Approaching Life and Love from a Catholic's Perspective.
In this month’s contribution for Catholic Stand, I shared how trying different versions of classic prayer practices can be an easy way to give your spiritual life a boost this Lent.
If reading the Catechism has you hungry for more, you can read the original post here: https://catholicstand.com/fresh-approaches-to-classic-prayer-practices/
Abigail C. R. Gripshover is a Catholic writer and speaker, passionate about the power of God’s love. She has been a voice for the Church online for over 10 years, encouraging her fellow Catholics to embrace the teachings of the Faith in every area of life. In the summer of 2022, she started a new journey of radical healing through radical trust in God. She is feeling called to share her story of chronic illness and God’s healing grace. She holds a B.A. in English Lit from Christendom College and works from home as a freelance copywriter and digital strategist. She and her husband, Bobby, also offer product photography services and love working with Catholic companies. You can connect with Abigail on LinkedIn to learn more about these services and find her business email address. View more posts
A Catholic's Perspective
“The cycle”:
Read
Meditate
Rosary
If you are starting, Total time = 10 minutes. If you’re finding it hard to meditate, this might be something you can do…A monk said that for him to be able to start meditating he reads the same scripture reading three times
Do not be tempted to do more; or you may become “overloaded”, over tired or stop all together
Read the Scriptures
Meditate on the Scriptures
Rosary: one decade
If you already say the full rosary, ‘just add’ ten minutes:
Do not read the Scriptures without meditating on it
Try to read the Scriptures before any prayer
Pray to God to help you to pray/ talk to him
If you are able to offer your prayer to God / Mary,
If you feel distracted, Try to bring your thoughts back to the Scriptures.
For those addicted to anything: alcohol, drugs, gambling, certain phobias, trying to get rid of false guilt, etc.; try “The cycle”. Try to be patient but persistent.
With time you may choose to do the cycles longer. By this you may choose to make 3 minutes prayer into 10 minutes or later into 20minutes. Just to recap, the important thing is to do each step: especially meditate.
I am surprised/ shocked how trying to be a Christian for a while how very little importance I have given to Scripture reading in prayer.
see what happens in your life…
this is nothing new, different, but similar “versions” must be said all over the world…
Whenever you want to pray it’s a good idea to ask God to help you to pray, Similarly, if you are going to do something for God, ask Him to help you do it well. And ask God every day.
I believe that if you pray to God, He will make you realise the things you want to do, more so than if you had not prayed. Do not be afraid of the time you lose in prayer, because you will get that time back twice, three times, ten times that amount or more.
Test the waters to see if you’re doing too much or too little…you will have a gut feeling about that.
Prayer is a gift. Therefore you should use it.
From this, when it comes to prayer, anything is possible, even exploring the dark corners of your heart and mind, which are often an impediment to getting close to God.
The key to God is prayer, to converse with him, and the key to prayer is asking God for his mercy to help you to pray to him.
Ps if you suffer from mild anxiety, go to somewhere where you do not disturb anyone, in your bedroom, in a big lonely park, inside your car, in a lonely street where you would not disturb anyone – and thus you do not feel self conscious – read the bible out loud; not only are you reading the Word of God, but you also are doing the physical exertion of reading as if to an audience as a physical exercise. And see what happens.
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