One thing...

Fr Mike, OP, has a marvellous post over on Intentional Disciples, where he says:

What is the "one thing" for the Christian? Mary discovered it [Luke 10:38-42]: being focused on the Lord. It is very easy for us to be anxious and worried about many things - including good things, like hospitality, or even "serving the Lord." In my own ministry I was - and still am, unfortunately - often very busy. But if my focus is taken from Jesus, the ministry will falter, and I'll begin focusing on myself. "How am I doing? Is our ministry successful? How's our attendance at Mass?" and on and on.

Just as my focus can shift from Christ to me in the active life, it can also shift from Christ in the life of prayer! I can approach the life of prayer like a checklist: "Did I get to Mass today? Say my rosary? Did I get the Divine Mercy chaplet in?" Or I can get upset that Mass wasn't just as I wanted: not reverent enough, or too formal; the music was poor or from the wrong period; the church architecture too traditional or too modern; the priest used inclusive language -or didn't - and on and on. Again, the focus has shifted from Christ to me.

When we are anxious and upset over anything, it may well be a sign that we've begun to focus on the means, rather than the end, which is the encounter with Christ, our Lord, our Savior, our Love, our Life. It is so easy to replace the end, the one needful thing - or, better, the One we need - with something that ultimately will pass away.

We cannot be satisfied by something that is good, perhaps, but not the Good. When that happens we'll always end up seeking "the More". When we lose sight of "the One," we'll become lost and engrossed in the many.

Fr. Mike is so right.

When I first read this I thought about the bothers we have still, to some extent, in the Anglican church. Some people are still worried about whether they're going to get Prayer Book or Common Worship, whether it's going to be Wesley hymns or Matt Redman, bells and smells or a Geneva gown, a woman priest or a complementarian bloke. Not me, of course.

Then I got to thinking about my own post the other day, about how hard I sometimes find it to trust God. Losing sight of the One? Yes - this is just what I do. The obverse of that - keeping the One continually in sight - is so much a function of the simplicity to which we are called as Franciscans, and which this dear Dominican has shown me so clearly. And of course we are back with the Jesus Prayer again (well, I am, where else?) and praying continually, which is such a true and trustworthy way to keep him always in mind - or should I say to keep our mind always in him?