And finally, just to remind you of that beautiful and challenging quote of John Main’s teaching in Word into Silence, his first book. And at the heart of that teaching is this insight that John Main gives us, that there is a wonderful challenge, a wonderful adventure, and a wonderful opportunity that each one of us is offered and that in meditating we accept that offer, we accept that invitation to leave self behind and find ourselves in God, in love. And, as John Main said to me before he died, ‘everything you need will be given to you’. We don’t have to feel or fear that this is an impossible task or something beyond our ability. We do it as best we can, that’s what faith is, and if we’re faithful to it. Of course we will do it imperfectly because we are human beings and we’re wounded human beings. So of course we will do it imperfectly, but if we do it faithfully then everything we need to complete it will be given to us. And this is what he says:
Meditation is the prayer of faith because we have to leave ourselves behind before the Other appears, and with no pre-packaged guarantee that the Other will appear.
But of course we know that he has appeared, we know that through the Resurrection. And he is continually reappearing, remanifesting himself in us and in our community, in communion with others.
( The Brick Wall of the Ego 2 by Laurence Freeman OSB )
