Tuesday, September 28, 2010

What is Stewardship?

Apparently this is what I will be learning about for the next ... um, well I'm not really sure exactly. Few weeks? Months? I still have a lot of unanswered questions.

So let me back up a bit. For some time now I have been feeling a desire for a spiritual director. I need some direction in my prayer life and just some overall help in staying focused on what's important. I've gone back and forth about it for a long time and one of the problems is that I have been told that there is a lack of spiritual directors in my diocese. It probably doesn't help that, of course, all the priests and seminarians have to have spiritual directors and we have had pretty large deacon classes the last few years and they all need spiritual directors as well. So what spiritual directors we do have are already extremely busy. So it makes it hard to ask someone because I would feel guilty if they say yes when really they already have more than enough on their plates.

So finally one weekend I decided to email my parish priest and ask him if he knew someone I could ask. I figured that was a good way to go. After mass that Sunday, before I had a chance to say anything to him, I read his column in the bulletin and in it he mentioned having just gone to a conference and how inspired he was there and how he wanted to know if others were interested in coming together to continue building on that enthusiasm by journeying together in our faith lives. His words were much better than mine and for me they sounded like something that might fill that need I had for a spiritual director.

So I sent him an email to ask what exactly this "journey" was he was referring to. He responded just by asking if I was curious enough to come find out. So I took a chance and said yes. That was at least a month ago if not two. Tonight the group finally got together.

The topic was about stewardship. We started with prayer, then introductions, watched a video and filled out a worksheet as we watched, and then had two activities, one we did in the groups at our tables and the second was an individual activity. Then we ended in prayer.

The one thing that I took away from tonight, the thing I heard that has stuck with me was this: the Textbook of Stewardship is the Word of God.

Well!! I was convicted!

I've known for a long time now that I need to read more scripture. Yes, I hear lots of scripture at every Mass I attend, but I don't spend nearly as much personal time with God's Word as I should. That's what I learned tonight.

I have no idea how long this program is. I only know when the next meeting is and that's it. But it's all part of the journey, I'm sure. Wonder what will convict me the next time!

In the meantime, I think I need to start praying with the scriptures more.

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