Writings on the Spiritual Life

William Flewelling

Description

Abbot Andre Louf said that, when a person decides to get serious about the spiritual life, s/he should acquire a spiritual director. Wayne Proudfoot argued that the form of religious experience depends upon the tradition in which it is perceived. Georges Bataille searched out the meaning of his own intense inner experience in non-traditional ways. This book seeks to follow the meaning of traditional measures of the spiritual life learned through the experience of the author once his spiritual life decided to choose him.

Sujets

• Values
• Philosophie et théologie
• Religión
• Religious text
• Value (personal and cultural)
• Spirituality
• Religion

Informations

• Publié par: AuthorHouse
• Date de parution: 09 août 2022
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781665567961
• Langue: English

Extrait

Also By This Author
Po etry
Time Grown Li vely
From My Corner Seat
Enticing My Del ight
The Arthur P oems
From Recurrent Yester days
In Silhou ette
To Silent Disappear ance
Teasing The Soul
Allowing The Heart To Contemp late
As Lace Along The Wood
To Trace Familia rity
The Matt P oems
Elaborating Life
The Buoyancy of Unsuspected Joy
To Haunt The Clever Sheer Of G race
The Christmas P oems
Life Is Empl oyed
Adrift In Seas Of Strange ness
Composure In Constr aint
An Elegance That Daw dles
The Ash Wind Sigh
Unplanned Obsolesc ence
Savored Once And Once A gain
The Simple Curvature Of W ords
Weave Tapestries Of Naught At All
On Inscape’s C urve
Cacophony Of Sil ence
Inn-By-The-Bye Sto ries
vols. 1, 2,3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8
9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 15 , 16,
17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22 , 23
Devoti onal
Some Reflective Pra yers
Reflective Prayers: A Second Collec tion
A Third Collection Of Reflective Pra yers
For Your Quiet Medita tion
A Fourth Collection Of Reflective Pra yers
Cantica S acra
A Fifth Collection Of Reflective Pra yers
A Sixth Collection Of Reflective Pra yers
A Second “For Your Quiet Medita tion”
A Second Cantica S acra
Without A F lock
Hymn Texts To A Welsh Meter – 1
A Seventh Collection of Reflective Pra yers
Directions Of A Pastoral Life time
Part I: Pastoral Notes, Letters To Anna, Occasional Pamph lets
Part II: Psalm Meditations, Regula V itae
Part III: Elders’ Stu dies
Part IV: Stu dies
Part V: The Song Of Songs: An Attrac tion
Exegetical W orks
From The Catholic Epistles: Bible Stu dies
Paul’s Letter To The Romans: A Bible S tudy
The Book Of Hebrews: A Bible S tudy
Letters Pauline And Pastoral: Bible Stu dies
The First Letter Of Paul To The Corinthians: A Bible S tudy
The Gospel According To Luke 1:1 through 9:50
The Gospel According To Luke 9:51 Through 1 9:27
The Gospel According To Luke 19:28 Through 24:53: A Bible S tudy
all published by AuthorHouse.com
Writings On The Spiritual Life
 
A School Of Prayer with A Second School Of Prayer and Letters To Anna
 
 
 
WILLIAM FLEWELLING
 
 
 

 
 
AuthorHouse™
1663 Liberty Drive
Bloomington, IN 47403
www.authorhouse.com
Phone: [phone]
 
 
 
 
© 2022 William Flewelling. All rights reserved.
 
No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.
 
Published by AuthorHouse 08/08/2022
 
ISBN: 978-1-6655-6797-8 (sc)
ISBN: 978-1-6655-6796-1 (e)
 
 
 
 
 
Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.
Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.
 
 
 
Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.
CONTENTS
Foreword
A School Of Prayer
I. A Beginning
II. Practicing The Presence
III. Meditative Reading of Scripture
IV. Silence
V. Gethsemane and Golgotha
VI. Prayer And Results
A Second School Of Prayer
I. The Attitude Of Prayer
II. What Does It Mean To Pray Always?
III. Solitude – Daring To Be Alone With God
IV. What Does It Mean To Be Together In Prayer?
V. Rhythms In Prayer
VI. Wrestling With God
VII. In The Way Of Unknowing
Letters To Anna
I. On Discipline
II. On Humility
III. On Dignity
IV. On Gentleness
V. On Simplicity
VI. On Faithfulness
VII. On Constancy
VIII. On Hospitality
IX. On Solitude
X. On Vocation
XI. On Suffering
XII. On Reading the Scripture
XIII. On Prayer
XIV. On Love
XV. On Ministry
XVI. On The Church
XVII. On The Trinity
XVIII. On The Incarnation
XIX. On The Atonement
 
About the Author
FOREWORD
In the mid 1980s, as a program idea for the church I was serving then, First Christian Church of LaPorte, IN, I developed what I called “A School of Prayer”. We gathered on a Sunday evening and talked our way through one of the six sessions that had been prepared. Another year, a “Second School of Prayer” was offered, this time with a sequence of seven sessions.
These study sessions were later published by Kelby Cotton in a newsletter on the spiritual life he circulated out of the congregation he served in the Denver, CO area. I do not have the newsletters in hand anymore and I do not recall the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) congregation he served there nor the name he gave the newsletter. I do recall meeting a reader of those newsletters and having him note that I was the author of them. I suppose that memory encourages me to revisit these School of Prayer offerings and put them together in this format.
I include as well my “Letters to Anna”, newly re-edited. They are letters composed to an imagined young girl, likely a tween or early teen, named Anna and written by someone who signed the letters AB. These letters were published in my Directions Of A Pastoral Lifetime, Part I , published through AuthorHouse.com, as the middle section of the book. They address matters of concern to the spiritual life as I see it and include discussions of Ministry, Church, Incarnation, Trinity, and Atonement. As such, it appears to me apt to be included with the Schools of Prayer in this setting.
I find that the works drew on other readings, mostly indirectly, but that those works were handiest in naming the happenings in my own experience with God in prayer. That is to say, the work as developed appears to me to come from what was first of all experience. In a personal retreat I attended about a decade after these were written, I inquired of my director, Sister Cornelia, of a passage I had read in a side book I had with me, one by Andre Louf in which the Abbot says that if you decide to get serious about the spiritual life, you should ger a spiritual director first. My question was what do you do if the spiritual life decides to get serious with you? She replied that the true Spiritual Director is the Holy Spirit; her job was to point out what the Spirit was doing. I take my task here as pointing out what the Spirit has been doing, at least with me.
I hope you find the collection of interest and value in your own life in the Spirit.
William Flewelling

A SCHOOL OF PRAYER
I
A BEGINNING

Whyever would we want a school of prayer? After all, we are far more accustomed to exercise in praying; and that is good to do. And, we are aware of prayer groups; and they are usually well worthwhile.
Well, we need a school of prayer because we are commonly so un aware of some basic facts.
First of all, we have always thought of praying as something we do. We are wrong. The first fact, as William McNamara points out in Earthy Mysticism , Crossword, NY, 1983) is: We cannot pray. Don’t despair: that is a very good lesson for us. The Apostle Paul says we do not know how to pray as we ought. And so, the Holy Spirit prays in us, with groans too deep for words. Praying is a divine activity. And we take part in it by giving ourselves to God.
Secondly, we have always been told that praying is nice, giving a warm feeling inside. But what happens when someone begins to pray is that s/he meets God, a consuming fire. And that is precisely the reason we pray: to meet God, to engage God passionately, to be engaged by God totally.
People who have prayed deeply agree, over many centuries, over many places, that the hope is to be united with God. Symeon the New Theologian repeatedly speaks of himself as iron placed into the furnace of God. Like iron in a blacksmith’s forge, he takes on the character of fire while yet remaining iron. He uses that of union with God, the very sort of thing that prayer is about.
I suppose we could restate these as saying that prayer is God’s activity in us, searching us with Holy Spirit in order to draw us to God.
That leaves us feeling pretty much out of it, so far as praying is concerned. And we may begin to wonder why we would have a school of prayer I first place! There is good reason. For God is so very respectful. God waits for us. God invites and offers and waits. We have to choose to love God. We have to choose to approach God, the God who has already approached us.
People fall in love in many different ways. There is a season for polite chit-chat over tea and cakes, or gentle parties to explore one another’s company safely. There is a season for being deeply, warmly present to one another. At times that presence is passionate and unreserved. At times that passion takes the form of physical union. Always, there is a sense of being deeply together, more myself because of my beloved with whom I am one than could ever be possible otherwise.
When we come to prayer, it is the same, only more so. Our first step in prayer and in praying is to become passionately in love with God. Our second step in prayer is to realize there are some difficulties – sin. And something needs to be done about it. It would be handy and easy if we could say sin is nothing more than breaking the rules. Then we worry about getting caught, feel guilty and find some way to ease our guilt. But that is not sin.
Sin is what separates us from God, from ot