The spiritual life of a good Catholic

There are moments when life makes no sense. When someone dies after suffering due to illness. When someone you know commits suicide and their family still struggles to understand. When you see those coping with depression, trying to survive day by day. At such times, it seems all we can do is pray with them.

Prayer helps to make sense of our messy lives, knowing that God is with us every day, even when we feel abandoned by him. I truly believe that God will never reject anyone who approaches him with a sincere and humble heart.

The late Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen knew that no matter what our circumstances, the deadliest enemy we face is armed not with a gun but with temptation. “In dangerous, uncertain times like ours, the Devil lures us quickly into lust, anger, hatred, and despair,” he wrote.

Archbishop Sheen wrote the Wartime Prayer Book to help Catholics from dangerous and tempting vices (lust, anger, hatred, despair) so that, we too, can put on the armor of God and triumph over evil in our day. He believed prayer is the answer to do battle in life.

The words of St. Augustine come to mind: “We may pray most when we say least, and we may pray least when we say most.”

One of the prayer reflections we do with the participants of Lay Ecclesial Ministry Formation is the prayer by Thomas Merton, a Trappist monk and spiritual master who was considered a great contemporary mystic. He died at the age of 53, and was buried in Gethsemani, near Bardstown, Kentucky.

Merton wrote extensively and most of his journals became books like The Seven Story Mountain and Seeds of Contemplation (among dozens he wrote). Merton struggled much in life and finally turned to Christ. He described his conversion as profound, redeeming and life-changing.

The Thomas Merton prayer: “My Lord God, I have no idea where I am going. I do not see the road ahead of me. I cannot know for certain where it will end. nor do I really know myself, and the fact that I think I am following your will does not mean that I am actually doing so. But I believe that the desire to please you does in fact please you. And I hope I have that desire in all that I am doing. I hope that I will never do anything apart from that desire. And I know that if I do this you will lead me by the right road, though I may know nothing about it. Therefore, will I trust you always though I may seem to be lost and in the shadow of death. I will not fear, for you are ever with me, and you will never leave me to face my perils alone. Amen.”

After they pray and reflect on these words, I often ask the participants which word or phrase speaks or resonates with them. Where is the Holy Spirit leading through the words of this prayer?

Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI reminds us: “If you follow the will of God, you know that in spite of all the terrible things that happen to you, you will never lose a final refuge. You know that the foundation of the world is love, so that even when no human being can or will help you, you may go on, trusting in the One who loves you.”

I have also learned to appreciate much of Flannery O’Connor’s writings. In her stories, she made it clear that God is with us even in our darkest moments. All we have to do is make him the center of our lives.

She was neither a theologian nor a religious, nor was she a married person. She was actually a celibate, single woman and a devout and faithful Catholic all her life who attended Mass every day. She died in 1964 at the young age of 39. In spite of battling lupus for 13 years, she managed to write many books.

Her ability to write was something she didn’t take for granted. She knew it was a gift from God and she wanted to glorify him for it. Her illness was also something She offered up to the Lord, accepting her cross as a faithful and loving disciple of the Lord Jesus.

In her writings, O’Connor often mentioned that “religion isn’t for the faint of heart and that God’s grace in the life of a person might disrupt it forever.”

O’Connor believed that human suffering isn’t necessarily a setback in life, and that “evil is not a problem to be solved. It is a mystery to be endured.” She believed that, like Christ, we too can become great — not in spite of our suffering, but because of it.

In Catholic spirituality, we ultimately believe that God loves us, that we need to learn to live detached from the world, reaching holy indifference. We need to understand the redemptive role of suffering, that the saints share with us their own struggles in understanding God’s will, and that each of us is called to holiness.

Deacon Luis Zuniga is the director of the Office for Pastoral Planning & San Juan Diego Ministry Institute.