how to actually obey from the heart.  Yes, I will ask for this grace.  Obeying from my heart, God's laws, will mean being a slave of righteousness: a veritable, loving, obedient slave of His Real Presence!  

Is it so, then, that when we obey from the heart God's laws, then obedience from the heart to laws of the land, the Church, of workplaces and society, will become subsistent and accomplished simply, mindlessly, for God's law and being a slave to righteousness transcends the others?  Seems so!  God's laws sift and sort all other laws, so that those who obey from the heart His laws, the other laws become (to use a colloquial term) "grandfathered in."

Obedience from the heart and being a slave to righteousness places us in holy, loving servitude to God's omniscience, omnipotence, and omnipresence.  We remain in His Love!  Surely this is what matters to God?

Dear His Real Presence, please give me the grace today and every day to be obedient from my heart and a slave to Your Righteousness!  Thank You, in faith, hope, and love!

God bless His Real Presence in us!

Catholic Hermit: Called to Be Holy

Today the universal church begins, together, proclaiming and pondering St. Paul's "Letter to the Romans."  These lines stand out, having awakened this morning remembering my mother's passing on this day 11 years ago.  I reflected upon her lovely life and her recommitment to Jesus Christ toward the end of her life after exploring a bit off the narrow path.  The Lord called her back, better then ever before!  

Last evening I watched a couple or so video clips of old "What's My Line" television programs.  I recall them from childhood and found myself laughing aloud in the hermitage--some much-needed laughter after some deep, inner questioning and praying for the Lord's guidance and will in various matters.  Yes, I saw Jesus in the laughter; I saw Him in the decorum of people, recalling the 50's and '60's before the yawing opening of our society to more an "anything goes" attitude.

It is not as if sin did not exist prior.  Of course not!  But people more attempted a refinement of loveliness and decency, at least externally.  And the external is a reflection of the internal, as the internal also illuminates through the external.

It is as if a weight has lifted from this hermit, a Catholic, a Catholic professed and avowed for this lifetime in the Consecrated Life of the Church--and more so, espoused and betrothed to Jesus Christ for now and all eternity.

The hermit's young helper's mother returned the call yesterday.

I was able to smooth things over, to apologize, to explain that when I am in Mass and in the very deep mystical state, that all is fresh, clear, raw, unfiltered truth.  In no way would I ever flee from Mass in horror if in the conscious, filtered, temporal state.  Like those before who shielded their inner problems (TV contestant Dorothy Kilgallen had a drinking and infidelity problem but masked it, as another side of her was decent, loving, warm, intelligent, and refined), I would have, during Mass if a priest or some other person did something that was distracting or off-point and off-kilter, simply ignored it and turned the thoughts to Scripture, to Jesus, until the disturbance had passed.

My spiritual father has ordered me not to return to the parish, nor to try to help or talk with the priest, nor to alert the diocese for they already know the situation and are handling it in the way that works best for them. (In God's will, He will take care of the priest and the parishioners over time, in His own way.  There is always opportunity for deeper conversions.)

And that is where this hermit's soul is, now, in the Order of the Present Moment.  I am at a point of deeper conversion.  My rule of life presents itself more than ever: to follow the Gospel Rule.  As a fellow Catholic hermit of yore discovered, the Gospel rule is the perfect rule of life for hermits and for anyone.  So within the Gospel Rule, within the Living Word of God, I am trying to live a life of love, utilizing the Nine S' to support and engage living the Gospel in the Order of the Present Moment.

Silence.  Solitude.  Slowness.  Suffering.  Selflessness.  Simplicity.  Stability.  Stillness.  Serenity.

There will be no more parishes in the foreseeable future.  I was able to explain to the helper's dear mother, that I do not desire to see through situations, through people.  Yes, if all is good, it is bliss.  If not, it is horrific hell to endure.  I have been trying very hard to do as the temporal Catholic rules and laws ask--and then a long-time friend who visited last week reminded me that for centuries, Catholics received Communion once a year....

I have been, with the help of priests and a specialist with the paranormal, trying to figure out what God wills with this rather rare mystical ecstasy at any and every Mass.  I have not so much considered that He wills me to a greater silence of solitude of being with Him.  I had ignored five visions and dreams with locutions (messages) directly advising me that I do not belong to the world of parishes anymore.  The first was within two years of becoming a Catholic!  Since it did not seem to jive with the norm, for I was not in the consecrated part of the Church as religious brothers and sisters, all along I have continued to try to go to Mass in parishes--with rather difficult outcomes.

No one is to blame other than me, I do agree!  I have been not paying attention to the signs, to the messages, to the dreams and visions.  And it was all right to do so because there is this gift called discernment that we must cooperate with fully--not lean unto our own understanding but seek the guidance of wise others and also then seek affirmation and confirmation from the Lord in His Living Word and in His guidance of our souls, in every present moment.

His ways are beyond our understanding and knowledge, for the most part.  What is asked of us it to have complete faith in Him, and to receive the peace He bequeaths.  The peace of the Holy Spirit is always a very good sign that nothing other can replicate--His abiding peace!  Abiding.

We can detect sin in ourselves and others when there is ugliness, envy, pride, vindictiveness, treachery, deception, bickering, detraction, wrong-judging.

I do not want to be in any of these categories.  That is not my nature and never has been.  This morning I feel a cleansing from my sins and a sense of light and love and being lifted out of what I had tried so hard to figure out, to go along with, to be a part of that which the Lord had me pass through, benefit, and then have my angel take me to the Stairway to Heaven.  The Mass is the Stairway, with all its beauty and wonder.  But what is in the Mass?

The Sacraments, all of them, and His Living Word are in the Mass.  The life, death, and RESURRECTION of Jesus Christ are in the Mass.  The passageway between the temporal and into the eternal mystical, union with God, are in the Mass.  And the Mass goes beyond the time and place.  In the Mass, we are sent out to take His Real Presence into life and into lives temporally and mystically, now and forever.

Although not the norm according to the temporal rules which are very good indeed but Jesus is clear that no temporal rule is necessarily eternal, there is the Gospel Rule of Life, of abiding in Him and He abiding in us, that transcends.  Many canonized hermits and saints came to this, and usually through much persecution and with negative judging by others.  Yet they persevered.

Yesterday I was thinking again about John of the Cross and Padre Pio.  They did not leave off their vocations or their temporal names in religious life, nor no longer consider themselves to be Catholic.  Rather, they more deeply understood their vocations, their roles, their Catholicism and very much so their Christianity as followers of Jesus Christ.

So it is with this nothing consecrated Catholic hermit.  Yes, I could use the name I had in religious life, even if I did not remain in that community.  I could go by Pio of the Wounded Heart.  But that is so very temporal, and as a hermit, I am not the same as John of the Cross or Padre Pio.  I am called to be hidden, and to more know the name by which I will be called in heaven, a name told me by the Lord some 19 years ago this fall during a bit of a taste of heaven in the here and now.

But even that, remains a name for heaven, not for my hermit life.  No, I am simply a consecrated Catholic hermit. That is more than enough name.  It reminds me of my vows, of my life and place in the Catholic Church, and of my vocation as an eremite.  And my given name, thought of by my late mother before I was born and gifted on the day of birth, means "gift of God."  That is beautiful!

I thank my mother many times over today, for her lovely life and her loving me and nurturing, protecting, and holding out all kinds of hope in what I might accomplish in life, to do good, to love, to thrive.  She instilled in me a love of God, of Jesus, of the Holy Spirit!  I have already this morning apologized deeply for the bungles I made and still make!  But love transcends our errors when we are sorry, and when we so want to do much good in Christ.  To be holy--that is the desire of this heart!

Through Him we have received the grace of apostleship,
to bring about the obedience of faith,
for the sake of His name, among all the Gentiles,
among whom you also, who are called to belong to Jesus Christ;
to all the beloved of God in Rome, called to be holy.
Grace to you and peace from God our Father
and the Lord Jesus Christ.
--from Romans 1

God bless His Real Presence in me, in you, in us!  Little children, let us love one another for God Is Love!  Accept, embrace, feel, reflect, and share His Love with Him and each other! 

Catholic Hermit: Loves Points Macarius Makes

Not reading quickly these days. The more spiritually profound the writing, the more the body, mind, heart, and spirit desire to dwell upon what is read--and more so be taken to the heart of God within the insights written.  This nothing consecrated Catholic hermit is still dwelling on Pseudo-Macarius' first homily!

Love this point:

"If, therefore, you have become a throne of God and the Heavenly Charioteer has mounted you and your whole soul is a spiritual eye and has become totally light, and if you have been nourished with that heavenly food of the spirit and you have drunk from the water of life and you have put on the raiment of ineffable light, if finally your interior man has experienced all these and has been rooted in the abundance of faith, then, behold, you already live the eternal life, indeed, with your soul resting with the Lord."

Truly, from time to time this nothing has experienced each of these mentioned, but this interior man has not been so rooted in the abundance of faith.  No, this nothing, this human hermit is yet distracted by the temporal detritus that plays with the mind and emotions (heart), and up-ends the spirit, far too often.  However, His Real Presence has been showing the nothing Catholic hermit the strident differences between things that are below and things that are above, of God.

And there are things of the temporal of God's created, that can very much in faith lead to the things of God above.  But there are things of the temporal that tend to lead downward or to interfere with faith, or simply to distract and keep the interior man from the abundance of faith that allows it to live the eternal life here and now, with the soul resting with the Lord.

So we see what are the differences between the two, and we also see a means of entering into God and spiraling with Him from the beauty, truth, and goodness of His Created and Creation, upward in faith, hope, and love.  But we still have the snares of the temporal that do not easily or at all merge us with His spiraling movement to that which is above.  Macarius provides a reason for the hindrance: settling for the poverty of sin.

"Look, you have received these things truly from the Lord so that you may live the true life.  If, however, you are not conscious of having experienced any of these things, weep, mourn and groan because you have not yet been made a participator of the eternal and spiritual riches and you have not yet received true life.  Therefore, be worried at your poverty, beseeching the Lord night and day because you have settled for the serious poverty of sin."

It does seem to this hermit, that it has not settled for the serious poverty of sin, either.  Thus the reason why there are at times and points, some part of the soul a spiritual eye--or that eye closed at times and open at others; and there is thus some light and some not light.  The hermit prays that the spiritual eye remain increasingly open--that it is more like the unconscious blinking of the human eyelid, and that the blinking become briefer and eventually cease, so that the soul is a spiritual eye filled with God's ineffable Light.

It is also interesting to note that when the physical body dies, the human eyelids are closed, or if not, another closes them, and there they remain closed to this world.  But then the spiritual eye is opened and remains open--either for an eternal view of God (even a distant view), or for an eternal view of not God, which we may term "hell."

Today the hermit's prayer is to be a throne of God, to be that chariot of which He mounts and guides in all directions at once, nourished by food of the Spirit and water of Life, clothed in His light, and rooted in an abundance of faith--thus for this soul to rest with the Lord.

It is this hermit's prayer for each of you, as well.

God bless His Real Presence in us!  Little children, let us love one another and remain in His Love. Let us pray for our spiritual eyes to be opened and remain filled with light and faith, and to lessen our distracted sightings of that which causes our bodies, minds, hearts, or souls to blink too often or be drawn closed.