Father Lehody reminds us in The Ways of Mental Prayer, that all Catholics are called to such
prayer, beginning with meditation and moving into contemplation. He reiterates
something I have learned the hard-way; that travelling or being in the presence
of evil creates a huge need for reparative prayer.
One has to repair the damage dome by long journeys,
distractions, dissipations, and times of trial, which all cause losses in
reflection and concentrating on God.
Most lay people understand the great need for times of
reparative silence. One of Lehody’s pithy sentences “says it all”. Lehody
refers to St. Alphonsus Ligouri and St. Philip Neri on this point. Mental
prayer is a “moral necessity.” We cannot be perfected in oral prayer, notes St.
Philip Neri.
Purity of heart can only be reached through deep and
constant reflection on God and not ourselves.
I daily say oral prayers, as I belong to a third order which
demands this discipline. But, these prayers, and the daily rosary, are not the
meditation or contemplation. Lehody
insists that we cannot confuse difficulties with impossibilities.
He quotes St. Ignatius
Loyola is saying that mental prayer is the shortcut to perfection.
I have written on the problems of the matter of sin in the
past several months. The matter of sin infects our memories, causing
distractions in mental prayer. But, St.
Bernard of Clairvaux gives us good advice by writing that we all need a
“sentinel”, a “guard” over our memories, just like a porter at the gate.
I suggest that both are good guardians-the remembrance of
our First Love, Christ and our covenant with Him; and the thought of damnation.
The memory, as I note in the long perfection series, must be
purified.
