Prayers in Winter

[“And, if you have not been enchanted by this adventure—your life—what would do for you?” (Mary Oliver, “To Begin with, the Sweet Grass,” Devotions, 78)] O Lover, The question “is this all there is...

[“This is how we shall know that we are in the truth, and before God be assured in our heart even when that very heart condemns us:  God is greater than our heart and...

[“(You have) self-disclosed to us the Mystery (Mystérion) of Your will, as purposed in the Christ, to be realized when the time was full (kaíros): to draw together into a headship everything (anakephalaiósasthai ta...

[“(I)f ever I could claim to have seen the face of God, it was in the colossal faces of those giraffes” (Lynda Rutledge, West With Giraffes [2021]).]  [“For (God) brought things into being in...

[“But of that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, nor the son, but the Father alone” (Mt 24:36).] O Lover,  The current religious aspect of our society weights heavily...

O Lover, As I recall, I first participated in the veneration of the wood of the cross in the 1991 Tríduum liturgy as I was nearing the culmination of my own RCIA journey. A...

O Lover, Across the last decade I have periodically been drawn to this meditational prayer mantra attributed to Your poveréllo, Francis of Assisi (c.1182-1226). Curiously, the impact of this cryptic phrase has seemed to...

O Lover, In the Lenten seasons of this my November I am being shown that my most important “giving up” is not regarding this or that, but reductionist depictions of You. At no time...

O Lover,  The gospel reading for the third Sunday of Lent (Jn 4:3-43) describes the encounter of Jesus with a Samaritan just outside the city of Sychar (now Nablus). The case can be made...

O Lover, The gospel reading at the head of the second week of Lent was the Marcan take on the transfiguration of the Christ (9:2-10). Ever within Your Presence, whether with or without my...