Contemplative at Home

A Lectio Divina meditation with Luke 1:39-45: Mary visits her cousin Elizabeth after the visit from the angel.

For more Advent meditations, please visit this page.

Advent blessings!Lissy

Contemplative at Home offers guided meditative prayer – space to slow down and listen to the truth that is being born out of God’s love for you today – drawing on Ignatian spirituality and at times, Lectio Divina.

Sign up for Lissy’s weekly newsletter “The Contemplative Window” or join our Facebook group here.

All music by Pete Hatch. petehatch.com.

A Lectio Divina meditation with the Annunciation, Luke 1:26-38.

For more Advent meditations, please see this list.

Advent blessings–Lissy

Contemplative at Home offers guided meditative prayer – space to slow down and listen to the truth that is being born out of God’s love for you today – drawing on Ignatian spirituality and at times, Lectio Divina.

Sign up for Lissy’s weekly newsletter “The Contemplative Window” or join our Facebook group here.

All music by Pete Hatch. petehatch.com.

Oops! That was embarrassing! Unfortunately an unedited version of this meditation was released earlier today. The updated version is now linked to this post.

“You prepare a table before me… my cup overflows” -Psalm 23

In this guided meditation you are invited to imagine the whole of your life spread out before you, as a great feast laid on a table, to call to mind the gifts and nourishment which are poured out for your encouragement and sustenance each day.

May it be a blessing to you in this season of feasting and gratitude.

And thank you, for your presence and engagement with these meditations and the Contemplative at Home community. You are a gift to me.

Grace and Peace,Lissy

Contemplative at Home offers guided meditative prayer – space to slow down and listen to the truth that is being born out of God’s love for you today – drawing on Ignatian spirituality and at times, Lectio Divina.

Sign up for my weekly newsletter “The Contemplative Window” here or join our Facebook group here.

All music by Pete Hatch. petehatch.com.

In this meditation we loosely follow our theme of hospitality in its guise of presence: being present with time, attention, love and care.

Psalm 139 intersperses “his steadfast love endures forever” into every single line of the song, meditating on the presence of Divine love in and over and through all of life.

What might this Presence have to teach us about being present?

Every blessing as you pray.

Sign up for our Advent Retreat, 27 November 2021 here.

Contemplative at Home offers guided meditative prayer – space to slow down and listen to the truth that is being born out of God’s love for you today – drawing on Ignatian spirituality and at times, Lectio Divina.

Sign up for Lissy’s weekly newsletter “The Contemplative Window” or join our Facebook group here.

We continue our exploration of hospitality as we pray a Lectio Divina with Genesis 18:1-14, when Abraham is visited by the three guests who are mysteriously “the LORD.”

As you listen to the text I invite you to be alert to the generosity and grace which is offered by both parties in this exchange.

I wonder what will stir in you as you pray with this foundational text to all the Abrahamic faiths?

Grace and peace.

Contemplative at Home offers guided meditative prayer – space to slow down and listen to the truth that is being born out of God’s love for you today – drawing on Ignatian spirituality and at times, Lectio Divina.

Sign up for Lissy’s weekly newsletter “The Contemplative Window” or join our Facebook group here

All music by Pete Hatch. petehatch.com.

This audio meditation with Luke 15 offers an imaginative contemplation with the older brother of the prodigal son, inviting you to enter the story from another perspective and find safe space to express your anger, dissapointment, self-righteousness, frustration.

“My son,” the father said, “You are always with me, and everything I have is yours”

Every blessing as you pray.

0:00 Intro and Stilling5:50 reading of selected verses from Luke 1511:16 imaginative engagement with the story18:10 review of prayer and closing

Contemplative at Home offers guided meditative prayer – space to slow down and listen to the truth that is being born out of God’s love for you today – drawing on Ignatian spirituality and at times, Lectio Divina.

This month at the newsletter, we are exploring hospitality – tomorrow thinking a bit about welcoming the ‘unwelcome’ – both without and within. Catch that here: http://eepurl.com/hkbDFP

or join our Facebook group here https://www.facebook.com/groups/1905953786386080/

All music by Pete Hatch. petehatch.com.

In this imaginative contemplation we focus on the father and the younger son in the parable Jesus tells in Luke 15. (We will think about the older son next week)

After two readings of the text, we enter the story ourselves, using our imaginations to open us up to how God may wish to speak to us through this text.

For more on imaginative prayer, as suggested by Ignatius of Loyola, keep your eye out for this week’s newsletter.

Grace and Peace, my friends.

And every blessing.

Lissy

Contemplative at Home offers guided meditative prayer – space to slow down and listen to the truth that is being born out of God’s love for you today – drawing on Ignatian spirituality and at times, Lectio Divina.

Sign up for Lissy’s weekly newsletter “The Contemplative Window” or join our Facebook group here.

All music by Pete Hatch. petehatch.com.

An evening examen, a mindful audio prayer to help you review your day, to observe where God has been and where God might be leading you.

This month I’m thinking about Ignatian spirituality, to which the examen prayer of review is central. This recording offers a fairly traditional examen practice, and reflects the way I’m engaging with the examen in my own prayer life at present.

I hope it is of use to you.

Contemplative at Home offers guided meditative prayer – space to slow down and listen to the truth that is being born out of God’s love for you today – drawing on Ignatian spirituality and at times, Lectio Divina.

Sign up for Lissy’s weekly newsletter “The Contemplative Window” or join our Facebook group here.

All music by Pete Hatch. petehatch.com.

Luke 14:16-23

In this Lectio Divina, we listen to two readings of Jesus’ parable about the Great Banquet, which the invited guests don’t feel bothered to attend – too busy with their new purchases, new relationships.

Perhaps you can get in touch with the care and delight the host puts into this great feast, and how great his desire was to share it with others.

May there be one nugget of nourishment for you in this meditation, whether that be in the awareness of your breath, a word from the text, or perhaps the beauty of something you see in your own surrounding as you pause for prayer.

This text touches briefly on the concept of Ignatian detachment which I will explore a bit further in this week’s newsletter.

Rich blessings as you pray, dear ones.

Contemplative at Home offers guided meditative prayer – space to slow down and listen to the truth that is being born out of God’s love for you today – drawing on Ignatian spirituality and at times, Lectio Divina.

Sign up for Lissy’s weekly newsletter “The Contemplative Window” or join our Facebook group here.

All music by Pete Hatch. petehatch.com.

An Imaginative Contemplation with Luke 13:10-13

“On a Sabbath Jesus was teaching in one of the synagogues, 11 and a woman was there who had been crippled by a spirit for eighteen years. She was bent over and could not straighten up at all. 12 When Jesus saw her, he called her forward and said to her, “Woman, you are set free from your infirmity.” 13 Then he put his hands on her, and immediately she straightened up and praised God.”

While this text goes on to highlight at the growing tension between Jesus and the pharisees over interpretation of the law and healing on the Sabbath, here we pause simply to engage with the healing experience for this woman.

As with any imaginative contemplation, if at any stage you don’t feel safe, please come away from the meditation. You may instead find it helpful to focus on an image of God that is safe for you, or to be present to your breathing. (Trigger warning: physical touch)

I take the liberty in this exercise of imagining collective singing in the synagogue. According to Google, scholars don’t know definitively whether collective singing happened in first century Galilee or not, though it has clearly featured at various points in history. Again, you’re always free to follow these imaginative exercises insofar as you feel comfortable doing so.

Contemplative at Home offers guided meditative prayer – space to slow down and listen to the truth that is being born out of God’s love for you today – drawing on Ignatian spirituality and at times, Lectio Divina.

Sign up for Lissy’s weekly newsletter “The Contemplative Window” or join our Facebook group here.

All music by Pete Hatch. petehatch.com.