Chatroom 2

Latest message: 2 days, 11 hours ago

arnobaule : Bye all. God bless.2025-01-14 21:02:17

arnobaule : Casey stressed the importance of time for this process, this growth into spiritual maturity.2025-01-14 21:01:20

kevinnorum : Thanks!2025-01-14 21:01:04

kevinnorum : Francis de Sales would be proud of you, Mary.2025-01-14 21:01:00

maryseitz : Goodbye, everyone. Stay warm and well. Kevin, get well!2025-01-14 21:00:59

friedachyn : Bye--til next month. Stay warm wherever you are.2025-01-14 21:00:54

arnobaule : Kevin, we should all arrive at the point!2025-01-14 21:00:21

maryseitz : Kevin, one of my takeaways from te video is, that kind of thing takes time. Oh! Who knew? I have to be patient with myself, which is not my strong suit.2025-01-14 21:00:15

kevinnorum : TTFN.2025-01-14 21:00:10

kevinnorum : Er, and gal. 🙂2025-01-14 20:59:33

kevinnorum : I missed you guys!2025-01-14 20:59:17

shawnkafader : Thanks for being here today everyone. I really enjoyed our sharing!2025-01-14 20:58:53

kevinnorum : Arno: re: Frieda's post about secular distractions. I hope I grow in seeing the sacred hid within the secular. To be pure of heart so all I see in others in their potential to also be pure of heart. E2025-01-14 20:58:53

friedachyn : I do too--she keeps it real.2025-01-14 20:58:41

arnobaule : Phase 3: "Now the good is also the desirable."2025-01-14 20:58:31

kevinnorum : Mary, I just love your style!2025-01-14 20:57:15

friedachyn : Helping one's neighbor or spouse is important to as well so don;t be too scrupulous2025-01-14 20:57:04

arnobaule : Kevin, pure?2025-01-14 20:56:53

maryseitz : Shawn, We could do that! Arno, you said much more elegantly what I was thinking. About myself, I would be glad to experience confused obedience regularly.2025-01-14 20:56:47

shawnkafader : I agree, Arno2025-01-14 20:56:46

kevinnorum : Titus 1.15: to the pure all things are pure...2025-01-14 20:55:42

arnobaule : Shawn, sounds like the kind of struggle in phase 1: Disciplina. Just plowing through without a lot of rationale may be what's called for for now.2025-01-14 20:55:41

shawnkafader : Appreciate it, Kevin. Sometimes I wish we had "Conversi Buddies" to check in with every once in a while to share journeys.2025-01-14 20:55:35

maryseitz : I would be so much better at LOH if 20 nuns and an abbess frowned at me for skipping.2025-01-14 20:55:22

friedachyn : Well, we have a lot of distractions in the secular world.2025-01-14 20:54:21

kevinnorum : Praying for you, Shawn.2025-01-14 20:53:30

arnobaule : ...in his time...2025-01-14 20:52:47

friedachyn : His talking about spiritual growth was very applicable to us.2025-01-14 20:52:30

arnobaule : It is remarkable that Bernard was dealing with these issues in this time and so are we! I found it highly contemporary y and worth delving into.2025-01-14 20:52:27

shawnkafader : So...I struggle to get back to a second LOH many days. I have committed to doing this in the New Year. Discipline - Habit - Joy...I hope.2025-01-14 20:52:14

maryseitz : It was a great video. Like the master teachers, he kept it simple and profound.2025-01-14 20:51:44

friedachyn : Yeah, this was an old video so it was great they recorded it for posterity2025-01-14 20:51:12

kevinnorum : Agreed.2025-01-14 20:51:11

arnobaule : But it is still good spiritual food to ruminate over. It has a lot of applications to we secular Cistercians, I feel. Even with all the inconveniences of technical issues.2025-01-14 20:50:56

shawnkafader : Remember, this was recorded in 1988 I believe.2025-01-14 20:50:35

friedachyn : Too much sheen from the white board2025-01-14 20:50:21

kevinnorum : His white board drawings were hard to follow.2025-01-14 20:49:55

maryseitz : Thanks for the heads up. I started listening to the next one, Alternations 2. I won't try to work backwards.2025-01-14 20:49:44

arnobaule : I know Frieda. Starting with the title. Alternation. What2025-01-14 20:49:07

maryseitz : You did. He was wrapping up the previous lecture.2025-01-14 20:48:57

friedachyn : I had to go back into YouTube looking for the first video for an introduction as this one is conference 12 and I learned this is a formation talk for monastics with a lot of Latin terms.2025-01-14 20:48:53

friedachyn : When I started the video, I felt like I had come to a lecture 10 minutes late and didn’t understand what the professor was talking about.2025-01-14 20:48:34

kevinnorum : And the sense I get is that joy/pleasure is not dependent on external circumstances ( see John 14.27).2025-01-14 20:48:33

maryseitz : I very much appreciated the part about disciplina and also about how habits go from confused dutifulness to pleasure.2025-01-14 20:47:57

friedachyn : That's a good thing, Mary2025-01-14 20:47:32

maryseitz : Trying to get back on topic here. I find that I listen to these presentations almost like lectio. I remember the specifics but more , I seem to ruminate about their application to me--for months.2025-01-14 20:46:55

friedachyn : Even for monastics devoted to the process it takes a life time with discipline and developing good habits to move toward where God desires us to be with Him.2025-01-14 20:46:50

arnobaule : And he says joy is the path to God.2025-01-14 20:46:09

kevinnorum : This sort of change is reflected in the books I have read over my adult lifetime. There are not many older ones that I re-read because I have changed and am in a different place.2025-01-14 20:44:59

friedachyn : I got more from the second half of the talk about the process of spiritual growth.2025-01-14 20:44:42

shawnkafader : Yes, it was at end of the section where he talked about - Struggles with discipline - Discipline becomes habit - Habit becomes joy.2025-01-14 20:44:31

arnobaule : Thanks for the chuckle, Mary!2025-01-14 20:43:53

maryseitz : later she hired a belly dancer for her son's birthday. She smiled naturally, was relaxed, and had joy through the show. A bellydancer! That looks like a 100% recovery! She never recognized me. 😉2025-01-14 20:41:47

arnobaule : Shawn, I think he's talking about maturing into the necessary changes over time. Spiritual maturity.2025-01-14 20:41:31

kevinnorum : C.S Lewis: prayer doesn't change God, it changes me.2025-01-14 20:41:20

friedachyn : Of coursw we change---just with ageing and life experiences.2025-01-14 20:41:12

maryseitz : Arno, there was a happy ending. It was a parish group of all ages and sexes of people. The ringleader used to hiss and smile like the devil. I complained and she got therapy. It worked! Several years2025-01-14 20:40:10

shawnkafader : Near the end of the talk Casey made the statement - "The reality never changes, we change." - What do you think of this?2025-01-14 20:40:04

friedachyn : To get back on topic. Cultivating good habits, you are transformed so that now the good is also the desirable, what you choose to do which I consider a sense of vocation to helping one’s neighbor.2025-01-14 20:39:45

maryseitz : Yes, Frieda.2025-01-14 20:38:42

arnobaule : I don't know how to respond to your experience Mary. It sounds awful. Was this within the Church or some old abuellitas passing judgement?2025-01-14 20:38:38

maryseitz : pardon me, diocesan exorcist. But I am way off topic.2025-01-14 20:38:28

friedachyn : That sounds psychologically dangerous to me, Mary2025-01-14 20:38:24

maryseitz : parish exorcist would just stir the pot and make things worse.2025-01-14 20:37:17

maryseitz : The more I learn about schizophrenia, the more it indeed resembles possession. But I think my son is handling it the best way--with medication, prayer and nonviolence. I am kind of concerned that the2025-01-14 20:37:03

friedachyn : Knowing about paganism doesn't mean you approve or join in it.2025-01-14 20:35:19

arnobaule : There is a whole thing around the issue of exorcism even within the Church. I have difficulty with it. When you take away the psychological dynamics, what do you have left?2025-01-14 20:34:47

shawnkafader : Another alteration, Mary - Sacred:Secular.2025-01-14 20:34:37

maryseitz : Yes. I guess I was steeped in paganism.2025-01-14 20:33:53

friedachyn : They wanted to exorcise the pagan world from you, Mary?2025-01-14 20:33:06

maryseitz : okaaay what did I do to deserve exorcism? I wrote a novel set in Bronze Age Crete, in a pagan world before the time of Christ.2025-01-14 20:32:06

friedachyn : I like that, Kevin2025-01-14 20:32:05

kevinnorum : I mean, versus sitting at Jesus feet knowing that our lives are hid in Christ (Colossians 3.1-4).2025-01-14 20:31:39

arnobaule : Mary, spiritual combat really takes place within us. To project that out as on people, institutions, or ideas can be dangerous as you can imagine. Who really knows? Discernment?2025-01-14 20:31:38

maryseitz : Yes, Arno! They tried to exorcise me.2025-01-14 20:31:16

kevinnorum : Mary, I have a friend whose marriage has broken up because his wife went full into the spiritual combat program. So much focus on Satan and demons vs' Jesus.2025-01-14 20:30:32

shawnkafader : 3 times you're out, Frieda...haha2025-01-14 20:30:25

friedachyn : I can't type or proofread2025-01-14 20:30:25

friedachyn : Know rhyself2025-01-14 20:29:58

friedachyn : Kbow thyself.2025-01-14 20:29:44

shawnkafader : I think this is a cooperation between us and God...but the further we get along the journey the more we realize the work is God's.2025-01-14 20:29:40

arnobaule : Casey mentions the necessity of having real experience of struggle with the deep dark side of ourselves as an indicator of progress on the spiritual path.2025-01-14 20:28:24

friedachyn : being prepared to learn; discipline being prepared to work. Discipline of making time and doing liturgy of the hours, lectio.2025-01-14 20:28:23

maryseitz : Arno, tell me about spiritual combat. I once belonged to a Charismatic group that went off the rails because of its dedication to combating the evil one. I've been leery of spiritual combat ever since2025-01-14 20:28:18

shawnkafader : I think this is what Casey was talking about when he pointed out our ontological desire for God.2025-01-14 20:27:58

friedachyn : I liked the secon half of the tallk. Stages in the spiritual life: means more than willpower and trying but a learning process from desire in other words being prepared to learn; discipline being prep2025-01-14 20:27:58

friedachyn : We don't let it take over.2025-01-14 20:26:42

arnobaule : Authentically dealing with the shadow side is what is described as spiritual combat.2025-01-14 20:26:06

shawnkafader : Our awareness can help it diminish.2025-01-14 20:25:17

arnobaule : Overcome, not meaning eliminate; I don't think we can eliminate what is part of our basic human make up.2025-01-14 20:24:31

shawnkafader : So we make progress little by little - sometimes seen by others before we see it ourselves.2025-01-14 20:24:03

kevinnorum : Right, Arno. Accepting does not mean license.2025-01-14 20:23:38

arnobaule : We have to overcome the shadow side (keep it in check) rather than act on it.2025-01-14 20:23:14

kevinnorum : Sin:faith is with me until I leave this house of flesh2025-01-14 20:22:58

kevinnorum : the stronger are the breakouts of shadow self behaviours or transferring them on to others2025-01-14 20:22:13

shawnkafader : Yes, Kevin.2025-01-14 20:21:59

friedachyn : to torture ourselves with guilt over a weak faith.2025-01-14 20:21:04

kevinnorum : One of the things I thought of was Carl Jung's emphasis on accepting our shadow self as being key to maturing. The more we deny or say no to this part of us...2025-01-14 20:21:00

friedachyn : Altternation between faith and sin, I think of as faith and doubt, presence and absence, mercy and judgment—polarities between hope and fear but both are true to human experience so we don’ t have…2025-01-14 20:20:54

shawnkafader : In my authentic struggle I am being pulled toward glory.2025-01-14 20:20:38

shawnkafader : Like Theresa of Avila says in The Interior Castle - there comes a point when God pulls you toward the center with a loving tether.2025-01-14 20:19:57

shawnkafader : I liked the 50/50 sin - grace alteration that is constantly moving toward glory. This helped me.2025-01-14 20:18:22

maryseitz : Yes, Arno, and if you do lectio with a cursing psalm, you'll be immersed in it for a long time! I find that hard.2025-01-14 20:18:20

arnobaule : I want to get beyond the cursing psalms.2025-01-14 20:17:41

friedachyn : Like Fr Casey said--. The intrinsic changeableness of Christian experience of grace means that no single experience can be isolated as normative of the human response to God.2025-01-14 20:17:35

shawnkafader : This is like a season, Mary.2025-01-14 20:17:31

maryseitz : Shawn, do you mean, practicing for 20 / 40 / 60 years?2025-01-14 20:17:20

maryseitz : I agree with y'all/Frieda! But some very holy people don't agree! And are thriving in the positive realm. They are not pie-in-the-sky folks though. Maybe this is what they need right now.2025-01-14 20:16:47

shawnkafader : I really liked the way Casey charted out the journey of spiritual growth.2025-01-14 20:16:41

kevinnorum : The "Yet" of Lamentations 3. 21 is like a huge pivot which permits both lamentation and hope to co-exist.2025-01-14 20:16:34

friedachyn : I agree with Kevin, context is important and being real with God2025-01-14 20:16:09

friedachyn : Mary, I think we need to struggle with the difficult psalms even the cursing ones.2025-01-14 20:15:21

kevinnorum : Mary, in a sense it is all getting into our Bibles, so that is good. Lamentations is hard if you don't know Jeremiah and the book that bears his name. Although, chapter 3 of Lamentations is positive.2025-01-14 20:15:01

shawnkafader : Mary, I think we naturally try to avoid/deny what feels negative to us. Perhaps the group needs to discuss this.2025-01-14 20:14:47

arnobaule : Exactly Shawn. The downside of spiritual growth that Bernard ala Casey is saying is necessary to experience as authentic growth.2025-01-14 20:14:33

shawnkafader : Agree, Arno. My problem is in accepting/living into both.2025-01-14 20:13:30

maryseitz : reading Nan Merrill's Psalms for Praying, which is much more contemporary and positive. And I think the Holy Spirit is okay with that. It feels a little one-dimensional to me. What are your thoughts?2025-01-14 20:13:14

arnobaule : I think he is suggesting that the tension produced by the polarization is what produces the growth or movement forward, much as the synthesis, antisynthesis producing the synthesis (dialectic).2025-01-14 20:12:52

maryseitz : Here, I have a question for y'all. In my centering prayer group, we used to do lectio on the psalms. The lamentations can get pretty violent, and the whole group kind of melted down. Now they're readi2025-01-14 20:12:23

kevinnorum : Indeed. Maybe it is right that we forget the illness and its suffering once it is over.2025-01-14 20:12:21

shawnkafader : Kevin, how would we know what wellness feels like without a head cold?2025-01-14 20:11:33

kevinnorum : I like that, Frieda. I can know hope in the midst of fear, they do not exclude one another. When I feel God is absent I can risk that He is present.2025-01-14 20:11:25

friedachyn : Like art we need both light and dark2025-01-14 20:11:05

shawnkafader : Casey also pointed out that it is not just the positive alone.2025-01-14 20:10:47

kevinnorum : And that any polarization is not true human experience.2025-01-14 20:10:07

friedachyn : I think we need balance and hope.2025-01-14 20:09:58

arnobaule : Yes, Shawn. In fact he says that both are necessary.2025-01-14 20:09:29

friedachyn : Maybe one needs to know when one has enough and give up searching2025-01-14 20:08:59

shawnkafader : Interesting how Casey pointed out that "both belong."2025-01-14 20:08:49

kevinnorum : a time to search and a time to give up.2025-01-14 20:08:06

maryseitz : Is there a time for war?2025-01-14 20:07:56

friedachyn : Indeed, Shawn we need peace everywhere.2025-01-14 20:07:32

shawnkafader : A time for peace and a time for war. I am praying for peace.2025-01-14 20:06:57

friedachyn : Mine was a time to keep; a time to throw away. Though I throw away old papers and old notices or paid bills at the turn of a new year, I donate books and old clothes and shoes to Goodwill.2025-01-14 20:06:46

friedachyn : Did you gravitate to any of the alternations listed in the Ecclesiastes reading?2025-01-14 20:05:52

maryseitz : Amen.2025-01-14 20:05:42

arnobaule : Amen2025-01-14 20:05:30

shawnkafader : Amen.2025-01-14 20:05:29

kevinnorum : Amen.2025-01-14 20:05:21

friedachyn : Let’s pray; O God f truth, prepare our minds to hear and heed your holy word in Ecclesiastes on alternation: fill every heart that longs for You with your mysterious presence, Lord. Amen.2025-01-14 20:05:08

arnobaule : No Shawn, far from it. Also, the winds have kept the smoke from the Los Angeles fires from the Valley floor here.2025-01-14 20:04:45

shawnkafader : Is it snowing in Vegas today Arno?2025-01-14 20:03:45

kevinnorum : Indeed. We don't think about being actively content when we are healthy and well provided for. Paul did.2025-01-14 20:03:40

friedachyn : Hi Arno2025-01-14 20:03:25

maryseitz : Hi, Arno!2025-01-14 20:03:13

arnobaule : Hello all2025-01-14 20:03:03

friedachyn : It wpould be nice if we didn't get sick but then we wouldn't have immunity2025-01-14 20:02:52

maryseitz : Kevin, are you content in your cold? I am not that spiritually advanced!2025-01-14 20:02:51

shawnkafader : Kevin, that seems to fit right into the talk this month!2025-01-14 20:02:24

kevinnorum : Thanks.2025-01-14 20:02:05

maryseitz : Sorry about your cold, Kevin.2025-01-14 20:01:57

kevinnorum : Sickness - health: another alternation. Is there a secret to being content in both?2025-01-14 20:01:51

maryseitz : Hi, all! Our snow has condensed into ice now so it's treacherous but hopefully nearing the end!2025-01-14 20:01:40

friedachyn : Thankfully, Texas is warming up this week, Shawn2025-01-14 20:01:31

kevinnorum : Hi Shawn. You are getting the arctic air we had awhile ago. We are actually above freezing for a few a days now.2025-01-14 20:01:17

friedachyn : Sorry to hear of your cold, Kevin.2025-01-14 20:00:58

shawnkafader : Hello everyone. Very cold in Northern Indiana.2025-01-14 20:00:20

kevinnorum : Hi Frieda! It is going well, except I got this head cold that has plugged my ears for about a week now.2025-01-14 20:00:02

friedachyn : Greetings. How is the new year going for you? Here in north Texas we just got out of our first and hopefully last snow fall.2025-01-14 19:59:09

Conversi : Welcome to the Chat2024-12-20 03:23:52

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