Jim Cogley’s Reflections: 25 Nov 2025 – Mon 1st Dec 2025

Coming Wood You Believe Healing Seminars with Jim Cogley & Luba Rodzhuk:

An Tobar Retreat Centre, Navan, Fri 28^th Nov 7.00-9.30pm – Recovery from Loss

Saturday 10am-4pm Healing and Integration – Bookings to Spiritans on 086-8416110.

Edmund Rice Centre, Callan – Approaching Christmas – What is Christianity?

This seminar will be an exciting journey of uncovering the riches of the Christian Faith that has become obscured beneath layers of historical accretions.

Sat 13^th Dec 10am-4pm. Early booking advised to Jim Maher on 086-1276649.

For ordering Wood You Believe books: jimcogley.com

For daily services usually 10am. Sunday 11am. Webcam: ourladysisland.ie

Books have a life of their own. They find their way into the most unlikely places and literally transform lives. After twenty-five years of writing I know to be true. However, as an author I need help with distribution and marketing. The 13 volumes in the Wood You Believe series, while very popular and meeting a real need, are only available locally, online and at seminar events. I am hoping that there may be some who would be involved in parish groups, organizations like AA, Active Retirement or book clubs/shops where these could be made available and make a real difference. They would go to you in multiples of five at almost cost price and the balance can be used at your own discretion. Particularly coming up to Christmas there is a huge demand for presents that are meaningful. If interested ring 087-7640407 for details.

Tues 25^th Nov – Christianity and Other Faiths

All is One

The ornate segmented vase, composed of six segments, each with different colours, can represent the different mainstream world religions. They all appear to be coming from a large blue diamond in the middle that reflects the eternal wisdom that was there long before any of them were ever heard of. These encompass spiritual principles that are true for every faith. It was through this original experience that the founders of all faiths were united, while at superstructure level they, and more often their followers, fought about their differences. This eternal wisdom is the purest essence of reality. While all religions are born of this, they often deviate a long way away from it. Only insofar as they continue to teach from this purest of fountains do they have anything useful to offer.

Wed 26^th Nov – The Spark Within

Eternal wisdom is the presence of God in all things and the goal of life is to come to this realization. The sole purpose of all religions is to serve this universal quest. Our supreme purpose in life is not to make a fortune, nor to pursue pleasure, nor to write our name on history, but to discover this spark of the divine that is in our hearts. Then when we realize this goal, we discover simultaneously that the Divinity within ourselves is one and the same in all individuals, all creatures, and all of life. This is the awareness that changes everything. Anyone who has made this supreme discovery lives with an unbroken awareness of the presence of God in all creatures. They live the reality of unfailing compassion, fearlessness, equanimity, and the unshakable knowledge, based on direct, personal experience, that all the treasures and pleasures of this world together are worth nothing, if one has not found the diamond at the centre of the soul.

Thurs 27^th Nov – All is One

At the level of mystical experience all is one. If Christ, Mohammad, the Buddha and Confucious were to meet and have a conversation they would not be engaged in an argument about which was right or who was the greatest. What they would share is out of their common experience of the numinous. It would be their followers who, not being in touch with source, who would argue later. This is a basic truth that mystics from all religions speak the same language while their theologians differ. The more we move away from core truth and experience the greater the difference and the more words we need to use. Hence the headiness and lack of vitality in Western theology. When we know not a lot of words are needed. It’s when we don’t know that no amount of words will suffice.

Fri 28^th Nov – What makes Christianity Unique?

This is an important issue, especially today, when there is a real blurring of the edges between the different world religions. There is a certain truth in that they are all like fingers pointing to the moon while none of them are the moon. They all point humankind to God but to varying degrees. As Christians we need to be quite clear as to where Christianity is similar and yet quite unique among all the great religious traditions. All the great religions are about man’s search for God while Christianity is more about God’s search for man. At the heart of Christianity is the Incarnation, the mystery of God becoming human with the implicit message that it is by becoming authentically human that we find our way to God. While so many religions point upwards to the Divinity, Christianity points downwards and insists that it is in the place of greatest messiness that it and we can be found – so the Saviour is first encountered in a stable!

Sat 29^th Nov – Christianity – What it is Not

In order to truly appreciate the uniqueness of Christianity as a portal to the Divine we need to strip away layers of historical accretions, centuries of traditional practices and a multitude of erroneous conceptions that can blind us to the truth. A big one is that Christianity is primarily about leading a moral life with our goodness being a basis for holiness. Neither is it about the respectability and external observances that often characterized worship in earlier times. Religious worship can be mere words with the heart far removed. It is never about striving, struggling, earning or deserving Divine favour, but it is about letting go of all of these as the very obstacles that get in the way of living in that experience. It is a total misconception that Christianity is about addition of effort, virtue or good works. It is much more about subtraction where poverty of spirit alone can qualify us for entry to the throne of Divine grace.

Sun 30^th Nov – Advent  1^st – Opening the Door

The first Sunday of Advent marks the beginning of the Church Year and so it is seen as a time of new beginnings. We tend to associate it as a period of waiting in joyful hope for the coming of Christ the Saviour. For some reason, it’s not the word ‘waiting’ that comes to mind this year but other words like Knocking, Hearing, Opening, Inviting and Welcoming. These words are all about how we get back to basics in relation to our Christian faith.

It’s becoming more abundantly clear to everyone at this stage that the essence of Christianity has become obscured for many beneath the layers of our religious history. The Christian faith has largely been reduced to a moral path for leading a good life. Unfortunately, that is the way it has often been presented. We may have grown up with the belief that if you kept the rules the rules kept you and one day would get you to Heaven. Here Christ was seen as a historical figure who offered sound advice as to how best we should live our lives. The Holy Spirit became the forgotten Paraclete and Mary was substituted in his place as the third person of the Blessed Trinity.

So, it’s against that backdrop of confusion as to what constitutes the essence of Christianity and the need to return to basics that I made this piece some months ago. It’s based on a famous painting depicting that verse from Revelations where Christ says, ‘Behold I stand at the door and knock’. It’s by the artist Holman Hunt and was painted around 1830 and is still to be seen in Oxford. In the painting the background is of a new dawn breaking,and Christ the Light of the World is seen with a lighted lantern knocking on a door that has no handle on the outside. It was painted that way to express the truth that Christ gently invites us to welcome him into our hearts but will never force himself, he will always wait for us to make that decision, to take the handle and open the door from the inside. For that reason, it’s regarded as the greatest evangelical picture ever painted and has inspired countless thousands to give open the door of their hearts and invite him to take central place in their lives.

Just imagine yourself as someone who grew up in an atheistic culture, but you had a spiritual hunger to find meaning purpose and a sense of fulfilment in your life. Suppose you had never been baptised, confirmed, been to Mass or received Holy Communion you would be just starting from scratch with a clean sheet.

It is highly likely that you would be coming with a life story, lots of which you might not be too proud of. Your life might be a mess, and you would be carrying a load of guilt and needing forgiveness. You would likely feel a need to be close to God in your life but begin to wonder how on earth would I ever bridge that enormous gap. I could never ever be good enough.

Then by chance or providence you meet someone who seems to have what you are looking for. You see it in the radiance of their face, it’s in their bearing and you can see something different about the way they live. So, you ask what is the secret and who is this Christ who seems so important to them?

Then he or she shows you a picture like this of Christ knocking on a door and they tell you that the door is your heart. The handle is on the inside so he can only knock, and he waits for you to respond to his invitation.

‘What will happen if I do?’ you might well ask, ‘Will my life ever be the same again?’ ‘Definitely not’, you will be told, ‘it will be turned upside down. But after a while you will find that its only then that it is the right side up’. Your past will be forgiven, your sins blotted out, as if they never existed, and he will become your best friend. Not only that but that big gap that separates you from God, that big empty space, will be completely filled with his love.

This is the challenge that lies at the heart of Christianity and is something we cannot take seriously enough. Many will opt just to be a practicing Catholic while never making a decision to invite Christ into their lives. Others may just choose to live a good moral life and take their chances. However, it’s much less challenging to practice one’s religion than to surrender one’s life to Christ and invite him in to be the Lord. Herein lies the essence of Christianity.

Mon 1^st Dec – The Core Message

In the opening lines of his letter to the Ephesians, St Paul, in a few succinct words sums up the core truth of the Christian message. Blessed be God the Father who HAS blessed us IN Christ with all the blessings of the heavenly places. Before the world was made, He choose us IN Christ to be holy and blameless before Him and that we might be his adopted children through Jesus Christ. Notice the word HAS; its past tense, not what we hope for one day in the future when we will be good enough. It’s as if we are starting our Christian journey from the end rather than the beginning and so it is a journey based on Faith in this God who never changes His face from a frown one day to a smile the next depending on our behaviour. The second key word is IN (Christ). This recurs over and over and points essentially to our baptismal entitlement of walking through life holy and blameless, with no guilt or unworthiness. This is the Good News that while we live imperfect lives and will die imperfect deaths, we are still holy and spotless and living in unconditional love.