Listening, finally arriving

Listening, finally arriving

A reflection on prayer.

God’s creating Word

is spoken in sacred mystery,

aligned with each life’s personal history,

encompassing our own story,

whispered towards our blessed time,

that moves slowly or at times quickly

witnessing our making of

our own earth’s footprint, a unique journey.

Each trusting soul, once, for always,

imbued with sacramental life,

anointed with wisdom,

both sacred, eternal, seeks meaning,

finally discovering it through prayerful listening.

Prayer, uttered habitually, devotedly,

bowed in the quietness of steady breathing,

begins an examination, a summing up.

“Father, speak to this servant

whose heart is softer now, tender,

bruised, battered, misunderstood,

at times rejected, gentle now,

brushed with weathered love,

with hope, ready at last to listen,

to be silent, to rest in humility,

basking in the security of being loved,

letting go of resentment, of hurt,

forgiving those who dished the dirt,

who blame, whose passions inflame.

This servant’s heart,

nurtured in the cauldron of life’s actual living,

coming to understanding the wisdom

of loving anyway,

of being loved forever,

even before breath took place

before bone and sinew took shape,

being formed in the womb,

emerging into the world as an infant

becoming a man,

from youth to old age,

until after the last breath leaves this body

and this sanctifying spirit too,

I am grateful

to have been schooled in listening, finally arriving home.”

Fr Patrick Brennan 2022 ©