You might want to read through these suggestions every now and then to help you get the most from this Lenten practice as it deepens for you week by week.
Thoughts on engaging with the weekly meditations:
▪ Set aside ten minutes, give or take. Perhaps a bit more if you decide to include writing in your practice.
▪ Read through what is presented, taking whatever time and going as deeply into any piece as you feel moved.
▪ If you can, come back to each meditation a few times over the week. You may find yourself drawn to one part or another, a prayer, the meditation, the Psalm. If so, let yourself settle more deeply into that piece; hear what it says in you.
Each of the meditations will follow the same outline. Some of the elements will stay constant and others change more or less with the theme of each post. Here’s an outline:
▪ Prayer
▪ Meditation: Thoughts for the week, and an invitation to imaginative engagement and response (you may want to write some of your feelings, thoughts, and/or prayers).
▪ A Psalm for the week (see note on Psalms below)
▪ A Benediction Prayer
Psalms — Each meditation includes a short text from Psalms. The psalms are amazing in their unapologetic humanness. They offer up the full range of our thoughts and feelings, dumping all of it at God’s feet and expecting a response. Read each week’s Psalm two or three times. If one word or phrase grabs you, stay with it awhile. Don’t worry about making something happen in your reading–relax and notice what does, or doesn’t, arise.
Resources on Forgiveness:
Don’t Forgive Too Soon: Extending the Two Hands that Heal. Dennis Linn, Sheila Fabricant Linn, Matthew Linn. Paulist Press 1997
Healing Life’s Hurts: Healing Memories through the Five Stages of Forgiveness. Dennis Linn, Matthew Linn. Paulist Press 1978, rev. 1993
Learning to Forgive. Doris Donnelly. Abingdon Press. 1979
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