New Beginning

This is my new blog, dedicated to retreats, quiet days, contemplative prayer and the spiritual life. Not exclusively my spiritual life, but the possibility of a life in the Spirit.

I am one of a number of men and women retreat leaders in the Diocese of Connecticut who are forming a network of resource people like ourselves, and who will launch our new group webpage in the beginning of May: Fresh Springs Retreats.

I have been thinking about putting up a new blog for some time, and since putting up my info page on the Fresh Springs site, I am inspired to make the name Julian House live again.

Some time ago, long before I even thought about seeking ordination to the priesthood of the Episcopal Church, I stumbled across contemplative prayer.

I have for some years wanted to have a "proper prayer life", the kind that God would approve. Many times I tried to have this prayer life. I would begin by saying the daily offices of the Episcopal Church's Book of Common Prayer - Morning Prayer, Noonday Prayer, Evening Prayer, Compline. I wanted to be like the monastics but being married it would have to be outside the convent.

The first to go would be Noonday Prayer and Compline (night prayers before going to bed). In addition, I would read all the scripture readings for the day, and meditate on them, adding, along the way, devotional texts. After a couple of weeks I would begin to weed some things out of the offices, until, after a month or so, I wouldn't be praying at all.

I wanted to get my prayers right. It had to be all or nothing. And since I couldn't do it all, I ended up with nothing, time and time again.

One day I sat down to start my prayer life all over again for the umteenth time. I laid out my Prayer Book, the Bible, the devotional texts I felt just had to be read, and I thought about beginning, but I never got any further than that.

I just sat there, in the right hand corner of the sofa, with my books before me on the table. And all I could do was close my eyes.

After time, I thought, "Well, at least I should be saying petitions for others, thanksgivings, prayers of adoration, prayers asking for forgiveness." But nothing was there. My head was empty. I sat in silence, worrying what was wrong, and at the same time, it felt right, which made me feel guilty.

I remembered Shalem Institute for Spiritual Formation. I phoned them and got a catalogue. Voila. I had stumbled into being a contemplative! It was normal. It had a long, long history and was one of the prayer traditions still being carried into the Episcopal Church.

I took all the courses in prayer I could from Shalem. One day, I was asked by the clergy of my church, the cathedral in Delaware, to lead a four week study in contemplative prayer. I began with Julian of Norwich, and her influence on me. I first encountered her and her "Showings", her Revelations of Divine Love, when on retreat at a convent in Philadelphia. From there, I had branched out into others of the mystics. Now here I was, being asked to teach.

I did. And the rest is history.

I don't know ahead of time what I will post here. I do know that I want to honor Julian and the others who gave me life, and I want to honor the gift I was given, one I have tended to take for granted, now that I am a parish priest, deeply embroiled in all that entails. I want to remember whose I am, and from where I came.

And I want a place where I can begin to chart where this gift is now taking me. I wonder where Fresh Springs Retreats will lead, and what part Julian House will play in it.