God is near and so are the cats...

You wouldn't think so, but cats can tell time. Every evening, about nine o'clock, they gather around me. Why haven't I gone in to do Ignatian retreat, they want to know. Magnus, the aloof white one with blue eyes, seems to be the spokescat. Phoebe, the Siamese, insists on kneading my arm, and Felix wants o-u-t-s-i-d-e. That's why cats sit in windows. 

The theme this week is that God loves me & cares for me. He (I use the pronoun in its gender-neutral sense) suffers. That's why I feel guilty about my faults. We haven't gotten into the sins part yet, but maybe that's just the depression talking. Perhaps there is imbalance. From my spiritual journal:

Dominant prayer feeling is a deep sadness. Compunction. I also feel, believe, that I am rather silly. Sad, really. Self-concerned. Self, self, self.

How do I die to self? All my efforts in that direction end up back to ME. There is a saying by John Climachus about this. "Before I can bind him, he is loose, before I can condemn him I am reconciled to him, before I can punish him I bow down to him and feel sorry for him." etc.

What a messed up bunch of beings. When we are up, we are down.

It is difficult to talk about yourself without a certain amount of self-reference, alas. For me, praying is like talking to myself. You can listen for a long time trying to hear what God is saying to you, because His first language is silence. 

You will notice that I use the male pronoun throughout, mostly because I am a traditionalist. I -like- Rite I. I want to bewail my manifold sins and wickedness because there is no health in me (I'm making part of that up). English doesn't have a pronoun that does God justice. When I was a Hellenic polytheist, I thought of God as They. (I don't think the Theoi are false, or demonic--I no longer worship Them, although it -is- handy to be on Hermes' good side). In my college days, I found the broody chicken imagery meaningful.

A prayer technique we are supposed to practice is Colloquy. I suck at it, at least as far as being confident that it produces answers. As you may have noticed, I like to run my mouth. To myself I talk and answer to boot. When it comes to quoting God--putting words in the divine mouth--I'm afraid of hubris. 

The next Scripture is in Jeremiah--where Yahweh is quoted as saying that he was going to make it a place of horror. The first thing that comes to mind is the Holocaust, since I am pretty sure the prophet was prophesying against Israel. My memory is not what I used to think it.

This week, my mood could be better. I seem to set Jan off, try as I may not to. We're worried about money. People are late paying us. That's the trouble with being a landlord - you are only as prosperous as your tenants. During the Jeremiah passage, I fretted about that situation. One tenant is behind, another talks about moving out because he can't pay the utilities. We helped him with the water bill, I'm not sure why. We finally got both of his issues dealt with. The other tenant will pay us next week. They are frequently behind. You can see the fretting. I'd delete this bit, but it exemplifies what my prayer life has been like. Fret fret fret.

My prayer session was mostly worrying. We, as Christians, are advised not to do so. Is it doing that when you "lay the issue before the Lord in prayer"? It helps to talk about it, I hear. That is the received wisdom about various trauma, like dealing with fearful episodes. 

The last reading is about the eschaton--Revelation. "I stand at the door and knock." Sounds occult, somehow. Doors of perception. Don't worry if that bit makes no sense. I couldn't figure it out either. Apocalyptic writing has that effect on me. Symbolic language is code. Everyone thinks that Babylon is Russia, or the US when it is in sinful mode. It's not. It's ancient Rome. Jewish writers couldn't come right out and say it or risk the cross or worse. Time for another quote.

For you say, ‘I am rich and affluent and have no need of anything,’ and yet do not realize that you are wretched, pitiable, poor, blind, and naked.

I believe (like many Americans?) that I should be self-sufficient. I feel ashamed when I am not. So I remain silent instead of asking for help. I make jests. I belittle myself. But then, where would I start? Acting helpless ain't in it, either. At our own eschaton, what will we have? Not much. Six feet or so, if our heirs can afford it. The verse goes on to tell us to buy fine gold & ointment for our eyes. See truly, speak your truths, and be free of self-deception. All our time is borrowed.