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Intercessor
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Posted: Sat Dec 8th, 2007 09:40 pm |
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Detachment
Have you thought much about the role detachment has played/is playing in your transition from the Protestant world into the Catholic world?
I suppose it hit me hardest when I had to detach enough from tearful relatives to resist their pleas to remain in the Baptist faith.
This morning I attended the Christmas party held by the Sunday School class I taught for many years. You know that ache you get when you see someone (a series of several individuals, in this case) after a long separation and realize just how much you have missed him/her? Lots of hugs and kisses and sweet words, lots of eyes brimming with tears upon saying farewell.
I drove straight to the Marian shrine where I was able to sit four feet in front of the exposed Blessed Sacrament for an hour and be with Jesus. A year ago I had to be willing to detach from family and fellow church members. Now I am being asked to detach from my beloved dog (widow's sole companion), my house, a lifestyle, and all the associations of living in this town. Nothing awful is happening. God is just requiring this willingness of me right now.
As I settled myself in the chair, I knew that today He and I would be talking mainly about detachment and conformity to the will of God. I asked the Blessed Mother to lead me to Her Son and to assist me in doing whatever He said.
I gazed upon Him; He gazed upon me. I waited and listened and promised my obedience to whatever will be asked. There was assurance that I would be given the grace to make whatever detachments are necessary.
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"If our charity is arrested by the difficulties encountered in dealing with our neighbor, . . . our relations with our brethren are not regulated by our love of God, but by our love of self." Divine Intimacy p. 781, Fr. Gabriel, O.C.D.
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Credo Catholic
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Posted: Sat Dec 8th, 2007 10:00 pm |
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| Becky, I get great comfort from reading your comments. Detachment from friends and family does mean detachment from this world. It means being in this world but not of the world, I think that's how it goes. I remember wondering if I would have to put my family aside, and I determined if that was what was required then I would do it. But it hasn't turned out that way, they have been nominally supportive, because we are a family that generally supports each other no matter what. They don't understand, they don't really like it, but they know it's very important to me. I hope your friends will feel the same, and not ask you to choose them over the beautiful relationship you have found with the Blessed Sacrament. God bless
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Intercessor
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Posted: Sat Dec 8th, 2007 10:30 pm |
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CredoCatholic wrote:
Becky, I get great comfort from reading your comments.
Marsha, that's how I feel about your comments.
Detachment from friends and family does mean detachment from this world. It means being in this world but not of the world,
Yes, and it's fascinating how detachment is related to being in conformity with God's will. To become more fully conformed, to remain fully conformed, one really can't afford to have attachments to creatures, things, lifestyles, experiences, dreams. One must be focused exclusively on wanting what the Father wants. It goes beyond, "OK, God, I'll submit and tolerate whatever You throw at me."
It's all so tied together--the detachment, the conformity to the will of God, the humility. It takes a huge plug out of one's pride to be engaged in an ongoing assessment of "OK, what does God want? Whatever He wants--that's what I want." It's a movement toward anticipating what God wants or, even more, a movement toward the two wills becoming only a single will. (some good help from David in grasping these truths)
I remember wondering if I would have to put my family aside, and I determined if that was what was required then I would do it. But it hasn't turned out that way, they have been nominally supportive, because we are a family that generally supports each other no matter what.
The important thing is the willingness to give all and to endure all. Sometimes God seems interested only in determining (and in revealing to us) whether we do indeed have that level of obedience. Sometimes it's only a test. But--sometimes it's more than a test. Either way, we must be detached and we must care more about conforming to His will than we do about anything else.
I hope your friends will feel the same, and not ask you to choose them over the beautiful relationship you have found with the Blessed Sacrament. God bless
No, the ladies in my former Sunday School class have been kind and supportive. It's just that I am no longer their teacher. We no longer fellowship in the same class or church. I have said good-bye to that part of my life, and they now have a lovely new teacher. My point was only that I was required to leave them and am now required to attend Mass while that class is in session. It was a question of being obedient to the Lord.
I passed that test and now pray for grace to pass other tests that may be ahead. With all my heart I want to become more fully conformed to the will of God. That will involve learning and maintaining a certain detachment.
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"If our charity is arrested by the difficulties encountered in dealing with our neighbor, . . . our relations with our brethren are not regulated by our love of God, but by our love of self." Divine Intimacy p. 781, Fr. Gabriel, O.C.D.
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Intercessor
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Posted: Mon May 12th, 2008 03:13 am |
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What is the reasonable goal concerning appropriate detachment?
Can Abraham live all day, every day, at the intense level of that moment when he has tied Isaac, placed him on the altar, and raised the knife?
Or are such intense moments of detachment relatively rare and filled, in between, with lower, less heroic levels of detachment?
Is the goal to remain detached enough all the time that one can almost immediately return to that total surrender of even the most precious "attachment," when God suddenly asks that of us again?
Last edited on Mon May 12th, 2008 05:08 am by Intercessor
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"If our charity is arrested by the difficulties encountered in dealing with our neighbor, . . . our relations with our brethren are not regulated by our love of God, but by our love of self." Divine Intimacy p. 781, Fr. Gabriel, O.C.D.
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David W. Emery
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Posted: Tue May 13th, 2008 02:31 pm |
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Can Abraham live all day, every day, at the intense level of that moment when he has tied Isaac, placed him on the altar, and raised the knife?
What you are seeing here is the inner conflict: God’s will versus my will. There is always plenty of that in human behavior. Abraham, a good child of God, is obeying his heavenly Father as best he can. But both Abraham and Isaac live beyond this harrowing moment.
In natural human development, we see the child grow up and mature, gradually becoming an adult and learning to live in harmony with his habitat. He begins by obeying his parents; progressing, he discovers his personhood and learns to love, marries, then becomes a parent himself. In the religious life, too, one obeys until he learns to love. Then there is a gradual inner transformation, until the intensity is not “versus” but “in and with.” One stops resisting God and starts pulling with him through his acts of charity (love in motion).
Detachment is at first a matter of obedience, often burdensome and conflictive. But as we learn, through the action of the Holy Spirit, to love in an interior configuration to God as expressed in his will (“Thy will be done” becoming now not a precept but a desire of the soul, what we call zeal), the burden becomes a joy and obedience a means to union. At this point we enter spiritual adulthood and begin to beget.
Detachment is a matter of priorities. Most people are called to continue to be engaged in the world while detaching themselves from it — in the world but not of it. Some see this as a delicate juggling act, but I think it can better be seen through the lens of charity. For genuine Christian love manages to accomplish the seemingly contradictory things required of us at this juncture.
How? By promoting the selflessness of charity, the Holy Spirit reconciles within us the divine attributes of mercy and justice, and the human attributes of free will and predestination: “He must increase, I must decrease” until “Thy will be done on earth” — in my own will, here and now — “as it is in heaven.” Humility and obedience, then, are only the beginning. As they are completed by desire and an identification of the human will with the divine (an internalizing — as in Jesus, whose human will was completely identified with his divine will, generating peace rather than conflict), submission becomes union and we are divinized. Our configuration to Christ is completed in the peace and union we receive even as the world mocks our “foolishness.”
David
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Annie
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Posted: Tue May 13th, 2008 03:08 pm |
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Detachment is flexibility. We do what we think we are supposed to be doing but at a moment's notice we may find we are mistaken and are told to GO OVER THERE AND HELP THAT PERSON WHOSE CAR IS BROKEN. YOU WILL BE LATE FOR CONFESSION BUT THAT CAN'T BE HELPED RIGHT NOW.
"Go, leave your father's house and your kindred and go to the land that I will show you." I have had to do this many times and usually did NOT end up in Canaan. 
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Annie
Ora et labora
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Intercessor
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Posted: Tue May 13th, 2008 07:18 pm |
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David W. Emery wrote:
Detachment is at first a matter of obedience, often burdensome and conflictive. But as we learn, through the action of the Holy Spirit, to love in an interior configuration to God as expressed in his will (“Thy will be done” becoming now not a precept but a desire of the soul, what we call zeal), the burden becomes a joy and obedience a means to union. At this point we enter spiritual adulthood and begin to beget.
Detachment is a matter of priorities. Most people are called to continue to be engaged in the world while detaching themselves from it — in the world but not of it. Some see this as a delicate juggling act, but I think it can better be seen through the lens of charity. For genuine Christian love manages to accomplish the seemingly contradictory things required of us at this juncture.
How? By promoting the selflessness of charity, the Holy Spirit reconciles within us the divine attributes of mercy and justice, and the human attributes of free will and predestination: “He must increase, I must decrease” until “Thy will be done on earth” — in my own will, here and now — “as it is in heaven.” Humility and obedience, then, are only the beginning. As they are completed by desire and an identification of the human will with the divine (an internalizing — as in Jesus, whose human will was completely identified with his divine will, generating peace rather than conflict), submission becomes union and we are divinized. Our configuration to Christ is completed in the peace and union we receive even as the world mocks our “foolishness.”
David
David, as always, your posts have many rich layers to be pondered a while.
I've highlighted some phrases I particularly noticed. I have been afraid of different sorts of things over a lifetime (meaning the fear changed from one thing to a different thing). Now I am most afraid of failing to conform to the Divine Will. Such a failure is now the worst calamity I can imagine.
Yesterday and today during private adoration, I found myself begging God to let me die rather than fail to conform to His Divine Will. The desire for that conformity is so intense because I know there is no other way to that union with Him and no peace or joy to be found outside that union.
Recognizing them as important Truth, I will be meditating on your comments about how charity is involved in detachment.
Thank you for the wonderful insights.
Becky
Edited to correct formattingLast edited on Tue May 13th, 2008 08:55 pm by
____________________
"If our charity is arrested by the difficulties encountered in dealing with our neighbor, . . . our relations with our brethren are not regulated by our love of God, but by our love of self." Divine Intimacy p. 781, Fr. Gabriel, O.C.D.
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Intercessor
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Posted: Tue May 13th, 2008 07:30 pm |
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Annie wrote:
Detachment is flexibility. We do what we think we are supposed to be doing but at a moment's notice we may find we are mistaken and are told to GO OVER THERE AND HELP THAT PERSON WHOSE CAR IS BROKEN. YOU WILL BE LATE FOR CONFESSION BUT THAT CAN'T BE HELPED RIGHT NOW.
"Go, leave your father's house and your kindred and go to the land that I will show you." I have had to do this many times and usually did NOT end up in Canaan.
Thanks, Annie. There are so many lessons to be learned from Abraham's experience.
I feel a bit better now that you, David, and Marsha have responded. This subject is so important to me that I dared drag it out three times with only Marsha (who loves everybody and is kind to everybody, even folks who post three times to their own obviously not-popular thread!!!) responding. I knew I was weird but had suspected I was even more weird than I dared imagine. 
Becky
____________________
"If our charity is arrested by the difficulties encountered in dealing with our neighbor, . . . our relations with our brethren are not regulated by our love of God, but by our love of self." Divine Intimacy p. 781, Fr. Gabriel, O.C.D.
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Intercessor
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Posted: Wed May 14th, 2008 05:35 pm |
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Annie wrote:
Detachment is flexibility. We do what we think we are supposed to be doing but at a moment's notice we may find we are mistaken and are told to GO OVER THERE AND HELP THAT PERSON WHOSE CAR IS BROKEN. YOU WILL BE LATE FOR CONFESSION BUT THAT CAN'T BE HELPED RIGHT NOW.
"Go, leave your father's house and your kindred and go to the land that I will show you." I have had to do this many times and usually did NOT end up in Canaan.
Flexibility is not a trait I was born with, but I'm working on it. The problem is a drive toward closure. Once I get going on something, especially if it's making sense to me, I can see the good coming from it, it's near completion---boy! it's tough to turn aside from such a project/plan to address something different.
I think it's an issue of pride--somehow the effort being expended, the "good works" flowing from the project persuade me that there is virtue in my undertaking. I fail to remember sometimes that an undertaking has no virtue once God points us toward something else instead.
And could we pursue the role patience has in conformity to the Divine Will?
(I'm still mulling over the role of charity.)
Ah, patience! I'd like a super-size portion of heroic patience, please, without having to suffer tribulation ----and I'd like it yesterday. 
A lack of humility and a lack of patience keep leading me into a frame of mind in which I'm thinking, "I've done all the things I was supposed to do. Now where's my growth in holiness?" I have to remind myself, again, that God gives us grace when He chooses. He won't be forced. He won't be rushed. So I'm in that place of having to wait before Him. I don't think there is going to be much more progress in conforming to God's will until He decides to bestow a further measure of grace. I do not have it in myself to move beyond this point.
Time to develop deeper self-knowledge, absorbing more fully how utterly incapable I am of transforming myself. It's all grace. It all comes from God. So--- I will wait.
Becky
____________________
"If our charity is arrested by the difficulties encountered in dealing with our neighbor, . . . our relations with our brethren are not regulated by our love of God, but by our love of self." Divine Intimacy p. 781, Fr. Gabriel, O.C.D.
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Annie
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Posted: Wed May 14th, 2008 06:07 pm |
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I don't seem to have much patience with myself or grace or anything. I just muddle along the best I can. I think if I just go through the motions eventually something sticks. The Divine Office is ideal with this because its format doesn't allow much goofing off. I'm a goof.
Sometimes people tell me things that are supposedly how I am and what I should do about it but they never make any sense. So I have pretty much stopped listening to people who are being "helpful" except my confessor and a few others that I know are trustworthy.
There's one guy who keeps implying that I lack humility, etc. and I'm thinking maybe he's projecting because he can't deal with a highly educated female who "uses big words."  He says I have to analyze everything but I was not designed to go through life with my brain unplugged. He also claims that my claim that I was designed to be a scientist is false. Go figure. 
My advice to those wondering about detachment is to be as detached as your God-given nature allows you to be. Some people are less detached and some more (these become Something-or-others of the Strict Observance). The rest of us become oblates or hunters sitting in the woods praying the rosary, not noticing the DEER RIGHT OVER THERE. 
Last edited on Wed May 14th, 2008 06:08 pm by Annie
____________________
Annie
Ora et labora
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Intercessor
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Posted: Thu May 15th, 2008 01:39 am |
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Annie wrote:
I don't seem to have much patience with myself . . .
I'm glad you brought that up since I intended to and forgot. Relatively new Catholics can be so focused on getting forgiveness from God and from the Church. Perhaps we forget, too often, to forgive ourselves and to be patient with ourselves.
The rest of us become oblates or hunters sitting in the woods praying the rosary, not noticing the DEER RIGHT OVER THERE.
Funny
____________________
"If our charity is arrested by the difficulties encountered in dealing with our neighbor, . . . our relations with our brethren are not regulated by our love of God, but by our love of self." Divine Intimacy p. 781, Fr. Gabriel, O.C.D.
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Ali
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Posted: Fri May 16th, 2008 11:16 am |
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Yesterday's Moment with Mary was about detachment. Only briefly, though . . .
Prayer to Our Lady of the Smile
O Mary, Mother of Jesus and our Mother too, who once by a visible smile didst graciously console and cure thy child Saint Therese of the Child Jesus, we beseech thee, come to us also to console us in the troubles of this life.
Detach our hearts from earth, give us health of soul and body, make us strong in hope, and obtain for us at last, that we may enjoy forever in Heaven, thy maternal and enrapturing smile.
Amen.
Everyone should subscribe to this, you know. I'm reading here, then ~pow~ my little Moment with Mary arrives and it mentions the same thing!
Ali
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Ali
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Posted: Fri May 16th, 2008 12:09 pm |
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Detachment is not something I have thought of in relationship to my spirituality. Maybe it's the word I'm hung up on. I recognize sacrifice. Sometimes we sacrifice a lot of our old selves to serve and worship God. But not detachment. Hmmmm
I'm already pretty detached from material things. I've tried to get dh to sell everything and either a.) start over with a small mountain cabin; or b.) and RV and travel the country with the kids. He is so not an adventurer, though, lol.
I don't think I could do what Abraham did. That is probably my weakness. I can detach from my children in an every day kind of way. I would love if my kids became a priest or a nun, I could detach from them if I new they were serving God in that capacity. Heck, dh and I look forward to our kids being grown and away from us so we travel or be together just us during that part of our lives. But if they were taken from me by death or kidnapped, I just don't know if I could get back up again after a blow like that.
But in my every day life, stuff is just ~stuff~ and can be obtained again. I'm sort of an introvert, and have moved a lot as a child, so my connections to people in my adult life are not so thick that I would mourn heavily the loss of those connections. Sad? Sure. But not so much that I woudln't reach out for more connections in whatever situation was available to me. If that even makes sense to anyone but me
Ali
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Intercessor
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Posted: Sat May 17th, 2008 03:06 am |
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Ali wrote:
Yesterday's Moment with Mary was about detachment. Only briefly, though . . .
Prayer to Our Lady of the Smile
O Mary, Mother of Jesus and our Mother too, who once by a visible smile didst graciously console and cure thy child Saint Therese of the Child Jesus, we beseech thee, come to us also to console us in the troubles of this life.
Detach our hearts from earth, give us health of soul and body, make us strong in hope, and obtain for us at last, that we may enjoy forever in Heaven, thy maternal and enrapturing smile.
Amen.
Everyone should subscribe to this, you know. I'm reading here, then ~pow~ my little Moment with Mary arrives and it mentions the same thing!
Ali
Yeah, Ali! Who plans that kind of thing?  It happened to me yesterday as well! See my new signature below? Boy, did the Lord ever run that quote through my mind yesterday as I struggled with "difficulties encountered when dealing with others."
"If our charity is arrested by the difficulties encountered in dealing with our neighbor, . . . our relations with our brethren are not regulated by our love of God, but by our love of self." Divine Intimacy p. 781, Fr. Gabriel, O.C.D.
Kim M. mentioned a while back that she also had had the experience of hearing out of her own mouth that which she herself needed to hear. I made some conscious choices yesterday because of having been moved by that quote from Divine Intimacy.
Thanks for the beautiful prayer. I love it.
Becky
____________________
"If our charity is arrested by the difficulties encountered in dealing with our neighbor, . . . our relations with our brethren are not regulated by our love of God, but by our love of self." Divine Intimacy p. 781, Fr. Gabriel, O.C.D.
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Intercessor
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Posted: Sat May 17th, 2008 03:34 am |
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Ali wrote:
Detachment is not something I have thought of in relationship to my spirituality. Maybe it's the word I'm hung up on. I recognize sacrifice. Sometimes we sacrifice a lot of our old selves to serve and worship God. But not detachment. Hmmmm
I'm already pretty detached from material things. I've tried to get dh to sell everything and either a.) start over with a small mountain cabin; or b.) and RV and travel the country with the kids. He is so not an adventurer, though, lol.
I don't think I could do what Abraham did. That is probably my weakness. I can detach from my children in an every day kind of way. I would love if my kids became a priest or a nun, I could detach from them if I new they were serving God in that capacity. Heck, dh and I look forward to our kids being grown and away from us so we travel or be together just us during that part of our lives. But if they were taken from me by death or kidnapped, I just don't know if I could get back up again after a blow like that.
But in my every day life, stuff is just ~stuff~ and can be obtained again. I'm sort of an introvert, and have moved a lot as a child, so my connections to people in my adult life are not so thick that I would mourn heavily the loss of those connections. Sad? Sure. But not so much that I woudln't reach out for more connections in whatever situation was available to me. If that even makes sense to anyone but me
Ali
I enjoyed your post, Ali.
My understanding and application of the teachings about detachment are evolving, and I appreciate hearing insights from others on the subject. Like you, I think I'm doing pretty well about the "stuff." More difficult, for me, are issues like independence, control, freedom to make choices (repetitious, isn't it?), impatience, surrendering my will (repetitious again, right?).
I'm thinking detachment means I must not allow my fondness for creatures and objects or my personal preferences and personal will to hinder my obedience to God's direction. The Lord does not enjoy having second place in our hearts.
There's a painting of Christ beckoning the rich young ruler. He asks him to sell all that he has and then follow him. That story (and that painting) have always tugged at my heart. I think Jesus knew the point of resistance in the rich young ruler's heart, just as He knows it in our hearts.
Click here for art.
Grace and peace,
Becky
____________________
"If our charity is arrested by the difficulties encountered in dealing with our neighbor, . . . our relations with our brethren are not regulated by our love of God, but by our love of self." Divine Intimacy p. 781, Fr. Gabriel, O.C.D.
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