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Finding god in the dark – taking the spiritual excercises of st ignatious to the movies

Grace: To ask for a sense of bow I, and all humanity, am implicated in a disorder larger than ourselves and bow I, consciously, or unconsciously, participate in and contribute to that disorder

Koyaanisqatsi – disorder of our life

Consolation and desolation pp17

Our fives are shaped by our past. Often we carry that past around with us, as if we were houses haunted by ghosts that refuse to leave. These are the traumatic moments that have stunted our healthy growth and made us cautious, closed off, insecure, pained and wounded. Unless those moments are brought to light and transformed by love, they fester and pervert us. They can even kill us spiritually. They are the sorts of things that make us think we must look after ourselves. No one else will. Pp49

Destruction pp54

You are not doing this to save yourself, which you cannot do, or to save anyone else. What you can do is have a firm purpose of amendment. That purpose resolves itself in a hatred for what you have done; a desire to find out why you have done it so as not to do it again; and a resolution not to do it again. Even if we have been sinned against, we seek not to continue that cycle of sin and destruction but rather to ask God's grace to break that cycle, to hold it up to be redeemed, and to try to transform what is destructive into life. We also need to find out the nature of the world that drives us to such a condition and how it makes us complicit in its activities. These are the graces we pray for as we consider at a deeper level not our sinfulness in itself, but how we can cooperate with that merciful love of God in re-creating the world and the relationships we have damaged. What we are doing here is the first step in responding lovingly to the love that we have found so far in our lives. 70

'Right view" reminds us that we are rooted in God's love, that we are all lovable and capable of loving, no matter what situation we find ourselves in. St. Paul puts it this way: "Nothing, neither death, nor - life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord (Rom 8:38-9).

"Right thinking'' refers to the process of reflection that grounds the experience of God's love for us, rather than those negative tapes that debilitate us and alienate others. Right thinking does not ignore the real presence of evil but knows - as Julian of Norwich knows - that "all shall be well and all manners of things shall be well." It knows that good overcomes evil and transforms evil. It knows that basically we are aligned to good.

"Right mindfulness" is being attentive to what is and so being able to discern truth from illusion. It seeks God in all situations and in living in the love the Christ has for the Father. It is to have that same focus and desire as the Christ and to live fully in the gift of the present.

"Right speech'' s peaks the truth lovingly. Truth without love is a lie; and love without truth is sentimentality.

Right action" manifests itself in a reverence for life through generosity, responsible gestures - a gesture is an act of homage to God performed in this world - and the way we place our body as incarnate spirit.

"Right effort" examines how we spend the energy we have: "To do the right deed for the wrong reason...the greatest treason (TS. Eliot). Why do we do what we do? Evil encloses us ever more tightly in the webs of narcissism; right effort struggles against those ego-limitations to ever more comprehensive relationships within the realities in which we find ourselves.

"Rigbt concentration" is a spiritual calm that acknowledges both the transitory and the Absolute at the same time.

"Rigbt livelibood" is having an occupation that fosters our vocation to be a witness to love. 77

Cost of discipleship 168

Chrsit walks on water 174

Jesus in the temple 179

Joy is often equated with loud celebrations. True joy is not like that. Joy is the felt sense of being rooted in Gods love. It is calm and focused and deep. The enemy of our human nature does not want us to be joyful, and so lures us away from it. Unless we counteract that temptation, we start moving from being joyful to being happy, from being happy to being excited, and from being excited to being in a state of pleasure. From there it is easy to slip into giddiness and then to desolation. Pleasure is a delight in the things that stimulate the senses. 1 can have pleasure in a good meal or in an ice-cream cone on a hot day. Excitement is an intensification of that pleasure, to the extent that it blocks out a sense of calm and of control. Happiness is when my desires coincide with the energies around me and 1 am affirmed in myself. Joy is acknowledging in a self-conscious manner my rootedness in a love and a life that is larger than me and that 1 know cares for me. In joy 1 can appropriate my self -transcendence; in pleasure 1 experience my selfhood solely in a physical way. Joy lies at one end of the continuum of delight; pleasure lies at the other end.

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The resurrected Christ does not abandon them in their fear but enters their little world and wishes them peace. Inasmuch as we become manifestations of the resurrected Christ we, too, are asked to enter the worlds of fear and selfenclosure and bring a peace that comes from rootedness in the Father's love. That relationship casts out fear. Interestingly, when we do this, we are tested as Christ was tested. We need to show signs that we live out of our relationship with the Father before others will believe us. The most effective sign of that is if, in our suffering, we remain faithful and loving.

Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon 307

About Schmidt

The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert

AT: Artifical Intelligence

Almost Famous

American Beauty

Bend it Like Beckharn

Big Fish

Billy Elliot

Bowling for Columbine

The Butcher Boy

Chicago

Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon

Dancer in the Dark

The End of the Affair

Far from Heaven

The Full Monty

Gossip -

Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets

Hearts in Atlantis

The Hours

lgby Goes Down

The Insider

Insomnia

Iron Giant

A Knight's Tale

Koyaanisqatsi

L.A. Confidential

Life as a House

The Lord of the Rings

Lost in Translation

Magnolia

Matchstick Men

The Matrix

The Mission

Monsoon Wedding

Moulin Rouge

Mystic River

0 Brother, Where Art Thou?

Pleasantville

Punch-Drunk Love

The Quiet American

Requiem for a Dream

The Royal Tenenbaums

Romeo + Juliet

Shrek

Stand by Me

The Sweet Hereafter

The Thin Red Line

Three Kings

The Truman Show

2001: A Space Odyssey

White Oleander