Post-Retreat Reflections
Posted by Arwen Mosher in Faith on Monday, October 20, 2008 4:50 PM
Because of various circumstances, the last time I attended my parish’s women’s retreat was 2004.
At that point it had been a little over a year since Bryan and I’d been trying to conceive and we were starting to figure out that God might be heading us somewhere other than “a baby as soon as possible.” That particular journey would take me through the hardest moments of my life so far, and some of the most spiritually fruitful. Because despair often nipped at my heels during those years, I had to throw myself again and again on God’s mercy. It was hard to do that, but there was an upside: He drew me closer to Him as I was reminded that He is the one true source of hope and joy.
Since having Camilla and since finding out I was pregnant again, I’ve felt incredibly blessed. It also happens that all the other circumstances of my life have lined up so that I often feel like we’ve got an embarrassment of riches: a healthy family, a thriving marriage, financial stability… the list goes on and on.
Heading into this retreat, I’d been feeling for a while that being so blessed was a challenge to my spiritual life. Not experiencing desperation on a regular basis meant that I was also not experiencing consolation on a regular basis, and I missed that. My goal for the retreat was to find again that immediacy of God’s presence that had so enriched my prayer life in earlier years, and to figure out a reliable way to hold onto it.
During personal prayer time at the beginning of the retreat, I asked God to help me realize anew the truth that I have only Him. I know cerebrally that all blessings are free gift and that it is an illusion to think that I have control over any of the good things in my life, but in my blessings I had gotten complacent, and I wanted Him to bring that truth home to me again.
I was even ready (or at least wanting to be ready) to ask Him to remove some of my blessings, if that was what it would take. I was quaking at the mere idea, but in my mind it represented the only way to show that I was truly committed to growing closer to God no matter what.
I was barely fifteen minutes into my prayer time before God to stepped up to remind me that He is so much bigger than I am.
This was the message I got from him, verbatim, because I cannot improve on His words:
“My child, I allowed you sorrow so that I might draw you closer to myself, but I bring you joy so that you might revel in it. I love you, and I love to see your happiness in my gifts to you. Drink deeply and joyfully of them, for as you live with the gifts of my love, you live in my light. I have more ways to draw you closer to me than you can possibly imagine - do not make the mistake of thinking that there is only one way. Praise and worship me from your joy, and I will encircle you with my love. You are my child, and I seek you every moment. Open your heart to the myriad of my wonders.”
As I prayed and went to Mass and spent time in God’s presence throughout the rest of the retreat, I started to realize more and more what He meant by those words. I have had sorrow before and I will have sorrow again - and there are certainly enough small opportunities for salvific suffering in the daily life of every vocation - but this is a time of my life in which He is calling me to seek Him in joy rather than in sorrow. I can find Him there, and learn more about Him, precisely because these gifts are nothing more than a participation in His goodness.
Praising God in all circumstances is the call of the Christian. I had been so mixed-up that I’d started to convince myself I needed to find a way to draw closer to God in spite of my blessings, forgetting entirely that since He is the source of all true joy, I could draw closer to Him through my blessings.
I am so grateful that He is giving me the opportunity.
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