Pro Orantibus Day: For Those Who Pray

Today the Church celebrates "pro orantibus" day, namely the day when we celebrate those who spend their lives in prayer. Cloistered and eremitical vocations certainly are the main ones we call to mind but I am especially reminded of all those are elderly and others who may be isolated or unable to do active ministry who spend their days and nights praying for our world, for our parishes, and so forth.

In prayer we allow God to love and accompany us, to work within and transform our hearts and make us into his own prayers in our world. We give ourselves to God so God might give himself to us and to those to whom we witness. We give ourselves to God so that the face we turn to the world is the very image of God-made-flesh. And of course, we pray and give our lives to prayer so that the deepest law of creation, Love-in-Act, is even more clearly revealed and made more pervasive within and through those same lives. In other words, we do so to glorify God and sanctify our world.

Contemplatives, whether hermits or not, remind us all that God completes us, that we are not truly human unless we are covenant partners with God. The positive side of this, of course,  is that this relationship is the foundation of ALL of our lives and we are each and all of us called to embrace it more fully day by day --- lack of cloister notwithstanding. While "pro orantibus" day celebrates in a special way those who live cloistered and eremitical lives, it also celebrates every person who lives his or her life for God and all that is precious to God by committing to be persons who truly allow God to work within us,

On Contemplation, Regard for Contemplatives, and Science and Contemplation

[[Dear Sister, thanks for the post on the theological points which have been central to your life. I was able to see a little more clearly how these things are linked together. Well anyhow I was able to see THAT they are closely related and interrelated. One thing that was interesting was the [centrality] of paradox. I liked what Henri de Lubac said about only being able to contemplate paradox and that we can't resolve it. Oh, by the way, thank you for your explanation of docetism and arianism. I had never heard anyone explain these as a loss of the [paradoxical] nature of truth. That was pretty cool.

But anyway, my questions are about contemplative life and prayer. I know the Church regards contemplative life highly in some ways, but I wonder if you think they REALLY regard it highly? I read somewhere about a hermit not feeling contemplatives had a real place in the Church and that no one understood contemplative prayer or mystical prayer and experiences. She wanted to write for her diocesan paper but I think they had no space for something on these topics. Do you feel like your life is really regarded?

If what you say about paradox and contemplation is true then shouldn't everyone become a contemplative? But most people don't. Are scientists contemplatives or are they anti-contemplatives? I mean sometimes they seem to be contemplating the paradox of nature or reality and other times they are tearing things apart and seem to be incapable of contemplating things. How do you define contemplation anyway? Is it gazing at God and if it is, then how do we do that? I can't see God and I don't think you can either.  .  .]]

Definitions of Contemplation:

LOL!! No, I can't see God and yet I do consider myself a contemplative! Let me start with your last questions, not because they necessarily lead to the others, but because they have me laughing and because they are based on an important truth, namely, we can't talk about anything unless we are all on the same page regarding definitions. There is a sense in which contemplation has always meant gazing on the face of God. It involves a profound look at reality and especially at the depth dimension of reality. I think that when we talk about the contemplative stance of artists, writers, scientists (more about that later!), composers, etc, we are speaking about people who do look reverently on reality and let it grasp and shake them to the core with its beauty, order, relationships, structure, power, fragility, meaning or value, and so forth. I believe that those who are known in the Church as "proper" contemplatives "possess" such an attitude towards reality, but especially towards nature and towards other persons. These people, in one way and another, are concerned with gazing on the face of God.

But I think that there is a second and more fundamental sense to the term contemplation which has less to do with looking on the face of God than it does with allowing God to gaze at us. When contemplatives sit in prayer they often see and feel nothing at all --- except the deep quiet that comes from surrender to the silence of solitude. If you ask what they saw the only answer is often, "darkness" or "nothing", and there can be the sense that the darkness, as the silence and solitude, are living realities which, though too great to be seen or comprehended by us, somehow grasp or take hold of us instead. In these moments we are known in the biblical sense of that term, that is, with an intimacy which is almost sexual in its comprehensiveness. We know ourselves as known and loved by God and one of the better metaphors for this prayer speaks in terms of being gazed at and delighted in by God. In such a view contemplation is less something we do than it is our submission to the dynamism of God being God. Occasionally these experiences might be translated into visual imagery or other sensible experiences --- wonderful when it happens --- but also not really necessary for the profound sense of being seen, touched, and known.

On Science, Scientists and Contemplation

Both dimensions are present in the properly contemplative life, that is, in the lives of those who are, properly speaking, contemplatives. At the same time though, probably every person knows something of these two dimensions of the contemplative life and of contemplative prayer. This leads me to your great question about scientists. My sense is that generally scientists are contemplative without being contemplatives. They are capable of being grasped by reality in a way which compels them to do science, to explore, analyze, experiment with, hypothesize, test, and then repeat the process or parts of the process again and again. They are passionate and "ultimately concerned" in the way any person of faith is concerned in an ultimate way. They submit to the truth that grasps them and thus too to order, depth, beauty, structure, and so forth. They are, to a certain degree, reverent about the reality which is the focus of their work --- and often about the greater reality we all know. And some are contemplative in the theological sense of that word; they are aware of the necessity and reality of something transcendent which grounds and is the source of even their own science; more, they reverence and submit to that reality in the way of any person of faith.

But there are some scientists who insist on divorcing the world around them from depth, meaning, and so forth. For these scientists what Tillich called "technical" reason is enough. So long as they can dissect, analyze, explore, hypothesize, test, and in general "know" and exploit or use something which is finite and no greater than the human mind, they believe this is enough. In fact, they believe this is all that is possible. Some of these scientists are called scientific naturalists. I honestly don't know if these folks never feel as though they have been grasped by something bigger than they are, much less by something which is living, but those I have read seem to rule out any ultimate or truly transcendent dimension to things. My point is simply that there is more than one kind of scientist and we can't lump them together too easily.

One of the really great things about contemporary physics with its notions of entanglement and the sense that some things only really exist the moment they are observed, for instance, is that scientists are coming to see more clearly that paradox and relationality lie at the heart of reality. This means that though they are free (and perhaps called) to explore science even more deeply and rigorously, they are coming to suspect that, by its very nature, reality cannot be pried apart and "objectively known" as was once thought. Instead, one must give oneself over to it, let oneself be taken hold of by it, apprehend it with oneself as an integral part of the equation. Really objective knowledge is also profoundly subjective.

Meanwhile, for instance, the discovery of fractals lets us imagine an infinite depth to reality, a depth which is clearly reflected and imaged again and again and again in all being. In some ways fractals are the face of the infinite. These discoveries, and others as well, open the door to contemplation to the scientist precisely as scientist. It's an exciting time for them but also for theologians and contemplatives (in the proper sense of the term) because in significant senses we know this depth dimension of all reality and have known and been known by "him" right along. This means that while science cannot replace religion and while religion cannot replace science, they can and are called to approach reality with the same reverent sense of awe;  the knowledge we each possess has never been more clearly complementary or capable of enlivening and illuminating one another.

Are Contemplatives regarded in the Church?

I think I read the same piece you did by the hermit bemoaning the state of the contemplative in the Church and world. I both agree (and sympathize) and disagree with her. First, are contemplatives regarded in the Church? Yes, there is no doubt in my mind that they are. What is not properly regarded is the universality of the contemplative experience in not just the life of faith, but the life of the arts, sciences, music, and so forth. We are still suffering under the notion that contemplation is a rarefied form of prayer to which very few are called. Several years ago a diocese stopped all Centering prayer meetings and one of the diocesan officials (a priest and possibly a Monsignor) explained that "contemplative prayer takes years to develop and is really for a relative few religious." (I don't think he realized how serious the criticism was he was leveling at his own prayer life with this judgment!) In any case while we (the Church per se) esteem contemplatives I am not sure folks generally regard contemplative prayer or contemplative living sufficiently. Of course it is hard to really regard what you do not understand or see the value in and the thing about contemplation is that it is hard to point to its value.

I have to say that it also doesn't help any when those who call themselves "mystics" define contemplative prayer in terms of experiences few will ever have, ecstasies, locutions, visions, etc, or in terms of a spirituality which is so "world-hating" and incapable of seeing the sacramental character of ALL reality that no honest or healthy person would WANT to be associated with it. It is important to remember that the truly miraculous, like the truly contemplative, is rooted in something both transcendent and immanent. (It is not "supernatural" in the way we ordinarily think of that word so much as it also transcends the natural.) To associate contemplative prayer with the "paranormal", for instance, is to make it elitist, and for most of us (including most genuine contemplatives), weird and irrelevant as well. So, my answer is that among those who really know what it is, contemplation is esteemed. Among those who do not know what it means or those who mistakenly believe it is elitist and meant for the favored few it is not really esteemed either.

I do feel my own life is regarded despite the fact that I suspect it is not generally understood. That I and the life I live are regarded is true on the parish level especially, but also on the diocesan and then too on the level of the universal Church. My pastor, for instance, always invites me to special staff occasions and does not expect me to attend the more routine meetings (to which I would have little to add anyway since I am far less involved in the day to day staff concerns). At these and many other times he often suggests a way I can contribute which is reflective of my contemplative life. I am able to lead services three times a month and there is no doubt people appreciate what I bring to them. If I suggest trying a period of silence people enter into that and the kids at our school (the few times I have done some of this for them) certainly are open to learning quiet prayer. One of the things I really appreciate is that I am invited to everything at the parish even when I am unable to say yes. It is rather special to have folks continue to make sure I am specifically invited though they know my life as a hermit may not really allow me to accept the invitation. In any case, all of these people respect my own need for silence and solitude so my sense is they do indeed regard contemplative life (or those living it).

Why is Contemplative Prayer NOT regarded?

Part of the problem which your questions and the comments made by the hermit you mentioned circle around is that we do not teach contemplative prayer or even introduce people to the environment in which it can flower. We teach prayers and have a few moments of quiet, but we simply do not allow for the silence needed for prayer itself. Some of this comes from folks being insecure with "teaching" (mentoring) others in this way. Part of our resistance to doing this, I think, comes from the sense that we are wasting time doing this; we really should be teaching a more "practical religion" some would say, or we should be teaching about social justice, or generally doing something more constructive with clear goals and ends, but sitting in silence to learn contemplative prayer? C'mon! (Both are actually necessary!) Adults know this to some extent, but this points up the third part of the problem, namely, it takes time and commitment with no tangible results for contemplative praxis to deepen and bloom in a person's life. Today folks tend to make (and desire their children to make) commitments to things that give more immediate returns  (including the capacity to get a good job and earn money!) --- and those which the Church has encouraged is a more "proper" part of "their" vocations!

On Contemplation and Contemporary Society:

I wonder if diocesan papers get offers from contemplatives to write about the importance of contemplative prayer in the lives of families, children, and people struggling in all the ways contemporary culture brings on. It would not be enough to write about contemplation using examples from past centuries, for instance. There would need to be some compelling stories about the way contemplation affects people, the way they live, see, hear, appreciate life, etc. For instance, several years ago I did a class in prayer for one of our grade school's classes. We practiced silent prayer at the end and I asked the kids to practice this once or twice each day. (Before bed was one of the times I suggested.) The class wrote me letters to thank me for coming and also to tell me what the visit meant. Several spoke of praying silently each night before sleep. A couple of the students wrote unintentionally humorous comments, to wit: "I really like praying before bed this way. It really works; I go right to sleep!!" but one young man wrote the following really perceptive comment (a budding contemplative in the making, perhaps): "I have been praying silently each night before going to bed. It really helps. When I wake up the next morning I feel different!"

Of course the purpose of prayer is to let God be God; we don't want to turn it into the latest anti-anxiety treatment, or the newest alternative therapy for ADHD, but the simple fact is, when we allow God to be God for us and in us, we really are different. We are completed as persons and as a result we approach life with more patience and perseverance, greater empathy and compassion, and a greater capacity to risk ourselves for others when we don't see any immediate return for ourselves.  There is a generosity and a wider perspective that comes with contemplation. Certainly silence and the simple practice of waiting on God and learning to listen to one's own heart have their effects as well, but even so, quiet prayer is about letting God be God and becoming the persons we are in relation to the sovereignty of Love-in-Act. What we are seeing with a new freshness today is that in a sacramental world increasingly understood as fundamentally paradoxical and relational, the capacity for contemplation is important and often the only adequate approach to truly human forms of knowing whether these are associated with faith and theology or with the sciences.

Postscript: I realized I did not answer the question about everyone becoming contemplatives. I answered a similar question once before but from the "other direction". That one asked why we needed contemplative nuns if everyone was meant or called to pray contemplatively. For that post, please see, Why do we need Contemplative Convents?  Though from a different direction I think it answers your question as well. If not, please get back to me.

Merton, TS Elliot, The Apophatic Way and My Own Contemplative Life

Dear Sister, I like the posts you have put up with the picture of the monk and the quotes from Merton and T.S. Elliot. I hope you continue these. Is Merton a favorite writer and spiritual teacher for you? I ask because some people have written that he went kind of awry or was "off" in his later years and was discredited as a Catholic monk. I don't mean you shouldn't read him but I wondered why you liked him and if you thought that was true.]]

Hi there. Thanks for your comments on the posts. I do plan to continue these. Not only do I love the picture -- which for me sums up so much of the eremitical life -- but I think these posts provide a way of giving a small but significant taste of various authors on the contemplative journey from time to time. When I first thought of combining the picture with a single quote I was thinking that visually and otherwise it would present as a kind of contemplative moment within the blog itself; I thought that might be really attractive to folks who come here. I haven't decided how often I want to put these up -- not TOO frequently of course --- and I think I also need to title them similarly so they stand out as a regular feature of the blog, but those logistical matters aside, yes I will continue to put them up.

As for Thomas Merton, yes, he is a favorite writer and spiritual teacher (or mentor) for me though until very recently it had been some time since I had actually read him. I was saying to a friend earlier today that I have just recently come back to Merton and am beginning to reread him with new eyes. I first picked up his stuff in the late 1960's or early 1970's. Later, in the 1980's I read some of his work on eremitical life. Along with Merton's own stuff I am looking again at the work of William Shannon. The latter's revision of The Dark Path (his new book is called Thomas Merton's Paradise Journey) is really exciting because in it I am reading again about something I once felt called to and with which I resonated to some limited degree, but now recognize as profoundly descriptive of my own spiritual journey and contemplative experience. You see, Merton's approach to contemplation and my own are the same (which is hardly surprising!); we both were called to the "apophatic" (a-poh-FAT-ic) tradition or way --- the way of darkness and denial. (It comes from the Greek word apophasis (uh-POF-uh-sis) which means negation or denial, ("God is not. . ."). It's opposite is the kataphatic or affirmative way (kataphasis [keh-TAF-uh-sis] means affirmation); it is a way of doing theology which proceeds by way of analogy and makes affirmations about God both in terms of similarity ("God is like. . .") and even greater dissimilarity ("but God is even more unlike . . ."). It does not, by definition, penetrate to the deepest essence or heart of God)

Apophatic Tradition in Contemplation

Apophatic contemplation, which is a way built on "experiencing" God directly, thrives on paradox and I have been turned on by paradox and especially by the paradoxes of Christianity from the moment my first major professor explained the difference between the way Greek thought tends to proceed and the way Biblical thought works. (The first moves from thesis to antithesis and then comes to rest in a synthesis which often is a kind of golden mean. Biblical thought, on the other hand, is at home with paradox --- a kind of both/and approach to thought and reality which often says things like "Dive into the emptiness and there you will find real fullness," "In losing yourself you will find yourself,"  "God's mercy IS his justice", and so forth.) For the contemplative knows that even though many of us are driven to write many words about prayer, spirituality, or theology, none of them even comes close to describing God or the experience (or non-experience!) of prayer. At the same time we know that the tensions of paradox come closest to conveying the truth about God and God's dealings with us --- though many would call them senseless babblings. Thus God is a light we only perceive as darkness or a darkness which illuminates, an emptiness which is fullness, the nothing which is all, so that faith and prayer involve a vulnerable leap (which we both must make and actually cannot make ourselves!) into a void in which we find (or rather are found by) total security. You get the idea I think.

Ruth Burrows (Sister Rachel), the Carmelite nun and specialist in Teresa of Avila whom I have also cited recently and like very much is a contemplative in the apophatic way and this is one of the reasons she so rejects the sense experience so many mistakenly associate with an experience of God in so-called "mystical states". Meister Eckhart, also a proponent of the apophatic way, agrees with Ruth Burrows in this and writes in typical paradoxical form: "Seek God so as never to find him". Both agree with Merton that when, through some experience in prayer, one "seems to have found God," they have NOT found God -- or that "once one seems to have grasped God, God has eluded one". As William Shannon (writing in a way which echoes what I have said here any number of times) explains, "God is not an object or a thing alongside of other objects and things: God is the All whom we can discover only in the experience of not discovering." The Apostle Paul described the same experience when he spoke of "coming to know/grasp God, or rather, being known/grasped by God." Paul Tillich's theology, which I focused on in both my senior year of college and later in doctoral work reminds me very much of this because he defines faith as, "the state of being grasped by an unconditional concern" and is emphatic that God is not A being, but instead the ground of being and meaning out of which all that is exists (ex-istere, out of - to stand up).

Of course the really big name in the apophatic way is John of the Cross (The Ascent of Mount Carmel, The Living Flame of Love, ). Meanwhile, T.S. Elliot may also have been "schooled" in the apophatic tradition because in true apophatic style he speaks of coming again to the place where he began and knowing that place for the first time. In Little Gidding V Elliot piles paradox upon paradox but he begins with the following one: [[We shall not cease from exploration, and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time.]] This really is the experience of contemplative prayer, the experience of seeking and exploring that which in some sense we know and desire profoundly as our source and starting place only to come to "know the place for the first time." Merton comes at it from the other way around and says it this way, [[[Contemplation] strikes us at once as utterly new and strangely familiar. . .Although we had an entirely different notion of what it would be like, it turns out to be just what we seem to have known all along that it ought to be. . .We enter a region which we had never even suspected, and yet, it is this new world which seems familiar and obvious.]] Seeds of Contemplation pp 144-145

Thomas Merton, A Brief Evaluation:

All of which brings me back to Thomas Merton and your questions. (Really!!) You see, this is the nature of my own contemplative experience and for that reason I know Thomas Merton to have been the real deal. So much of what he writes resonates with me and my own experience in prayer, but also with the "greats" like John of the Cross, the author of the Cloud of Unknowing, many of the Greek Fathers, et al. But besides that, I think I largely owe him for my eremitical vocation. You see when I read canon 603 for the first time it was intriguing to me personally and suggested a way all the dimensions of my life could be rendered coherent (that is, made to hold together in meaningful whole). However, I also doubted such a vocation could be anything but selfish. (Contemplative life struck me that way; eremitical life was far worse --- it seemed a kind of epitome or summit of selfishness!) I then read Dom Jean LeClercq's Alone With God which intrigued me; I liked it very much though I had no idea the Camaldolese existed. Still, I had doubts about the value of the life. Then I read Merton's Contemplation in a World of Action. As I have written here before, it electrified me because it showed eremitical life as valid and more, as a significant gift of God to the Church and world. Later I read his "Notes on a Philosophy of Solitude" in Disputed Questions and that became a new favorite -- but by that time I was already a  hermit and had been for more than twenty years.

Some suggest he was not a true monk or that he had confessed upon walking into a library with shelves of his books that much of it was crap (I think he said B.S.). I have already written about those things in this blog and will link you to it here: Defending Thomas Merton . Bear in mind that for the apophatic contemplative words ALWAYS not only fall short of but also betray God. We are nonetheless compelled to write about God and prayer but with an awareness that when what we write is compared to the God who grasps us in prayer, the judgment must always be what it was for Thomas Merton, Thomas Aquinas and so many others: this is as straw, it is a load of refuse, BS, etc. Further our work is always also our very own and reflects not just our virtue, our knowledge, and our union with God but our limitations and even our sinfulness or estrangement from that same God and our truest selves. Thus when Merton looked upon the newly published Seeds of Contemplation, for instance, he remarked, "Every book I write is a mirror of my own character and conscience. I always open the final printed job with the faint hope of finding myself agreeable and I never do" He goes on to say both sincerely and perhaps with more than a little contemplative irony (or all-too-human hyperbole), "There is nothing to be proud of in this one either. : ."

Meanwhile, as someone associated with the Camaldolese as an oblate, I know that many Christian Contemplatives read, study, and regularly meet and discuss with contemplatives of other religious traditions. Some of my Camaldolese brothers and sisters in particular are specialists in other contemplative traditions and the New Camaldoli hermitage hosts inter-religious meetings of such contemplatives regularly though not frequently. We (contemplatives from various religious traditions) have a lot in common precisely because the God we meet transcends words and descriptions --- and also the limits of our own religious traditions. (Sometimes our own clinging to these limits represents what Mary Magdalene did with the Risen Christ and we need to remember that while we are to honor these traditions appropriately for all they truly reveal/mediate to us, they must not cause us to cling to a yet-unascended Jesus nor to limit the reach of the Holy Spirit.)

Though aware of all this (and paradoxically too, because of it) Merton never ceased to be a Christian and a Cistercian Monk.  Because his own life reflected the paradoxes and tensions of the contemplative who is drawn beyond more usual borders and boundaries I understand why what he wrote was uncomfortable for some of his confreres and others. Of course, I also know he was a flawed human being; his unacceptable behavior with the nurse he met during his stay in hospital was unjustifiable -- though he tried pretty hard (and pitifully) to do this in what I read of his last journal. Still, my own judgment on Merton is favorable. He was and remained a Catholic Christian, Trappist Monk, and true contemplative who was also a contemporary hermit and a fine writer. I am grateful to God for his life and more than a little sorry for his premature death because I would have liked to have known him.

Why Do We Need Contemplative Convents if we are all called to be contemplatives. . .?

[[Dear Sister Laurel, I often wonder why we need Contemplative convents when God is supposed to want each and every soul to be a contemplative and wants them all for Himself. On the other hand, if being a contemplative and giving God your all, just as He wishes, how can you be like this plus be married and committed to someone
at the same time...! I can't get my head round the Secular Carmelite thing. To me, if one experiences the Presence of God...how can they turn round and commit themselves to another!? Many thanks,]]

My basic answer is that while all may be called to some expression of an essentially contemplative life (a position which can easily be misunderstood, by the way) --- even in their great activity, most are not called to a life dedicated to contemplation and all that requires. Some are exemplars of a dedicated contemplative life, while others exemplify contemplative prayer and contemplative (attentive, mindful) living in the midst of the world. It is similar to the idea that every person is ultimately solitary and called to some degree of authentic solitude, but not every person is called to be a hermit.

Likewise, every person is meant to nurture and foster family and the future of the species, but not every person is called to be a mother or a father in the ordinary sense, for instance. Mothers and Fathers inspire all of us to be nurturing and open to bringing forth new life, despite the sacrifices involved. and they do so with a special vividness and, better perhaps, concreteness. Hermits inspire us to give solitude the place it requires so that human poverty can be transfigured by divine grace in the same way. They each remind us of one dimension or aspect of a fully human life. We could multiply images: Contemplatives remind us that we are meant for union with God and called to become prayer ourselves. Consecrated celibates remind us we are ALL made for an eschatological love which transcends all historically conditioned forms of love. Married people remind us of the holiness of sexual love and the important fact that we all bring one another to God and to completion in him -- though marriage is a privileged way of achieving that. Each focuses our attention on an aspect of truly human life, the nature of human love, etc. Each provides a different lens through which we can see aspects of a mystery far too large to get our minds around otherwise. We need these individual and dedicated examples and exemplars, not least, because we do dwell in space and time, and do not see clearly without them. More, we are not inspired without them.

Another reason, of course, is that as human beings living within the limits of space and time (history), we each must take a specific path to wholeness at a given moment. We simply cannot take all paths. For instance, there is no way I can be both hermit and apostolic religious at the same time, no way I can be consecrated celibate and participate in married or sexual love simultaneously, etc. My own call to wholeness and holiness involves a life given to God in a specific way because historical existence requires it. It is not better than other ways, but it is better for me; other paths, though they could well serve my own growth in authentic humanity, would not serve it as well. For me, for instance, diocesan eremitical life is the context which allows the WHOLE of my historical existence with all its limitations and gifts to make sense and serve others. Life in a Cistercian (or Camaldolese!) monastery, for instance, might function similarly for me, but I don't believe it would do so as well. Apostolic Religious life certainly does not do so despite the fact that it inspires me to be true to the "for (and with) others" nature of the Christian vocation.

Your second question is excellent. The answer is a paradox isn't it? The simple truth is we truly give our lives fully to God ONLY to the extent we also give it to those he loves. As noted above, one expression of part of this truth is marriage. Here two people give themselves to one another body and soul precisely so they may come to God together. In their love for each other they discover the reality of divine life/love. This is the most common or usual way persons come to know God's exhaustive love and to commit themselves to it. But your question comes at things from another direction, namely from a more apparently unmediated experience of this love which then leads to life commitment to another. I think your question is really how can one not make this love of God exclusive, true? But it is completely understandable that one's relationship with God spills over into relationships with others, that this love inspires and empowers us to love others and lead them to share in it.

This is true in lives of every contemplative and even every true hermit I know. It is true in the case of Consecrated Virgins whose relationship with Christ is explicitly spousal. It is true of those Apostolic Religious I know whose relationships with God-in-Christ are described as nuptial or spousal (though also in those whose relationships are not of, course). In fact, it is as prayer lives deepen and relationships with God mature that one is called to share with others. Of course, this does not mean these persons give themselves in marriage to another, but, together with our understanding of the Sacrament of marriage, it suggests that for many people, such a dedicated sharing of lives makes tremendous, even ultimate sense. That may not be true of your vocation or my own, but it is true for these people and witnesses to the mysterious nature of Divine Love and the way we share in it. Because God is the ground of all existence, and because we come to know and love others truly only as we come to know them in and of this ground (that is, in and of God), this leads to the paradox I mentioned earlier: we give our lives to God ONLY to the extent we also give it to those he loves.

Let me add one thing which may further illustrate this paradox. It is based on a prayer experience I once had. In that experience I had the sense that I had God's entire and exclusive attention and love. At the same time, however, I had the sense of assurance that he was caring for everyone else in the very same way, that ALL was well, nothing and no one was being neglected or loved less than I. How is this possible? It is divine love after all, and therefore a very great mystery. What I am suggesting is that we are called to love in the same way. We are invited to give ourselves completely to God, to love him exclusively AND we are called to love others exhaustively as well. This is the paradox and challenge of contemplative life.

For some, this love will involve marriage precisely because these persons experience the presence of God in this way, not in spite of their experience of his presence. For some it will mean apostolic religious life, for some others contemplative religious life, and for others of us, it will even mean eremitical or solitary life, for instance, but the sense that these lives are about loving God AND others exhaustively at the same time does not change --- only the way this is expressed. I suspect that once God is ALL in ALL and we are part of that new heaven and new earth Paul talks about, we will understand more clearly how it is that union with God means a total gift of self to others as well. For now all I can affirm is that God's "wanting us all for himself" is a different kind of exclusiveness than we are used to in merely human terms. As I understand it, he has us all to himself WHEN we also love others --- even when that love is expressed in eremitical life or in solitary contemplative prayer and time alone with God. In other words, it is not exclusive in a competitive way, but insofar as it includes others.

I hope this helps some. If I have been unclear or raised new questions, please get back to me!