Prayers

Seven Ways to Spice Up Your Relationship with God

The dry times in our relationship with the Creator, just like with our loved ones, are invitations to shake things up, get creative, and spice up the time you spend with God.

Embraced—The Gift of Imaginative Prayer

Imagine, for a moment, what the Apostle John may have experienced at the end of the Last Supper when Jesus invited him to sit and rest his head against his chest.   What went through John’s mind as he relaxed next to Jesus? Could he feel Jesus’ heart beat? Did he...

Help! How to Deal with Life’s Interruptions & Distractions

St. Francis of Assisi suggests when we take time to pray and contemplate—to connect with our Inner Beauty—we discover wholeness. We become God’s prayer. Here at the Abbey of Gethsemane tucked in the rolling hills of rural Kentucky, I spend a week of silent retreat....

Desire

Desire There’s an ache that accompanies usA human wound that won’t go away. It’s our desire for...

Finding Your Center

Do you ever notice how often our thoughts buzz around our heads like a swarm of bees circling a...

Frosty the Snowman and the Breath Prayer Meditation

At the moment of your birth, the first wisp of air that entered your nostrils was the breath of God bringing you to life. As the Creator breathed into you, you became a living soul. Every breath you’ve taken since, and every breath you take until that moment you pass...

Savoring God’s Presence Within You (Lectio Divina Meditation)

Meditation is an awakening to, an awareness of, the presence of God within you, Thomas Merton writes.  It’s our personal encounter with Christ, an experience beyond words of the unique relationship between our self and the One who created us.   When we spend time with...

Prayer of the One Self

I am beginning to know you better.  The two of you.  I am beginning to accept each of you as you are, opening my heart to be loved by the Life-Giver: My true self, in touch with grace, in touch with my gifts, in touch with the discerning heart that lives...

Prayer of the False Self

Oh God, my God, why do I abandon you? Far from you I wander and drift dancing on a sea of my attachments. My desire for affirmation so I feel like I belong, even though I know I belong to you, and you are all I need. My compulsion to feel responsible for everything...