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Father Francis Kelly Nemeck, OMI, is director of the Oblates of Mary Immaculate Lebh Shomea Retreat Center in Sarita.
Photo provided |
By J. Michael Parker
For Today’s Catholic
SAN ANTONIO • The paradox of contemplative prayer is the “cloud of unknowing” — that one becomes more aware of God by not knowing than by knowing.
Father Francis Kelly Nemeck, OMI, director of the Oblates of Mary Immaculate Lebh Shomeah Retreat Center in Sarita, illustrated that in his interpretations of writings of St. John of the Cross, a 16th-century Spanish Carmelite mystic, during Oblate School of Theology’s 2009 Summer Institute, “De-Mystifying Mysticism,” before about 350 listeners.
He noted the day of his talk was the birthday of St. John of the Cross.
The priest noted that St. John of the Cross wrote four books, which actually were commentaries on his poetry expressing his insights about contemplative prayer. The books were The Ascent of Mount Carmel, The Dark Night of the Soul, Spiritual Canticle and The Living Flame of Love.
“These books came about grudgingly,” Father Nemeck said. “His flair was for poetry, and his habit in giving conferences was to choose a line or a phrase from his poetry and talk on it for hours. His audiences couldn’t figure out how he got so much material out of such brief lines of poetry, so they asked him to write commentaries.”
The priest said that nobody can describe adequately the understanding that God gives to loving souls. Something of the experience can overflow into poetry and symbolism, rather than ordination rational explanations and prose.
“He’s announcing that the deepest and most beneficial way to describe the inner experience of God is in poetry. He talks about God in him. I can’t explain them adequately, but I only hope to shed some general light on them,” Father Nemeck said.
“My explanation doesn’t exhaust their whole meaning.”
In the prologue, he said, St. John was saying that during a contemplative prayer experience, “I am where I am, but I have no idea where that is. I have a sense of some profound mystery, something profound and beyond me taking place, but I still don’t see where I am in prayer. Yet my not knowing paradoxically transcends knowing.”
The priest said that the saint felt that even if he could know where he was, he was better off not knowing than knowing.
Contemplation is a concentrated interchange of all-inclusive, all-embracing love. Father Nemeck commented on a stanza that says, “Everything that my soul does, and all that I have now are employed in his service. I no longer tend a flock, nor have I any other work except that of love alone.”