Penang CDM organises Scripture Centred Retreat

Mar 23, 2018

PENANG: A one-day Scripture Centred Retreat was organised on March 3 at the Church of the Divine Mercy (CDM).

Sr Sandra Seow, from the order of Verbum Dei Missionaries (Word of God Missionaries) from Singapore, facilitated this retreat. She brought along Sr Maria Jose Egido, who was responsible for establishing this religious order in Singapore in 1997.

The retreat entitled Jesus, the Living Word, Speaks began with Sr Sandra explaining that this retreat was aimed at enabling us to know God in our hearts and have an encounter with Jesus through His word. She then went into the four steps of Lectio Divina (Divine Reading) Read, Meditate, Pray and Contemplate. Sr Sandra, however, introduced a fifth step, namely, Action. This is to have faith to put prayer into action and so to live our faith. She explained that this ancient method was used by monks to listen to God, using the Word of God to find the hidden personal message to each of us. It gives us a means to dialogue with God. Our success in this dialogue will depend on how open we are to the promptings of the Holy Spirit.

In the next session entitled “The Living Word, the Core of our Faith”, Sr Sandra explained that the Church teaches us that Jesus is present in the Word. The key element for us is to listen to what God’s personal message to us is. This was also emphasised by Pope Francis when he explained that the first duty of a Catholic is to listen to the Word of God. In this world of external and internal distractions, a sincere and genuine listening is not easy. It requires a heart that is committed to understanding God’s message.

Sr Sandra then went on to explain the Parable of the Sower in Luke 8. She linked the different types of soils to the distractions in one’s life towards listening to God’s Word. In conclusion, she reminded us of the words of St James 1:22-24 “But you must do what the Word tells you and do not just listen to it and deceive yourselves. Anyone who listens to the Word and takes no action is like someone who looks at his own features in a mirror and, once he has seen what he looks like, goes off and immediately forgets it”. We cannot look into a mirror and just go away not doing anything to fix the way we look.

Sr Maria Jose in Transforming Encounter with Jesus the Living Word, said that Jesus is the dictionary in which we can find everything. St Ambrose had said that the sacred scripture has been given to us so that God and man can speak to one another. St Jerome, in turn, said that ignorance of the scriptures is ignorance of God. The Word has the face and voice of Jesus. She emphasised that we need to encounter Jesus in a personal way and relate to Him. God takes the initiative to knock on our door but we do not hear it. She showed an allegorical painting by William Holman Hunt entitled The Light of the World, representing the figure of Jesus preparing to knock on a weed overgrown and long unopened door. The door can only be opened from the inside as it has no handle. We are given the freedom of choice to open the door and let Jesus come in and share a meal with us.

She went on to explain the encounter of Zacchaeus, the chief tax collector, with Jesus in Luke 9. Even though Zacchaeus was known to be a public sinner, Jesus looked up to him. Zacchaeus, in turn, was determined to meet with Jesus. He didn’t give up even though he was a man of small stature and pressed away by the crowd. He climbed a tree. We need to be determined to encounter Jesus, and Jesus will call us by name, as He did Zacchaeus. Jesus does not judge us and gives us dignity by accepting us even though we don’t see the things we do wrong. He does not impose anything on us.

The onus is on us to open the door to Him.

In the last session, The Journey of Prayer by Means of the Word of God, Sr Sandra invited the audience to draw a symbol of prayer in a handout. She explained that Prayer is a lifelong Journey which is a communion with God, resulting in a transforming union of growing towards others. She referred to the CCC on three methods of prayer.

The audience was also invited to share in groups the ways to continue after this retreat. She also shared other methods of prayer like the Ignatian Contemplation of Imaginative Prayer by St Ignatius of Loyola that employed the use of creative imagination.