Contemplative prayer- Our Lady of Fatima

HOMILY EASTER SEASON WEEK 05 03 – Year II

Abiding in Jesus and Bearing Fruit:

Optional Memorial of Our Lady of Fatima

(Acts 15:1-6; Ps 122; Jn 15:1-8)

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In the Domano Retreat center in the Diocese of Prince George, there is a vine covering most of a wall that both clings to and reaches out. That vine is a metaphor for today’s readings and the message they hold out to us.

We are to both cling to Jesus and reach out to others; pray and love; abide in Jesus and bear much fruit.

Abiding in Jesus involves prayer. The Church breathes with two lungs – devotional prayer, such as the rosary, and the public prayer of Jesus Christ, or the Eucharist.

While discursive prayer (prayer that we recite) has its value, I suspect the kind of prayer Jesus has in mind when he speaks of “abiding in him” is the prayer of contemplation he himself practiced communing with the Father. According to Fr. Thomas Keating, contemplation is a very mature way of praying. It involves listening to God’s word, meditating on it, praying with it and finally, just resting in God’s presence, trusting that God is doing whatever God wants to do deep within us. Keating reminds us God’s first language is silence.

Elijah in his cave in 1 Kings 19:11-13 experienced God in the “sheer silence” of this kind of prayer, and not in the hurricane, earthquake or fire. Mary of Bethany is another biblical model for the prayer of contemplation. She was sitting at the Lord’s feet, the posture of a disciple, not so much listening to the words Jesus was saying, but more so aware she was in the presence of the Word – a big difference – just soaking up his love.

It is rather ironic that the Western Christian world has largely given lip-service to this kind of prayer when tourist pamphlets advertise doing yoga on a beach to lure people to an exotic destination. A Buddhist monk attending a retreat I was conducting told me she meditates at least six hours a day when she is on retreat. The late Bishop Sheen attributed his success in preaching completely to the time he spent in contemplation during his morning “holy hour.”

Fr. Armand Nigro SJ taught us the importance of a “holy hour” during a thirty-day retreat in Spokane before I was ordained a priest. It is a practice I have continued ever since, into which I have inserted the four stages of Lectio Divina: lectio (reading), meditatio (meditation), oratio (praying with the passage) and finally contemplatio (contemplation – just being in the Lord’s presence like Mary of Bethany).

In this holy hour I try not to think or feel anything but rather just trust that God is doing whatever God wants to do within me as I waste time with God. It is a real test of faith and a great way of praying for a recovering workaholic, as I am not doing anything for a whole hour! I can honestly say that my homilies very often mysteriously seem to form themselves during that special time. I would encourage us to make some time each day for contemplative prayer. As Franciscan Bob Mitchel used to teach, most people live busy days into which they try to insert moments of prayer. It should be the other way around – we should live prayerful lives into which we insert activity.

The second part of Jesus’ teaching on the vine is to bear fruit. The words that best describe this action are agape love and selfless service. A very pertinent question we can ask ourselves is, “What would Jesus do?” and then proceed to do it, regardless of the cost. Bearing fruit is to be like Jesus, caring for others and sharing our selves with others in trusting fellowship. Like Jesus, we are to use our skills and talents in an unselfish way.

Today the church invites us to celebrate Mary as our Lady of Fatima. This title was given to the Blessed Virgin Mary after she appeared to three shepherd children in Fatima, Portugal, between May 13 and October 13, 1917, within the context of war and anti-Catholic persecution. The three messages or ‘secrets’ of Fatima stress the importance of repentance, conversion of heart, and dedication to Our Lady, especially through daily prayer of the Rosary.

Mary is a wonderful model of contemplative prayer, abiding in God’s love, as described by Luke who mentions Mary “pondered these things in her heart” (Luke 2:19). She is also a model of one who balanced action and contemplation in her life, exemplified by her caring for her cousin Elizabeth in her pregnancy. We would do well to follow her example.

The Eucharist itself is an experience of abiding in Jesus through Word and Sacrament, that also mandates us to go out and bear fruit by sharing the love of God with all others. May our celebration deepen our intimate relationship with Jesus and empower us to live it out through selfless service.