Each day should see me more humble; each day more willing to accept what comes my way. Thus I become more closely united to the Lord – grow, as I grow in grace, in the love of his Father...

No one can accuse St. Paul of being a pessimist; for him life was cheerful, rewarding, fulfilling. His doctrine is one of hope. But the passage of his upon which I would like to meditate is in his Second Epistle to the Corinthians: “More than ever I delight to boast of the weaknesses that humiliate me so that the strength of Christ may enshrine itself in me. I am content with these humiliations of mine, the insults, the hardships, the persecutions, the times of difficulty which I undergo for Christ. When I am weakest then I am strongest of all.”
Those of us who have experience of pastoral work come to realize that there are daily difficulties which cumulatively can amount to an extremely heavy burden. One can say further that in every human life there is a sadness or difficulty from which the person would gladly be free. There are, too, considerable crises of one kind or another. We call these “crosses” and know that the Scriptures that carrying the Cross is a condition of discipleship. We know, too, that “the grain of wheat must die…” We are familiar with the concept that a burden, carried as a cross, can become light. Many, however, do not derive this consolation – they become overwhelmed.

What is the role of the Cross in the spiritual and monastic life? Constantly God allows us to be buffeted by events and persons. There are frustrations: “If only it had worked out as I had planned!”; failures: “I made a fool of myself”; feelings of inadequacy: “Others do things so much better”; misunderstandings: “I did not mean to upset him”; being unappreciated: “No one knows the trouble I went to.” … We learn to cope with problems and to become less vulnerable.

However, we should go further, and in suffering see flashes of enlightenment and growth in our life hidden with Christ. We should recognize “golden moments”: “when I am weakest, then I am strongest”: We can come to find content, even delight, in humiliations, insults, hardships, persecutions, and difficulties, undergone for Christ. We become content when we realize that God is allowing us to experience – with and in his son – something of what Christ endured in Gethsemane or even in his dereliction on the Cross.
(Searching, pp.144-146)
 

It is important to adapt the attitude of waiting, of just being present at prayer even though the effort seems to us unrewarding. Success or failure – that is the attitude of Samuel: “Speak, Lord, for your servant hears” (1 Sam 3:10). This attitude may be as far as we get. And it my opinion it is a mistake to expect in prayer a response from God. Often God’s response is outside prayer. And often we do not link up an outside response with the effort we put into prayer. God speaks to us through events, through other persons, in opportunities presented to us day by day. But he speaks to us essentially and above all in the depths of our being, inspiring in us a great wanting for God. (Searching 124)
 
To pray is to try to make ourselves aware of God and in that awareness respond to him. It is an attempt to raise our minds and hearts to God. Abbot Herbert used to tell us that to try to pray was in fact to pray.

Prayer is an act of faith, hope, and charity. It is always an act of faith: “Lord, we would have our eyes opened.” Our Lord, let me remind you, points to us the question he put to the two blind men on the way to Jericho: “What would you help me do for you?” “Lord, we would have our eyes opened.” He puts to us the question he put to that other blind man whom, as Saint John records, he cured: “Do you believe?” “I do believe, Lord,” the man answered, and falling down adored him.

Prayer is an act of charity, an act of love. “You know all things, Lord, you know that I love you.” It is an act of hope, because he puts to us the same question he put to certain of the apostles (in the sixth chapter of Saint John): “Would you, too, go away?”  “Lord, to whom would we go? Yours are the words of eternal life. We have learned to believe and are assured that you are the Christ, the son of God.” We, also, are tempted to go away, turn away, and then we remember that there is none other to whom we can go to find eternal life. Prayer is the cry of a humble man: one who recognizes his inadequacy before God. “Lord, be merciful to me a sinner.” “It is not those who are in health who have need of the physician, but those who are sick.” To pray is to acknowledge our dependence on God and so we wonder why we should ask, when God is already aware of our needs. Because he told us himself that we should ask: “Ask and you will receive.” Because our asking is part of the order of things that brings about the working of God’s providence. And if my request is not answered, we know it is because his wishes for us will always be greater than our ambitions. (Searching, pp.126-7)