As part of the Catholic Company Reviewer Program, I was sent a copy of Jesus, Present Before Me, by Father Peter John Cameron, O.P. The book is divided into 30 days, each of which contains a short scripture passage, a meditation, questions for contemplation and a prayer. (The book also contains a set of reflections on the mysteries of the rosary and several eucharistic devotions.)
Since I do not have many opportunities to get to Adoration, I have been using the meditations as part of my daily morning prayer. As is to be expected in a book of this kind, not every line or reflection is going to strike everyone with the same force. In some cases either the meditations did not speak to me or I found the reflection questions not sufficiently tied to the meditation that preceded it.
Having said that, there are enough gems in this book to make me happy to have a copy of it in my possession. I already mentioned in a prior post my strong reaction to the statement that the Eucharist imparts “the communion of love I live with my Father.” That line and others like it invite reflection on the Jesus’ incredible love and longing for us. “Hope” in the words of one of the writers Cameron quote, comes precisely from an awareness of that love, “from an awareness that there is Someone who loves us with an everlasting love.”
Another that arrested me had to do with wonder (a word, the mere hearing of which has a stong effect on me): “Jesus remains invisible in the Eucharist to reawaken childlike wonder in us…And in recovering our wonder, our humanity blossoms in a way it never could otherwise.” The invitation to spend time reflecting on how disposed I am to wonder in my life and how have I experienced the wonder of Christ is a valuable one.
Another day focuses on the meaning of worship, suggesting that “when we worship God, we drop the fiction that we could ever face God as independent business partners…True worship, says Pope Benedict, means accepting that nothing finite can be our goal or determine the direction of our lives.”
I could go on and on with examples, but they would only be examples of what spoke to me. So you may just want to take a look at the book yourself and see which reflections speak to you.
