Resources – Page 9 – The Church's Ministry of Healing

Consecrating empathy

Posted on: 26 March 2020/in Thoughts /by CMH_Admin2020

One time, after Jesus was busy ministering to people and healing them, He went to a
solitary place to pray.

“Very early in the morning, while it was still dark, Jesus got up,
left the house and went off to a solitary place, where he prayed. Simon and his companions went to look for him, and when they found him, they exclaimed: “Everyone is looking for you!” Jesus replied, “Let us go somewhere else, to the nearby villages, so I can preach there also. That is why I have come. (Mark 1:35-38)”

Jesus had a freedom to say ‘No’ to certain demands in order to do what He was called to do. This came out of His prayer life and relationship with God the Father. If we are to follow in Jesus’ footsteps then we are to have the same discerning spirit.

Our lives have changed drastically over the last few weeks, with restrictions of movement, many places, schools and churches closing down – for now. People with children are probably busier than before. People living on their own restricting human connection to mostly online encounters. Doctors, nurses, and those working in shops serving the country “on the front line”.

While demands have changed – increased for some, reduced for others – our ability to care for each other, and for the world around us, has been put on overdrive. The positive elements to it show us we are all connected. Our hearts are challenged to expand, to include the whole world in our prayer. But this can also be overwhelming.

The wisdom from John Eldredge may give us much needed peace. Eldredge speaks about “consecrating empathy”. Watching the news can easily overwhelm us. Yet the answer is not in shutting down every negative story we might hear and doing nothing. Instead, what we can do is “consecrate our capacity to care” (Eldredge). In other words, we can say a brief prayer and join our own capacity for care with Jesus’ capacity, which is infinitely greater. This way we are also giving God permission to direct us, to guide us how to use this capacity.

Having invited Jesus to help us in this caring process may eventually increase our own capacity in loving others, deepen our prayer, and bring creative solutions to our actions. Above all, it might increase the peace in our hearts, the peace that surpasses understanding. The more inner peace increases, the more peace there will be in the world too.

Iva Beranek

Dr Iva Beranek is the Ministry Facilitator for the CMH: Ireland

Online guided meditation with intercessions – 26th March

Thank you to those of you who joined in our online retreat last week.
If you missed it, you can listen and pray through the recording, which can be found
on the Church’s Ministry of Healing: Ireland Facebook page.

This week we will offer an online guided meditation with intercessions for the needs in our country & in the world. Join us live on our Facebook page this Thursday, 26th March, at 11am.

Blessings & keep safe.

CMH:I online retreat – 19th Marth

We are offering online retreat this Thursday, 19th March, via Facebook live, at 11am to 12noon.

Here you can find the Church’s Ministry of Healing: Ireland Facebook page.

During this time of social distancing, the need to connect with each other still remains. This will be a space to connect with God, the source of all peace. We will join our prayers together – there will be a time within the hour where we will be able to bring our own petitions and intercessions to God.

No need to register. Simply tune in whenever you can.

Be free to let others know.
You are in our prayers.
Keep safe.

Gratitude as a Lenten practice

Posted on: 27 February 2020/in Thoughts /by CMH_Admin2020

“In 12 years of research, I have never interviewed a single person with the capacity to really experience joy who does not also actively practice gratitude.”
Brené Brown

Practicing gratitude is simple. It does not requite any special skill, like riding a bicycle for example would. We can write our gratitude notes in a journal or on small pieces of paper that we put into a jar (“a gratitude jar”). While the practice is simple, it is good to be reminded of the value of gratitude.

Research has shown that gratitude can improve both mental and physical health, and “not surprisingly, grateful people are also more likely to take care of their health”.* A number of studies revealed other benefits, such as improvement in self-esteem, better sleep, reduced stress and even a help in overcoming trauma.

I have been writing a gratitude journal for a few years now. When I read through it I notice I am often grateful for small things. Or maybe better to say ordinary things, like sunshine, a fox in my garden, hot water – hot water features quite regularly in my gratitude notes. Green grass, a conversation with a friend, a pressed Autumn leaf in my notebook, especially since I found it at the beginning of Spring.

In “One thousand gifts”, Ann Voskamp describes her practice of writing one thousand gratitude notes into a journal. This practice gradually transformed her. When she was young, something tragic happened in her family and it marked the rest of her life. As a grown up woman, she had lovely six children, a husband, they lived on a farm, but her daily living was marked with anxiety and worry. Until she started to write the gratitude notes in her journal. She started noticing that her days were filled with beauty. Interestingly, a lot of the things she wrote about were also every-day and simple.

“243. Clean sheets smelling like wind
244. Hot oatmeal tasting like home
245. Bare toes in early light”
[Ann Voskamp, “One thousand gifts”, p. 55]

We have just started our Lenten journey. Lent is a time where we reflect on Jesus’ time in the desert. We journey with Jesus towards His final days on earth, His death and resurrection. I have never been in an actual desert, but I am sure that even there we can find things to be grateful for. Some deserts bloom with flowers during certain seasons.

There can be an oasis in the desert, and it must feel almost like a little miracle to come across one. Perhaps those who travel in the desert become aware of the essentials they need. We can be grateful for company, water, food, a shelter for the night. Even if we are not going to go physically into the desert, we can experience that life sometimes provides ‘desert-experiences’. During the difficult times, too, we can practice gratitude, and it may help to ground us into the experience of God’s goodness.

In Lent, at least liturgically, we don’t sing Alleluia, which is exclamation of relief and ultimate victory. But the prayers are still filled with praises to God. Those praises, as well as noticing gifts of each day, are a bit like new buds on the trees as Spring is gradually bursting into bloom. The more blossoms we notice, the more grateful we feel.

If we take gratitude as our Lenten practice, noticing goodness in life will guide us from the praises of God’s goodness towards the Easter Alleluia. We might even notice that some of the desert places within us bloomed as we did that.

Iva Beranek
Dr Iva Beranek is the Ministry Facilitator for the CMH: Ireland

D&G ministry of healing Quiet Day, 22nd February

The Dublin & Glendalough Committee invites you to their Quiet Day on Saturday, 22nd February starting at 10.30am. The day will be led by Rev Canon Adrienne Galligan. It takes place in Mageough, Cowper Road, Rathmines.
See further information on the flyer.

All are most welcome!

Advent – when light makes a difference in the dark

Posted on: 10 December 2019/in Thoughts /by CMH_Admin2020

Each Sunday in Advent, we light a candle on our Advent wreath, flickering and shining their light into our churches and homes. As the evenings grow shorter, we can see the candles clearly. They appear brighter and more distinct to us the darker it becomes, and as nighttime falls, they appear quite brilliant in the inky surroundings, little beacons of light in a sea of darkness. And the light from a single candle can be seen from a great distance in total darkness.

According to scientific study, the human eye could detect the flicker of a candle in total darkness, with a direct line of sight, at 46km away, or 30 miles. It seems an impossible task for a tiny little flame to emit light that can be seen from that distance but it can. And the strange thing is that that little beam of light can be seen further the darker the world around it is. Truly light can cut through darkness, the light only becomes stronger the darker it gets.

In our day to day lives, it is all too easy to become a little down trodden, to become overwhelmed with our own worries and concerns. Yet we are not alone. If a small bulb or a candle can shine far out into the darkness, how much further can the light of Jesus’ love shine? As the mirrors of a lighthouse amplify and direct light into the darkness, so too can we take that light that Jesus brings to us and reflect it in how we live our lives and in how we share our lives with others, in how we treat others. In this season of Advent, we can reflect that light and that love into the darkest corners of our world. Jesus is the bearer of that light, his healing love is there for all, yet it is up to us to open the door and let it shine into our lives, into our world.

Rev Ross Styles

Grief at a time of Advent

Posted on: 5 December 2019/in Thoughts /by CMH_Admin2020

Grief is never easy. But some times of the year it may be amplified. I have friends who recently lost people close to them. It’s hard to see their pain, and yet only by witnessing the pain – ours and someone else’s – will we find healing in it.

Whether the loss was recent or from the years past, the closer we are to the season of Christmas the more painful some memories become. On the other hand, Advent in its gentleness, like candles lit in the dark nights, can provide a cloak of comfort. Advent is a season of gentle contrasts: darkness in which light comes, longing for hope into which hope is born, desire for peace that comes out a deep anguish and a need for change. It is Christ coming into our humanity, bringing us His light, hope, peace. But this coming comes softly, like the frost on the winter grass.

If you are in a season of grief and if the pain of memory knocks on your door each morning, know there is nothing wrong with you. It is not only human, but also healthy to allow ourselves to feel all the nuances of emotion we experience. Grief is painful, but only by walking through it will darkness of the night lead us towards the dawn.

Often when we light a candle, its wax drips, like tears. Light a candle, sit next to it, and allow your emotions to surface. Weep if you feel like weeping. Know that God is with you. You are not alone. You are never alone. Let Him cradle you in His love, comfort you, love you. God can hear all your questions. He hears the screams of your pain, and screams of the silence of your heart. You are not alone.

Yet if you are well enough, but you know someone who is in pain: sit with them. Allow them to talk. Don’t be quick to offer answers. Dry their tears. Be there. Show them that God cares by you caring for them. And know that God will sit down with you. He will cradle you both in His gentle presence and lit your inner candles in these dark nights.

Iva Beranek
Dr. Iva Beranek is the Ministry Facilitator for CMH:I

Wellspring, 23rd November, St Patrick’s Church, Dalkey

“Whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”
Jesus (John 4:13-14)

Our next Wellspring takes place on Saturday, 23rd November 2019, in St Patrick’s Church, Dalkey.
Wellspring, one day retreat, has become a regular space for nourishment where we can come to meet God and explore what is deepest in ourselves. In our busy lives, taking time for inner nourishment is nothing short of a gift.

There will be time to walk outside; to participate in guided reflections; to avail of one-to-one discussion with a spiritual director; or just take time to relax and read.

The facilitators for the day are Dr Iva Beranek and Carol Casey. Suggested donation to CMH:I is €25. Please bring your own sandwich for lunch and we will provide tea and coffee. The retreat starts at 9.30am and finishes at 4.00pm.

All are welcome!

Please note that places must be booked in advance (hello@ministryofhealing.ie).

“Thy kingdom come” is a prayer for healing

Posted on: 14 August 2019/in Thoughts /by CMH_Admin2020

Jesus thought us to pray, “Thy kingdom come, on earth as it is heaven”. In this day-and-age when social media is so prevalent in our lives, the news travels quickly from one part of the world to another. And bad news travels even quicker, or at least it seems that way at times. We don’t even have to go as far as listening to the news. It is enough to talk to people we know, or to look into our own lives, to see that we need healing, this world needs healing. In other words, this world is crying out to receive more of God, more of His presence and more of His kingdom here in our midst. We need the prayer that Jesus thought us to become reality, “Thy kingdom come on earth as it is in heaven”.

Initially in the garden of Eden, before the Fall, there was no illness, no distress, no anxiety, no discord, and we all long to return to that place in one way or another. It must have been amazing to live in that kind of environment – it sounds like a life where everything is in its right order and there is perfect peace. And yet, that’s not how the story ended.

Now we live in the moment of history between the harmony our ancestors enjoyed in the garden of Eden, and between the promise of heaven, where “He will wipe every tear from [our] eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things will be removed forever (Revelation 21:4).” Each and every one of us needs healing. Healing is not only for those who are terminally ill or who have experienced deep traumas. We have all been scarred with some experience that has affected us, or still affects us, and that needs to be brought to God so that He can put the balm of His love and the balm of His truth over it. Jesus healed when He encountered people, and that is also how His kingdom spread. Every experience of healing here on this earth is an experience of heaven, a touch of God’s presence. It is an experience of God’s kingdom coming to inhabit our reality now in our daily lives.

The key to allowing God’s kingdom to inhabit us more fully is, I believe, in the Gospel where Jesus visits His friends, Martha and Mary. Mary “sat at the Lord’s feet listening to what he said” (Luke 10:39). You can imagine the scene: Mary is sitting at Jesus’ feet, listening to Him. There is something peaceful about that…the exchange of love is happening. Mary is fed in the presence of Jesus. Then comes Martha, worried, distracted with what needs to be done, and she does not notice this atmosphere of peace and love. Not until Jesus points it out. “Martha, Martha,” He said, “you are worried and upset about many things, but few things are needed—or indeed only one. Mary has chosen what is better, and it will not be taken away from her (Luke 10:41-42).”

The difference between Martha and Mary is in the attitude of their heart. In the presence of Jesus, Mary is exposed to the depths of His love. This kind of love-relationship with God cannot be taken away from us, yet it also cannot but spill over into our interactions with each other. Mary’s attitude does not mean she will not do anything, but rather that her doing will have a different flavour. Out of this love-relationship with Jesus we bring God’s kingdom to this earth. Martha, or any one of us when we are worried, disappointed, hurt, in any kind of need, are invited into a similar relationship with Jesus, where we can bring our worries, stresses, discouragements, needs and over time encounter His healing and His peace.