More Than

There is no doubt that the machinery that can be associated with contemplative discipleship may actually work to impose limits that prevent authentic relational development between yourself and God. In order to fully mature people seeking to respond to the call of Christian contemplative prayer must come to develop an exceptional awareness that rituals and practises do not in and of themselves constitute a genuine relationship, although they may provide adequate context for nurturing such a relationship; genuine discipleship is always interior and personal and holistic and real and immanent. Responding to God's initiatives means more than just the rote response to a certain line of conduct and the coherent mental ability to justify that conduct religiously. In fact, the genuine interactive experience of God is more often than not unpredictable and incoherent. It is one thing to say that some certain physical gesture that I make is intended to express a response to God's presence in my life, but another altogether to respond genuinely that personally allows me to really grow and develop in that love in the context of my normal, daily activity. In fact, the former may actually come to be a hindrance to the actual experience of God. In the end there may come a time when you will come to realize that in order to face the genuine, deep invitation of the call to contemplative life, you may need to leave behind the support that nurtured you at an earlier stage in your life.