I will never forget the day I called the Abbey of Gethsemani to make arrangements for a personal retreat that my friend and I wanted to make there. I thought it would be the perfect place for a 4 day “discernment of vocation” retreat because after all, it had been the place where the famous Thomas Merton had experienced much enlightenment. My call was received by a monk who introduced himself as “Brother Luke”. I began to share my plan for my retreat which included the Ignatian Rules of discernment, a good spiritual director and my journal all which needed be housed in the aesthetic beauty of monasticism. So, I asked Brother Luke if he would be able to connect me with a spiritual director at the Abbey, preferably one who could take me through some of the rules for discernment. After an awkward moment of pause Brother Luke replied, “Mam, we are Trappist Monks. We don’t guide people in the rules of discernment. We just want you to come and bask in Gods love ”. At that moment, my fully stocked cargo for seeking direction in my life had derailed. It would take me a while to see the contents of what I thought could enlighten me was more about my own egoic needs for certitude. The irony that I would seek my future vocation in four days at a place where Merton penned umpteen books and journals about the ego is embarrassing if not hilarious.
I still booked the retreat and that day began a whole new way of seeing discernment for me. Brother Luke was right. My stay of silent meals in community, restful calm, long trail walks in the beautiful nature, hillside sunsets and praying the hours all had a way of inviting me to God within. Those four days helped me cross a new bridge of trusting and knowing. I left that place with not even one hint of what my future entailed and yet I accessed a deeper hope, peace, trust and love, all of which were the true keys I would need to unlock whatever good life God had planned for me. Being that I was still raw from having gone through a divorce two years prior, God knew my soul was barren and in need of healing before moving on with more of life.
There was an engraved hedge stone at the entrance of the Abbey that read, “God Alone”. Funny but my whole experience there was more like God-Alone-With-Us. By facing the valley of the shadow of my own death I experienced God with me and in me. I felt so connected to the monks without ever talking to them. I shared deep intimacy with those around me in the silence at mealtimes~ those otherwise strangers. By the end of my time my soul felt like it had grown too large to fit into the car ride home and yet resembled a mustard seed. Although I wished I could have stayed there forever I have to admit that I found a deeper Love at the Abbey and she came home with me when I left. In some mysterious way, I took the monastery with me.
I know there are particular times when we need tools for discernment and as Ignatius would say, especially when choosing between two “goods”. And yet, it occurred to me from the day I called Brother Luke that the best of tools for discernment only serve to take us to the center of God’s heart; to find the Divine within us. To know oneself, is to know God and to know God breeds a benevolent life in whatever we do and yet we must experience this in order to truly move into our calling. Interestingly, our calling starts with being our true self (Merton calls this our deepest calling). To see is to rest in God’s presence, to rest in God’s presence is to “not know” and to “not know” is well….
to know.
I will end with some “tools” for discernment from those who learned the practice of unknowing, before they could know.
“Finally, I call consolation every increase of hope, faith and charity, and all interior joy which calls and attracts to heavenly things and to the salvation of one’s soul, quieting it and giving it peace in its Creator and Lord”. Ignatius of Loyola
“Discernment is a life of listening to a deeper sound and marching to a different beat, a life in which we become “all ears.” Henri Nouwen
“The presence of discernment and detachment is manifested by a spontaneous thirst for what is good – charity, union with the will of God – and an equally spontaneous repugnance for what is evil. The man who has this virtue no longer needs to be exhorted by promises to do what is right, or deterred from evil by threat of punishment. “ Thomas Merton
“The great teachers are saying that you cannot start seeing or understanding anything if you start with “no.” You have to start with a “yes” of basic acceptance, which means not too quickly labeling, analyzing, or categorizing things as in or out, good or bad, up or down. You have to leave the field open, a field in which God and grace can move. Ego leads with “no” whereas soul leads with “yes.” Richard Rohr
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This is beautiful, Val. Thank you.
Also, I totally laughed at Brother Luke’s response! I was going along, thinking your plan sounded great, too, until I realized Trappist is not the same as Jesuit. How cool that they showed you a different way of knowing than St. Ignatius would. How cool that God gives us so many ways of learning, discerning, and knowing.
Christianne,
I see your point about God giving us many ways to discern and yet something really transcended the typical “ways’ that day. I could really see how I had even used Ignatian exercises for my own security purposes (but then again if I were to really go ahead with Ignatius rules I would have come to that reality. He had a way of exposing the ego as well. Interestingly God just gave me what I needed for that time.
Val, Thank you for sharing this. I just spent this weekend at St. Gregory’s Abbey trying to practice some discernment with my wife and community about making a move. I left feeling a great disappointment that the weekend hadn’t lead us to a conclusion. I felt, though, God telling me to let go of all the logic, pros and cons, and even the feeling about for consolation or desolation – to leave all that under the cloud of forgetting along with even my expectation to hear from God on the matter. This is not easy for me, but I come again to the place where I need to rest in God rather than know what God has in mind.
Hello Chris,
Sorry I am responding so late..I just now saw this. I love that you sought discernment in community and yet I love your open hearted stance to notice a much larger picture. Yes, this road is never easy for any of us and in fact it is the least popular road…or as some say, the road less traveled or even perhaps in the words of Jesus…the narrow gate. If only we could know (meaning get wise) that letting go is the road to calvary and as we do, it becomes the very opening by which we can finally fit in the narrow gate…because the other side is so much more. Chris I appreciate your telling a humble story. Prayers for you now to keep watch, as you respite, as you hope, as you doubt and as you wait.
Wow. Fantastic, Val. I can fully attest to your discoveries there at Gethsemani (thanks for the beautiful Merton-designed cross by the way!) since I made similar ones at a sister Abbey in Lafayette, Oregon where I used to go. I think I may have written about it in a previous post. I would go regularly seeking God’s guidance for this thing or that issue, this problem or that relationship. All I ever got however was an earful of…nothing. Make no mistake, the process of aching before God is never wasted time. Ever. But when I stopped expecting something from God and began to relax in the PRESENCE of God, it gave perspective to what it was I was seeking in the first place. Remember Job? God didn’t answer his questions. He gave him Presence and…better questions. When God shows up, the rest is gravy.
Nicely done, friend
So true Rob, so true. Yet we both had to experience this for ourselves. I am beginning to realize how important experience is for our spirituality and transformation.
Experience, God in us, is always the deepest truth. It is our truest dogma.
And to think for so much of my life I thought God was “over there” in that higher place. That Jesus had bridged us back to God and yet Jesus felt so out of reach unless I did the right stuff. I totally resonate now with Jacob…”you were here all the time God, and I did not know it”. Or, that buried treasure and mustard seed within. Oh true Rob. That dogma lies within (and without). May we continue to open our eyes to truth there. It is so expansive…benevolent. God is everywhere.
Your comments are timely, too, Val given our proximity to Advent, that time of year when we celebrate “God with us.” The notion that matter matters really does…matter, because it means God is everywhere present, nothing is either sacred or secular in our present dichotomy and that we are always under God’s gaze. Wow. What an encouragement!
Yes Rob…maybe we should listen as we post. Perhaps its time to tune our eyes and ears toward Advent.
‘Tis the season!