retreat day 4

Another sparkling day of retreat, in every way.  Beautiful sunshine, and good reflective talks.  Today's talks were entitled, 'Notice what God is doing' and 'What's next?'

Fr. Conroy's 1st talk of the retreat repeated the old cliche that 'God is love.'  Whenever I hear that I kind of just roll my eyes, because my early experiences of religious education were a bunch of 'warm, fuzzies' that centered around 'God is love.'  I remember my parents asking our teachers when we going to learn something!

But, in this instance, when Fr. Conroy spoke of God as love, his point was that the more we love, the more we come to know God.  And the more we come to know God, the more we are able to serve Him through all that we say and do.  So, the object of our lives must be to love everyone, at all times.  That must be our goal, because that is what God does, and when we achieve that, we will know and understand God completely as well.

So, today's 1st talk took us to the suggestion to notice what God is doing. 
And we can do that best by being in touch with Jesus' presence in everyone and in every situation.

He shared a story of someone who was at a construction site.  Men with wheelbarrows full of bricks were passing him.  He stopped the 1st man he saw and asked, 'What are you doing?'  The man gritted his teeth and in a very put-out tone said, I...am...pushing...a....wheelbarrow...full...of...bricks.'   He stopped the 2nd man he passed and asked him the same question.  That man said, 'I have a wife and three children.  They need to eat and have clothes to wear.  I am just doing my job so I can fill their needs.'  A third man passed and was asked the very same question.  This man said, with a smile, 'I am building a cathedral!'

When we look for Jesus in every situation we find ourselves in, when we view the world around us through the eyes of God, we get a completely different view of things.

Our 2nd conference continued that theme.  In Luke's Gospel, the story of the disciples on the road to Emmaus tell us how the disciples were dejected because Jesus had been killed.  They were broken and wounded.  But they came to recognize the Risen Jesus in the breaking of the bread.  And in John's Gospel, Chapter 21, having caught no fish the entire night, the disciples headed back to shore.  Someone on shore suggests they cast their nets to the other side, and their nets were filled.  They recognized Jesus as that person on the shore.  When the disciples were aware of the presence of the Lord, their nets are full.  When we can see Jesus in all things and at all times, our nets will be full as well, and the outlook, bleak as it sometimes is, becomes filled with hope and promise.

After evening prayer, we head to our dinner, what is usually an exquisite affair.  Sometimes the Archbishop joins us for our last evening's dinner, so we will be on our best behavior.