Conversations with God: beginning Raphaela's spiritual diary
From today on, I will try to write Conversations with God, Raphaela's spiritual diary.
In 2019, when I lay in bed after a traffic accident, I heard the voice of our Father in heaven and wrote down conversations with God on my blog.
The spelling was a mess and the writing clumsy, but I want to take those records out one by one and bring them to life again in this room, together with the mind journey I have walked with PuNolChi.
1. A dawn as dark as night, 5:50 a.m.
5:50 a.m. / a dawn as dark as night / starlight / and one tree frog
On the handle of the church's glass door, a tree frog is clinging tight.
Even the tree frog came to see Jesus / and is clinging here so tightly, / and I…
2. 2013: my first ten-day silent retreat
Seeing the tree frog and the starlight, I think of my first ten-day silent retreat in 2013 and of Sister Teresa.
At that time I was not a Catholic, and I had never once read the Bible.
I didn't really know what a retreat was, but since I was running five-day food expression group counseling, I thought it might be something similar. Feeling that ten days of silence would give me some important realization, I cleared my busy schedule and simply went.
The sister who guided the twenty or so of us had not studied psychology, but I was receiving her guidance through the lens of C. G. Jung's analytical psychology.
3. Raphaela's Acts of the Apostles
At that time the sister encouraged each of us on the retreat to write our own Acts of the Apostles.
I didn't really understand it then, but now I think I understand a little.
So from today I want to approach Healing Santa Kim Ji-yu's healing essays spiritually. Of course, I still don't know much about spirituality. I have studied it since 2013, but it always feels difficult and puzzling. But the priests told me that spirituality is not difficult: it is meeting Jesus, who is with us in everyday life. Spirituality may feel enormously sacred, holy and burdensome, but they said it is loving the partner beside me, loving my children, loving my neighbors, and practicing sharing as much as I can. Since I was baptized and became a Catholic in 2019, I want to write the Acts of the Apostles the sister recommended in 2013: my own, Raphaela's Acts of the Apostles.
I have no plan for how to do it. I will simply follow my heart, ask the Lord who is within me, and try contemplative prayer, waiting for the Lord's answer.
In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, amen~ Recently, listening to a homily by Fr. Pio Kwak Seung-ryong at Taean Catholic Church, I heard him say that the Holy Spirit must come and the fire of the Holy Spirit must blaze within us. Lord, come and live in me; come and kindle the fire of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
4. Monday 6 a.m. Mass and Eucharistic adoration at Eungbong Catholic Church
At Eungbong Catholic Church, where Communion under both kinds is possible, after the Monday 6 a.m. Mass I spent a moment in Eucharistic adoration and read the Liturgy of the Hours.
The heavens declare the glory of God, and the firmament proclaims the work of his hands.
Day pours out the word to day, and night to night imparts knowledge.
No speech, no word, no voice is heard, yet their sound goes out through all the earth, and their message to the ends of the world.
(Psalm 19)
When your words came, I devoured them. Because I am called by your name, O Lord God of hosts, your words became my joy and the happiness of my heart.
(Jeremiah 15:16)
Almighty God, who has brought us safely to the dawn of this new day, protect us today by your power, that we may not fall into sin, and that our thoughts, words and deeds may follow the path of your justice. Amen.
(from the concluding prayer of the Liturgy of the Hours)
The word that spreads through all the earth even without a sound — today the tree frog told me first.
Like the tree frog, I too begin the day clinging tight to the Lord's side.
This dawn, what would you like to ask the Lord?
Healing Santa Kim Ji-yu
This story was first posted in the Conversations with God spiritual coaching of the healing space Haengbok Yeolgi cafe.