Vorau Retreat 27^th April 2007

I would much appreciate if you could send me links to possibly other  web pages referring to other retreats or simply send the photos to me so I can put them on the web or maybe you could share notes you have taken, or give any help so we could collect all what was "lived" done and said)

	Vorau Retreat 27^th April 2007	Comments/definitions
Listening to new voices Spirit of listening and openness
	God knocking at our hearts, generous host, priceless gift for us who open our hearts	Cardinal Basil Hume
	God is interested in our world, the life we lead, not just our spirit	Over spiritualized Christianity on our world
	A Christian is one upon whom God’s spirit has come, it’s a definition of a human being
Action = good works	Faith was overly spiritualized i.e. to save your soul, no responsibility here on earth, for things, Must fight the cause of injustices, Marxism took up the care of people, Christianity neglected this role.
	Deprivation = you don’t have because I’ve taken from you
	Bishop Helder Camera “Spiral of violence” 3 kinds · Structural violence · Institutional violence · Repressive violence	Very often what is legal is immoral
Other religions	Hinduism is at least as old as Judaism, Islam needs a Martin Luther, change will come from Iran, (his Muslim friends say this),
Guiterez “Theology of Liberation	People who are under the boot, those who are suffering oppression	Jon Sobrino, University of Central America (lots about him going at present Fr. Cyril talked a lot about him
		“The gospel according to Solentinami by Ernesto Cardinale
		The church in Europe is busy with religion it is not bothered with spirituality, as it should be. There is a tremendous emptiness inside for many Europeans
	The essence of being human is that you can not know the future
	Forgiveness for wrongdoings, to see how she sincerely tries to do the best she can and means well in her heart (eternal confession) Dear Lord to see that. That he will guide me in this transition period and never give me more then I can handle, that my fears will not overwhelm me in this ,to trust him and be able to let go.	Confession with Fr. Cyril 2007-04-28
	Must take Jesus’ humanity seriously, he struggled like we did.
Incarnation:	Means the worked became flesh, i.e. Jesus became flesh, took on a human form for our benefit, he therefore understands how it is down here
Incarnations = he emptied himself of his divine qualities and became fully human	When Jesus died on the cross he was not aware he was saving humanity, it was after the resurrection that he was aware of who he was.
	Jesus didn’t know everything, God did	Predicate of God ??
	Don’t attribute everything of Jesus to God	Jesus human
	Father forgive them, for they know not what they do	Jesus human
	Jesus did not know what was going to happen to him
Sins	Sins of commission are not such big things
	Sins of omission, we don’t love, share, forgive enough
	Most of our sins are of human frailty if you are serious about love, life , you don’t commit serious sins	(Nice to know)
Mortal sin	Mortal sin is accumulates sins, its where you don’t care about anyone, anything it isn’t a one time thing with mortal sin
	Mortal sin is an attitude and a very bad one
	There are few times in our lives when we do an unloving act
	When one doesn’t hurt people easily
	The joy of knowing God through scripture is something I should experience
the church	Part of God’s mysterious plan for us i.e. the church
Psychology of faith	Jesus ad to grow into his messianic destiny, eventually he got the message , he had to grow in self awareness, faith nor of us knows ourselves through and through, none of us understands ourselves thoroughly
	If Jesus had true knowledge of his messianic identity, he has to give up being human.	Later in life
	The salvific death of Jesus ??	From salvation
	We are all beloved daughters and sons of God
Miracles	When Jesus worked a miracle, he always said “your faith has healed you”
	A miracle is a “sermon in action.”
	“Miracles are kindness to our fellow man”
	Human nature by definition does not know the future
	We do not as human have a clear idea of God
Nature of Jesus	Monophysitism = meaning one nature, i.e. Jesus was this but was still God ???	(from the Greek monos meaning 'one, alone' and physis meaning 'nature')
	Avator = takes on the form of a human being but is no human, i.e. St Bernadette apparition
suffering	When we ask God why he lets the world in such a state, that he let such dreadful things happen, He answers that he sends lots of good people to help
love	“Many waters cannot drown love” meaning love endures
	How you will be saved is how much you love your brothers and sisters
	I love Jesus, because I love him, we don’t do or say it because we be saved, our religion helps to save us	Fr .Cyril said,…
	God’s message is that all that maters is how you reach out to your brothers and sisters in love
	Real test that you love God is that you love my brothers and sisters around me, to forgive, to share, its not easy, but that is the idea
Church	Catholic church creates its own problems by all this unnecessary secrecy
Love your neighbour	You can be anything, non believer, or anything else, its how you are with your fellow brothers and sisters, how you treat them with compassion	(difficult to do with some)
	John’s gospel is the most beautiful, John realized Jesus was God and its filled him with amazement at the resurrection
	“I am the truth, look at me and you will find your way to God”
	The church is a community
	The sacraments: don’t forge them
	Religions have to learn to be human
Knowing by words, knowing by experience	What arrogance that with words we can capture the essence of God completely, in relation to dogma as put forward by the Vatican
	Language has its limitations i.e. declaration of love
communion	Through the Blessed Eucharist we encounter Jesus i.e. Holy Communion
	We apprehend God through the Blessed Eucharist therefore I must receive communion as much as I can
	Most important is the dialogue of life, where you share a friendship with a person of another faith
	Syro-Phoenician woman evangelizes Jesus	Conversation of Jesus with the Syrophenician Woman (arranged from Matthew and Mark): The woman comes to the house where Jesus is in retirement; or meets Him and His disciples by the way. The woman: “Have mercy on me, O Lord thou Son of David, my daughter is grievously vexed with a devil.” Jesus is silent, “He answered her not a word.” The disciples: “Send her away; for she crieth after us.” Jesus (to the woman): “I was not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” The woman (bowing before Him in worship): “Lord help me.” Jesus: “Let the children first be filled: for it is not meet to take the children’s bread, and to cast it unto the dogs.” The woman: “Yes, Lord: yet the dogs under the table eat of the children’s crumbs.” Jesus: “O woman great is thy faith; for this saying go thy way; the devil is gone out of thy daughter.” And her daughter was healed from that hour.
	We may have hidden prejudices
	Cynicism is the worst sin
Finding God	God comes into your life through other people
	Jesus was concerned about the whole person , the total human person
	We need something to hold on to, photo, token to hold on to, i.e. inner child, statues, my icon, teddy bear and image makes the absence less painful
	Son of man, meaning belonging to all people
	We must bring to him what is old and stale for Jesus to renew, our hearts, broken ones
Prophet	Jesus was not a priest, he was a laymen, Jesus saw himself as a prophet, to be a prophet was a vocation, a special vocation among the Jews
	The uniqueness of Christianity is Jesus, no other prophet claimed to be God
Priest’s role	The job of a priest is to take us to God, and bring God to us
Glossary		Ecclesia = assembly hall
		Kyria kos =house of the God (Greek)
		Hermeneutics = science of interpretation
		Apprehend = to touch only, touch the tip
		Comprehend = to understand, to grasp
	2007-05-16