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FILM LECTIO – Marie Biddle rsj, ma, mth
A healthy life – one in which we thrive rather than simply survive – depends on our willingness and ability to face the truth – the truth being revealed in our daily experiences. Jesus identified himself with truth – see John 14:6. This includes the truth of our joys, our griefs, our failures and our hopes. In facing the truth – anywhere, everywhere, all the time – we encounter the risen Lord.
We will use the film, Secrets and Lies, as a way of promoting personal reflection on both the obstacles and possibilities for each of us in facing the Truth in our daily experience.
Joy and Woe are woven fine
A clothing for the soul divine
Under every grief and pine
Runs a joy with silken twine.
[William Blake, Auguries of Innocence 60]
“No one told me grief feels so much like fear.” [C.S. Lewis in A Grief Observed, New York, Seabury, 1961 quoted in Transforming Our Painful Emotions: Spiritual Resources in Anger, Shame Grief, Fear and Loneliness, E.E. & J.D. Whitehead, Maryknoll, Orbis Books, 2010, 135.]
² We cannot master our emotions – they are not slaves. We can learn to befriend these bewildering feelings. Befriending is a discipline that resists both the inclination to deny emotion and the temptation to abandon ourselves to it. Befriending begins in acknowledging what we feel, confident that our most frightening arousals are, finally, not our enemies. ……… Body and soul are not alienated from one another. A partnership is possible between bodily impulse and spiritual insight. (At the heart of our tradition is the Incarnation.)… Spirituality is not about avoiding the fleshand its demands, but about purifying and harmonizing our complex desires. [J.D. & E.E. Whitehead, Shadows of the Heart: A Spirituality of Painful Emotions, Crossroads, 1966, 14.]
“The individualism of our postmodern and globalized era favours a lifestyle which weakens the development and stability of personal relationships and distorts family bonds. …. In our world, especially in some countries, different forms of war and conflict are re-emerging, yet we Christians remain steadfast in our intention to respect others, to heal wounds, to build bridges, to strengthen relationships and to ‘bear one another’s burdens’ (Gal 6:2)” (Laudato Si, #67).
The Truth Will Set You Free [Jn 8:22].
Truth cannot be found by merely rational means. There is a truth that can only be facilitated, it emerges according to its own timing. It overtakes us – replaces the illusions, the games, the pretences, the lies. This is the heart of what we call human growth, becoming who and what we are. We don’t choose it – it chooses us. Our response, in the end is one of active, energetic, deliberate submission and surrender to reality in our life. In the end it is a Grace.
Cost $40
Please register and pay at https://www.trybooking.com/CICTV
For more information email thecalltobe@gmail.com or if you have trouble booking online.
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The Four Arrows & the Cross symbolise diversity giving rise to communion in and through the Paschal Mystery. Those who are diverse by nature & culture, in and through Christ find lifegiving unity.