Contemplative Prayer and the Beloved Disciple
The School of Spiritual Formation for the Spring Quarter of the Avila Institute will be under way soon. The Avila Institute offers courses to help you in your spiritual formation such as the upcoming course on Contemplative Prayer and the Beloved Disciple. The deadline to apply for the spring is Ash Wednesday, March 1st.
“Without me, you can do nothing.” These words from Christ Himself in the Gospel of John (John 15:5) capture the essence of how our attitude towards prayer should be. Prayer involves our effort and cooperation with grace, especially in the early stages. But without the grace of God we cannot achieve anything through prayer. In fact contemplative prayer is something granted to souls entirely at God’s discretion. You cannot follow some special formula to arrive at union with God.
That being said, we can look to the Scriptures and the saints to see how we can grow deeper in our prayerful relationship with God our loving Father. In particular the Gospel of John and the person of John the Evangelist provide great insight into understanding the contemplative life. In the 15th chapter of John’s Gospel, Jesus gives the analogy of the vine and the branches, telling his disciples to remain in Him. To remain in Him means to be faithful in prayer, to accompany Him in the good times and in the difficult times. Despite Jesus’ words only one of the Twelve remained with Him at the foot of the cross. Why is this? What is it about John that he remained faithful when the others scattered?
John remained at the wounded side of Christ, mourning with him, consoling Him, being there for Him. He knew where his hope was, even when darkness descended and all seemed hopeless. John is said to represent the contemplative Church while Peter represents the active Church. Both are essential to the life of the Church, but we can learn a lot about prayer from the saints who were contemplatives.
By looking at the Gospel of John and the person of John the Evangelist, we can begin to discover the mysteries of prayer and the challenges of being faithful to Christ.
This Spring the Avila Institute will be offering an online course called Contemplative Prayer and the Beloved Disciple taught by Professor John Johnson (Dates: March 10, 17, 24, 31, April 7, 21). The course will cover the following:
St. John the Evangelist’s insights into our Lord’s Heart offer the Church a model of apostolic life and Christian contemplation. Only in imitation of the Beloved Disciple are we able to stand with Mary at the cross and fully share in Christ’s saving passion. When others flee, John stays. In this, our Lord is greatly consoled in His final hours by the love of His friend. Similarly, in these, the last days, Christians must adopt the charism of the Beloved Disciple in order that union with Christ might be achieved through a share in His suffering. This charism is particularly Marian and Eucharistic. Most of all, it is contemplative: St. John is uniquely suited to receive the secret of our Lord’s heart: the secret of Love.
This six-week class will dive into the work of St. John at various junctures in his life with Christ and expound on:
- Contemplative prayer.
- Eucharistic Adoration.
- Marian Devotion.
- Right response to apostolic betrayal (John and Judas).
- God Who Is Love.
- Eschatology, Mark of the Beast, and Beatitude.
We would love for you to join us for this course or others at the Avila Institute. The course is filling up quickly, so register soon! In addition to Contemplative Prayer and the Beloved Disciple, this spring we will also be offering the following courses in Session 1 of the School of Spiritual Formation:
- Holy Spirit in the Life of the Church taught by Dr. Ben Nguyen (Dates: March 8, 15, 22, 29, April 5, 19)
- Growth in Holiness: Doctors of he Interior Life taught by Dr. Michael Gama (Dates: March 9, 16, 23, 30, April 6, 20)
All of these courses will delve into the richness of Church tradition while also being a journey in prayer that leads you closer to Christ. The School of Spiritual Formation involves one class per week in addition to a weekly journal. There are no additional assignments. You can take as many or as few courses as you would like. To apply, visit our admissions page.
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Art for this post on Saint John the Evangelist: St. John the Evangelist (shown with his traditional symbol; at St. Anthony’s Catholic Church, Steinauer, Nebraska, USA), Corbert Gauthier, 2013, copyright, all rights reserved, used with permission.
About Dylan Jedlovec
Dylan Jedlovec is an Operations Administrative Assistant at the Avila Foundation, parent organization of SpiritualDirection.com, the Avila Institute for Spiritual Formation, and Divine Intimacy Radio. Finishing up an undergraduate degree in Marketing and Economics from Samford University, Dylan is first and foremost a disciple of Christ and a son of the Church. Dylan has a heart for evangelization on college campuses, and has worked closely with FOCUS as a student missionary and served as President of the Catholic Student Association at Samford. As a member of the University Fellows Program at Samford, Dylan developed a love for the writings of the Saints, particularly the Doctors of the Church, through his studies of the core texts of the Western Intellectual Tradition. This love for the rich intellectual tradition of the faith brought him to the Avila Foundation, where he seeks to further the kingdom through feeding Christ’s sheep. In his free time, Dylan enjoys watching baseball, reading, hiking, running, and lifting weights (although you can’t really tell).