Copyright 2018 Maria Morera Johnson. All rights reserved.[/caption]
Years of keeping a regular weekly holy hour has made it clear to me that I still don’t know how to do this right.
I’ve had a few very profound experiences in those opportunities for Adoration, but to be honest, it’s not a regular occurrence. The more common experience is that I just show up. I never have to worry about Jesus showing up; he’s waiting for me. The weak link in the relationship is me.
Truth be told, I still, after all this time, struggle with what I think is the “proper” thing to do during Adoration. I teeter between going prepared with reading material, journals, and a list of prayers — things that I think are good and pleasing to the Lord — and showing up empty-handed ready to sit in silence and listen. More often than not, it’s a bit of a mix. I fear I am taking my agenda instead of being open to the Lord.
I fidget and get distracted in the silence.
I alternate between moments of sublime awe and spiritual desolation when I feel nothing at all. The latter would worry me if I didn’t also have moments of consolation like I experienced today. Exposition of the Blessed Sacrament at a cloister took me by surprise today. The monstrance faced the nuns in the cloister. I had a perfect view of the side of the monstrance, and couldn’t see Jesus no matter where I moved.
I felt like Zacchaeus hanging off the tree.
I thought of the hemorrhaging woman who wanted to get close enough to Jesus to just touch his cloak. And in the silence I heard come closer.
Closer to his Sacred Heart. Closer to his Love. I didn’t need to see to know my Lord was there.
Copyright 2018 Maria Morera Johnson
Copyright 2018 Maria Morera Johnson
About the Author
Maria Morera Johnson
Maria Morera Johnson, author of My Badass Book of Saints, Super Girls and Halo, and Our Lady of Charity: How a Cuban Devotion to Mary Helped Me Grow in Faith and Love writes about all the things that she loves. A cradle Catholic, she struggles with living in the world but not being of it, and blogs about those successes and failures, too.
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