December 2011
The Sisters of the Good Samaritan offer you a simple reflection starter on a current book that reflects Good Samaritan Benedictine spirituality.
Each month we will offer some questions based on a chapter of the book. These questions may help you to reflect and pray. They can also be used for small group sharing. Currently it is:
St Benedict on the Freeway: A Rule of Life for the 21st Century by Corinne Ware, Abingdon Press, USA, 2001.
Chapter 6 – “Facing Godward”
The reflection starters below may help you plumb the depths of the text and explore more deeply what the text is saying to you in your daily life.
As you read the final chapter of this book, chapter 6, “Facing Godward”, notice any words or phrases that connect with your experience, surprised you or raised a question for you?
- What helps you to “‘tune in’ to the divine voice that is always speaking” (p.116)?
- At this point in your life journey, what are the “preoccupations…” and… “distractions” that prevent you from ‘tuning in’ to “the moment that God is creating” (p.116)?
- Corinne writes “the recollected life is not so much about doing more things as it is about doing what we do now in a new way” (p.118). What might you do differently to help you be more attentive to God in the now?
- In reviewing chapter 6, make a conscious effort to be aware of God in the ordinary and extraordinary events in your daily life.
- As we come to the end of one year of grace pause and give thanks for those things in your daily life that heighten your awareness of God’s presence.
- As you prepare to journey through a new year of grace, pause and reflect how you might “turn toward God, open to blessing and live moment by moment with full attention” (p.120)?
May the season of Advent and Christmas be for you and for all who are dear to you a time of deeper awareness of and gratitude for God’s constant blessings in your life.