TECHNIQUES I USE TO LISTEN TO JESUS.

This conversation with you is the third in my sharing of HOW I do Lay Cistercian spirituality, as I know it. All of these conversations (I used to call them blogs, but that sounds so nerdy) are my thinking with occasional help from Grok.

IV. FIVE LEVELS OF SPIRITUAL AWARENESS

Reading the Word in Holy Scripture is not like reading a telephone book (or what used to be a book until the Internet put them out of business). The Word of God is placing yourself in the presence of Christ and listening to the reading with the “ear of the heart,” reflecting on it several times, each time growing deeper into the Mystery of the Cross and Resurrection and how His energy allows you to “Do What He Tells You.”

I share with you five levels of deeper reflection that I use when doing Spiritual Reading of the Scriptures.

I. Say the Word

II. Pray the Word

III. Share the Word

IV. Be what you say, what you pray, and what you share with others.

V. There are no words needed to listen to the Word

V. TWO DIMENSIONS OF PRAYER

VERTICAL PRAYER-The realm of the mind – to know God. Personal Prayer

HORIZONTAL PRAYER-The realm of the heart—to love God. Prayer of the Church

Vertical Prayer-  Jesus and I are present to each other in contemplation and the Eucharist to allow me to tag along as the Son of God, who alone can approach the Father, gives praise, honor, and glory to the Father (the pure energy of Love). I get to sheepishly hide behind the Humanity of Christ, as a child would hide behind his mother’s skirts when introduced to a powerful person, to give my unworthy addition to that of Christ. Vertical Prayer is between Christ and me and the Father through the energy of the Holy Spirit. Using the energy of Christ, I can pray for others, in reparation for the slothful behaviors I exhibited, and ask for God’s mercy on myself, my family, my colleagues, my fellow Lay Cistercians and monks/nuns, and the whole world as outlined by Our Lady of Akita. Prayer is being present to the one you love.

Horizontal Prayer – I join my vertical Prayer with all vertical prayers (horizontal) of the Anawim, as the Catholic Church militant, purgative, and triumphal, with Jesus and the Holy Spirit, to give glory, praise, and honor to the Father for the forgiveness of sins. Eucharist, Penance, The Art of Contemplative Practice, Rosary, Liturgy of the Hours, Devotions to the Sacred Heart, Miraculous Medal, Litanies, Novenas, Eucharistic Adoration before the Blessed Sacrament, dedication as a Lay Cistercian (for me) or other Lay orders or institutes.

• The product of the mind and heart – love others as Christ has loved us. Forms a cross.
• St. Benedict tells us to “listen with the ear of the heart. (Prologue to the RB)
• Long for Capacitas Dei and Conversio Morae daily as a mindset to what it means to be Catholic.

VI. LECTIO DIVINA STEPS TO REACH CONTEMPLATIVE PRACTICE

 A Carthusian monk named Guigo II designed a step-by-step technique for his monks to begin their journey toward making contemplation automatic. I use this technique to the point that I don’t even think about the steps; I perform them habitually. The late Pope Benedict XVI added a fifth level to the sequence, one he termed ACTIO, or Do What He Tells You.

1. LECTIO – Reading a sentence or short paragraphs from Scripture (a Gospel reading) slowly several times, pausing each time you read it to reflect for five to fifteen minutes on what you read. Lectio is the Latin for reading, and it refers only to reading Scripture, which allows me to place myself in the presence of Jesus and treat the text as producing Christ’s own energy through the Holy Spirit. Repetition of reading is key here.

2. MEDITATIO – Lectio Divina is not a process to read Scripture but to take the individual deeper on one point or a sentence. Meditation means thinking of what it means to you and how this reading is you, right now, listening to Jesus “with the ear of the heart.”

3. ORATIO – The third level of depth in the text is to stop the meditation, which is your mind trying to discover a meaning for you this moment, and raise your mind and heart to God in silent Prayer from your heart. I ask Jesus to still the cosmic noise around me so that I can prepare myself to wait for whatever Jesus wants to tell me.

4. CONTEMPLATIO—The purpose of Lectio Divina as a process of going ever deeper into the upper room of your inner self is to have the discipline of just waiting with Christ next to you on the couch, both of you silent in mind and heart (Be still my heart.) until He tells you what you need. When I began my Lectio journey towards habitual Prayer (pray ceaselessly) using these four steps, I lasted about two minutes before my mind seduced my heart. As time went on, and I started over and over and over, I began to make the steps one act where all I had to do was be with the one I loved most and long for His presence.

5. ACTIO – The Blessed Mother told the wine stewards to “Do What He Tells You,” at the wedding feast in Cana. Catholicism is about doing, not just filling up time because there is no other option, but activating in your life what you need to “Have in you the mind of Christ Jesus,” (Phil 2:5) right now, and sharing it with others.

VII. THE TEMPLATE OF ALL THAT IS:  THREE UNIVERSES, ONE REALITY.

I have written extensively about my conceptual framework of “What does reality look like?” This way of thinking about all that is takes three dimensions: physical universe, mental universe, and spiritual universe. Taken together, they are the template for my view of “How does it all fit together,” one of the steps in The Divine Equation (first conversation).

My discovery of this process was inspired by Atheists and Agnostics that I read on Quora.com. All of them challenged me to discard (abandon) all the assumptions I had previously held about what I considered real and true, the premise that somehow God has a role in all of this. Scientific inquiry was a field I found explained what was real using mathematics, physics, chemistry, and logic. For example, when I look out at the cosmos, or the world of matter and its properties, these languages tell me what is true using tested measurements and formulae. All of this is true, with the caveat that science is the discovery of wonder when looking at reality, not a final process, but one that itself exists with movement in complexity and consciousness as it picks up bits and pieces and begins to assemble them.

When I considered if science answered the six questions of The Divine Equation, my conclusion was yes and no. Yes, because this view of reality, this language of what is, must be a critical component of whatever makes us reality. No, because it only looked at matter and its properties, good though they are, but could not measure what was beyond what a person can see or hear or touch. There must be more. There is because I did not limit my language just to science, although it must be understood that this is an integral part of the whole.

THREE UNIVERSES AND WHY HUMANS NEED TO LEARN HOW TO USE THEM.

Asking the question of “What else is out there that would give a more robust view of why I am where I am, as I am?” I came up with three universes, each separate, the template of all that is, seen, unseen, known, unknown, and how itself is in a process of evolution where humanity discovers the resonance amid the dissonance of daily living. Here are my results.

PHYSICAL UNIVERSE: This universe is one of matter and its properties and elements and how they interact. They exist beyond human control with their own set of rules. All that is exists in this universe, governed by the laws of nature: gases, elements of the periodic table, macro and micro forces, within the context of time (movement by adding complexity and consciousness). All living organisms (bacteria, living cells, animals, even humans) are part of this physical universe. It is the foundation of all that is, interacting with each other by laws that only humans have identified so far.

THE MENTAL UNIVERSE: If the physical universe is the baseline and foundation for more complexity and consciousness as it accumulates reality into its collective DNA, then only humans, not animals or lower species, possess qualities that have their own nature, not apart from animality, but evolving beyond it. Two of these new additions to animalistic needs are reason and the ability to make choices independently of our nature but subject to the consequences of our actions, good or bad. Science examines the physical universe using tools developed quite recently to ask the interrogatories and build on what the cosmos might be. It does not do a good job of looking at the human dimension of the interior or the invisible moods or deviations as to what is good or bad behavior. Psychology, depending on whom you follow (Freud, Jung, Maslow, Fromm, Buber, etc.), all look to how the invisible interacts with matter. The mental universe is peculiar to not only our species, but, more significantly, to me as an individual who pops up for eighty years or so and absorbs the physical universe’s lessons on the purpose of life, so that I can align my purpose of life with absolute truth, outside of the corruption of matter and mind. I can’t reach the spiritual universe without using the tools of both the physical and mental universes to unlock the mystery of my humanity.

There is only one key to unlock the gates that allow entrance into the deepest part of my evolutionary journey to reach Omega, the highest level of knowledge, of Love, and of truth that I can absorb.

SPIRITUAL UNIVERSE: I spend my whole lifetime searching not only for the keys to a higher level of humanity, but also for the six questions that are needed to open the six locks of the inner tabernacle of my heart, one where no one wants to go. I enter the spiritual universe through an act of freely choosing to do so, but there is a problem. How do I sustain my choice of Jesus as my Center (Phil 2:5), because as soon as I say I believe, the forces of original sin and rationalism begin to eat at my conversion? I must tend to this daily to keep my equilibrium. Eucharist is my food. Forgiveness of sins repairs any wayward treks or rotten timbers that hold up my temple of the Holy Spirit. It is only with the energy of Christ that I can sustain and maintain my Catholic heritage. It is work. I must get my hands dirty.

Characteristics:

• One with three separate components is the template of reality.
• There are three separate universes (physical, mental, and spiritual) existing simultaneously, each with their own characteristics and natures. Together, they form visible matter (Physical), visible and invisible reality (Mental), or the bridge to the next step in our evolution as a species; then, visible reality on earth, which leads to learning how to live in a condition without matter, space, time, or human references.
• I use a template to help me SEE reality in its unique components, yet each universe has a purpose to help me discover my purpose. I call it the Rule of Threes.
• For example, I begin with the observation that there is energy in the Physical Universe. I know that because of what others have described as nuclear fission in the Sun, and because I exist in the universe of meaning and the mind. Because I use the template of the Rule of Threes, I look for why the physical and mental universes, each with their own unique energy, are there, and what it means to use that knowledge of those two universes to seek a deeper universe for humans.
• The Spiritual Universe may be invisible to the human eye. Still, I use my human reasoning and freedom to choose to move to that deepest level of humanity, being a spiritual ape.
• To get to the spiritual universe, I think that humans, using reason and free will alone, do not have the energy to make what would be looking at reality and make an opposite conclusion about the next invisible level of evolution, one that can only be entered with help from a nature that is not human nor confined to the limitations of matter or mind.
• The Spiritual Universe is twofold:
• With a kenosis (complete abandonment of all that went before to accept the Rule of Opposites in this universe), e.g., if you want to be my disciple, you must love one another as I have loved you. If you want to be the greatest, you must be the servant of those around you; you enter the Kingdom of Heaven while you still live, beginning to learn how and what to pack for the trip to be with Christ in a universe without matter or mind, but taking with you what Jesus has told you to pack. You die to the false self at Baptism and become a pilgrim in a foreign land. You are an adopted son or daughter of the Father and heir to the kingdom of Heaven in Heaven, your reward for being a good and faithful servant on earth.
• Having died (death is your human life that is changed, not ended), you live out what you have discovered about the Divine Equation’s six questions with the answers that Christ has given to you through the intermediary of the Catholic Church. 
• We are made from star stuff, but we are also destined to evolve into using what we have learned to live among the stars outside of time itself, with the one who is Omega, the one who has no boundaries of matter or mind.

• Jesus took on the nature of an enslaved person (Philippians 2:5-12) so that we could know HOW to make the jump from merely being human to fulfill our destiny at the deepest level of evolution possible for our human species.
• My books and blogs all have the Rule of Threes interwoven throughout. This is my most frequent template to keep my mind from being seduced into thinking all there is is just matter and mind.

VII. THE TEILHARD MAP OF ALL REALITY

I use the map about how Teilhard de Chardin views reality as a template for how I use the notions of dual citizenship, The Divine Equation, and the Rule of Threes, among others. This map points out a crucial view of mine that all reality is connected, that there are not two universes (matter and mind). Still, they lead to an evolution of the deepest part of being human, the spiritual universe, all working together in harmony to move in complexity and consciousness toward a predetermined Omega.

Figure 1 Teilhard’s View of Reality in Motion

This big picture of human evolution brings into focus the Father as creator and sustainer of matter, the Son as taking matter and adding not just human meaning but the opportunity to move in complexity and consciousness to the fulfillment of human nature, being an adopted son or daughter of the Father and a friend of Jesus the Son. To sustain this evolutionary glide path, the Holy Spirit helps both the Catholic Church and each one of its individuals (all individuals) to have the energy to move from humanity to that next level, while still living in the world, one of dual citizenship, but one which is also substantially more sophisticated than being a spiritual ape. We inherit the kingdom in Heaven after we die, but all Catholics must follow the teachings of the Master Rabbi (Magister Noster) to see life on earth through those new glasses Christ gives us at Baptism.

TECHNIQUE VIII: What do you see? Three levels to dig for heavenly gold on earth.

Because The Rule of Threes is so important in how I look out on each day trying with all my might to convert myself to more Jesus and less my false self, hooked as it is with the Seven Deadly Sins, to my earthly body, I have developed a technique using just one photo, but looking at it for three time; first time just with the eyes of matter and its properties: secondly, looking at that same image but asking the question: What do you see? This is just what my humanity sees in the photo as meaning, leaving out God and any religious interpretation.

Lastly, one more time, the question: What do you see, this time adding in what your religious background suggests but with an important twist: Ask Jesus to share with you what He sees and then Do What He Tells You.  Plus, look at it for a timed fifteen minutes without losing focus, just allowing Christ to whisper to you.

There are more techniques that the Holy Spirit has deemed to share with me using spiritual energy, not that of my own. These are the ones that I use most often. Take them and Do What He Tells You.

Copyright. Michael F. Conrad, Ed.D. The Center for Contemplative Practice. All Rights Reserved.

Six Core Websites Every Catholic Should Memorize and Use Frequently: www.wordonfire.org; www.scotthahn.com; www.usccb.org; www.newadvent.org; https://thecenterforcontemplativepractice.org/; www.vatican.va

Bonus: www.organism.earth