Jim Cogley Reflections: Tues 6 May 2025 – Mon 12 May 2025

Three Wood You Believe evening seminars entitled Getting the Past out of the Present involving Personal and Ancestral Healing are scheduled to be held in the Edmund Rice Healing Centre in Callan, Co Kilkenny on Thursday May 1^st, 8^th and 15^th from 7.00pm to 9.30pm. The cost will be €20 per night and €50 for all three. Bookings by phone or text to Jim Maher on 086-1276649. Also, highly recommended is a full Saturday from 10am to 4pm with Donal Spring on Healing the Inner Child on May 10^th. This is a beautiful venue that is quickly becoming established as a centre of Healing.

A seminar entitled Personal and Ancestral Healing will be held in Lady’s Island Community Centre on Saturday31^st May from 10am to 4pm. Cost €40 with refreshments included. Facilitators – Jim Cogley & Luba Rodzhuk. Bookings by phone or text to 087-7640407. Early booking is advisable.

Also, for those interested in doing some serious inner work over a number of days a retreat will be given by Jim Cogley and Luba Rodzhuk in An Tobar, Ardbraccan Retreat Centre in Navan. This will begin on the evening of Monday 30^th June and conclude on the following Friday. Please make bookings to An Tobar ASAP as numbers are limited; 046-9078973; Postal Code C15 T884.

Tue May 6^th – Grace

Graceful Elegance

Grace is a word in our religious vocabulary that we have heard since we were children. Obviously, it belongs to the mysterious realm of the way we experience God in our lives. We have a certain intuitive understanding of the term, but most would find it difficult to define. In the Hail Mary we address Mary as full of grace, we speak of a state of grace, moments of grace, a graceful life, a graceful death and so much more. Yet we find it difficult to put what we mean into words. It is such an oft used word that is so little understood. In seminars I sometimes use the anacronym for GRACE as Gods Riches At Christ’s Expense. This makes sense but we may still be left wondering what exactly is this mysterious commodity that we call grace.

Wed May 7^th – Secular Grace

We may get clues as to the nature of grace from the ways the word is used in non-religious settings. So, we speak of a graceful dance where the movement just flows and is one with the music. We speak of a graceful gesture that embodies kindness and respect. A graceful manner is very becoming, and a graceful lady has a beauty that extends beyond appearances. From the world of golf comes an analogy that might be very helpful. A golfer tees off with all his might and the ball remains so close as to mock him. Another seems to put little effort into his swing, the club hits the ball with apparently little force, yet it travels forever. Of the first it could be said that he has used ‘powerless effort’ while the other has exercised ‘effortless power.’ From this analogy we can begin to see a clear distinction between the life of effort and the life of power which is grace.

Thurs May 8^th – Will-Power V God’s Power

It is an unfortunate fact that the Christian life for so many became equated with will-power. With that came the assumption that it was possible to serve God entirely by my own determination and strength. With this model there was no room for weakness. Christians believed that Christ was the figure they were expected to imitate and that it depended entirely on them as to how well they succeeded. If someone was suffering from an addiction it was generally believed that he or she lacked the necessary will-power to overcome their problem. Similarly, with someone suffering from anxiety or depression it was generally believed that if only they tried that bit harder that wouldn’t be in the sorry state they are in.

Fri May 9^th – Ego Bankruptcy

Most people who have embarked on a deeper journey of Spirit have first discovered the bankruptcy of the ego in terms of will-power totally letting them down. It was when their lives became unmanageable, in spite of their best, even heroic efforts, and no amount of trying harder made any difference, that a new word came into the picture, namely surrender. It was the point of greatest powerlessness, weakness and vulnerability that there was no place left to go except surrender into the arms of the divine. Countless numbers can testify to a mysterious and powerful change happening in their lives after they had come to the end of their own strength. It wasn’t when they were trying their utmost that the miracle happened, but paradoxically when they gave up trying altogether and simply surrendered. They just ‘let go and let God’ to use the AA term.

Sat May 10^th – The Blessedness of the Poor in Spirit

The words we can associate with ego are will-power, strength, effort, struggle, anxiety, trying harder and a few more. On the other hand, the words we can associate with Grace are surrender, abandonment, letting go, peace, ease, being carried and living in the present. Christ began his beatitudes with Blessed are the poor in spirit which roughly transliterates as blessed are those who know their need of God. This is the starting point for everyone who embarks on the spiritual life. It is entirely possible to live a religious life on the basis of will-power and believe that by doing so I can save my soul. However, it is entirely impossible to live a spiritual life and experience a state of grace except by way of letting go and surrender.

Sun May 11^th – Listening to God

When we listen something new is born

The sheep that belong to me listen to my voice. I know them and they follow me.

Finding someone who is a good listener is extremely difficult and the fact of having two ears is certainly no guarantee. Shown is a symbol of listening that looks like an ear. However, if you look closer you will notice how the inner fold is shaped like a foetus. This is meant to say that when we truly listen something new is born. Someone who availed of the listening service last pilgrimage season said, ‘It was only when I found someone to listen that I came to hear what was going on in myself’.  Very few of us really listen and when we think we do it’s more with the intention of speaking. Try telling someone about your few days holidays in the Canaries and I guarantee that within two minutes you will be hearing about theirs from five years ago. Just try to really listen to someone and put aside your own story and see how difficult it is. As a young student I heard a sermon on listening that changed my life. It convinced me that the most important thing I could ever do in life was to learn to listen to the voice of God.

We had a retreat master who gave a short talk on the importance of listening to God as the one who had a lot more important things to say than us than we to Him. The fact that we were endowed with two ears and one mouth was itself an indication that we should be listening twice as much as we were talking in prayer. He suggested changing our prayer pattern from, ‘Listen Lord your servant is speaking’, to ‘Speak Lord your servant is listening.’ Those words made sense and became like a guiding principle.

That night, quite late, as I prepared for bed, I did not say my usual prayers but instead listened in silence. I was surprised by a still small voice that, with a compelling authority, said: ‘Go to number 65’, in a certain housing estate where I knew there was a lot of student accommodation. This seemed in direct contradiction to the rules of the time that forbade seminarians to be outside the gates after 7pm. What voice should I obey? My response was that I was here to follow the Lord before any man made rules, so I quickly dressed and carefully made my way unnoticed past a night watchman while he was filling his pipe. Feeling somewhat foolish, I rang the door of number 65 to be greeted by a distraught student in floods of tears. She was in deep trouble and had decided to end her life. Just being there as a listening ear and a supportive, even providential presence, gave her a sense of being cared for and that her life was for living and not for ending.

From that point on I set my heart towards listening to the whispers of Spirit and had a deep realization that doing so would be far more formative than mindless adherence to seminary rules. While such whispers were not an everyday occurrence, they were always immensely significant.

Over the years I have heard so many saying I can never hear God speak to me and I usually reply, ‘And you never will’. The secret is not to rely on your own ability to hear but to trust in God’s ability to speak, no matter how deaf you might think you are. Just surrender and be willing to do His will and leave it to Him to get through to you.

Over the years I have followed that principle, and it has never let me down. Once while at a funeral of a man in Kilmore Quay, his distraught wife was there whom I had never before seen in church. They had lived in the UK, and I thought she may have been of Protestant background or none. As people were coming for Communion, she seemed the only one not coming. A strong whisper said, ‘Go down and bring her Communion.’ At one level it was against all the rules, yet it seemed the most compassionate thing to do, so I went down and asked her if she would like to receive, and she said ‘Yes’. Some time later she told me that while she had never gone to church, she had always prayed that one day she might belong in a faith community. That moment when I first received at my greatest grief was when God’s love touched my heart, and I knew my prayer was answered. I knew then that I belonged and I also knew where I wanted to belong. That was the beginning of her journey of faith, even if she was not starting from where she was supposed to. And it all began with a whisper that apparently broke the rules!

Mon May 12^th – The Grace-Filled Life

The absolute necessity for the ego to surrender and experience its own powerlessness is something many good especially religious people find difficult to grasp. Surely there has to be room for trying harder and exercising self-effort? Perhaps it seems trite to say that it’s precisely when we are trying the hardest that God finds us most trying! Grace and struggle cannot co-exist together; it is always when one comes to an end that the other begins. Consider the life of Christ towards the end. When did his new life of grace begin? Was it while he was on the Cross and struggling the hardest to stay alive or was it after he said, ‘Father into your hands, I commend my spirit’ and breathed his last. Obviously, it was only when he died that his new life began. His journey is also ours. The struggle of the ego acts like a contraceptive to Grace. It is only when we have come to the end of our struggle that the new life of grace begins. We still may have difficulty with giving it words but we no longer need to because we know it.