Contemplation – A Long Loving Look At the Real

We are watching out for sightings of God all around us, and we try to find the divine life at the heart of reality. Ignatius left no detailed rule about how much prayer his followers should undertake. Instead, he asked that we should keep God always before our eyes. This is contemplation in action. It is a tall order, yet we know what it is like to be doing something, whether pleasant or distasteful, with someone else in our mind. I came across migrants working in the diamond mines of South Africa. They endured long hours in the depths of the earth in order to send money home to their families
Contemplation has been described as ‘a long loving look at the real’. This is how God looks at our world. Then God ‘gets going’ and intervenes on our behalf. In this sense, God is THE ‘contemplative in action’. So, of course, is Jesus. He prays, he works, he suffers, but always in the presence of his Father. He has a discerning heart, which is why he can say, ‘I always do what is pleasing to him’ (John 8:29). As his companions, we try to imitate him. It is no accident that the first Jesuits wanted to be known as ‘companions of Jesus’. 

Brian Grogan SJ, Finding God in All Things