Jim Cogley’s Reflections: Tues 5 May – Mon 11 May 2026
Coming Events: A seminar entitled Healing the Wounds of our Broken Humanity -Growing strong at Broken places, with Jim Cogley and Luba Rodzhuk will be held in the Community Centre, Lady’s Island on Sat 16th May from 10am – 4pm. Bookings to 087-7640407. There are some spaces still available for this day.
Advance notice for those wishing to do a Summer Retreat: A 5-day residential retreat will be given by Jim Cogley and Luba Rodzhuk in the Spiritan Retreat Centre in Navan June 22nd to 26th. This will be entitled Coming Home to Ourselves –The Healing Journey. As these events tend to fill up quickly early booking is advised on 046-9078973.
Tues 5th May – What’s in a Name?
What’s in a name? Probably far more than we realize in terms of energies and associations passing from one generation to another. In some African cultures when a child is becoming an adult, it is they who choose the name he or she wishes to be called. Each name carries a meaning like courage, kindness or wisdom and so living up to their name becomes their adult goal. In our culture a child chooses their confirmation name and while this practice is of value a lot more could be made of it, if it were understood more deeply. For much of the Christian era children were often called after saints in the hope that in life he or she would be inspired to imitate the life and practice the virtues of that holy person. More often children were called after parents or forebearers as a way of honoring the ancestors. Often the same family names can pass through many generations.
Wed 6th May – Intolerable Burdens
The age-old practice of honouring a deceased family member usually happens in good faith but with little awareness of the serious consequences. A young woman who was pregnant said that if her child was a boy she would call him Stephen after her brother who had been killed six months earlier. It never occurred to her that in doing so she would be inflicting the child with a huge burden of family grief and also denying her son his identity by having him so closely associated with his uncle. A similar story is of a mother who lost her son to suicide a year earlier said that her only consolation was that her daughter not long before had just had her child and given him the name of her son. Done in good faith, what an intolerable burden to place on a child. It doesn’t take much insight to imagine how such an action could even lead to another suicide given the right stress factors.
Thurs 7th May – The Unrecognized Story
I had an aunt who passed on about twelve years ago. In her late forties she developed stomach cancer and was operated on and given a prognosis of about five years. It was quite accurate because five years later she was on her death bed and lapsing in and out of a coma. Visiting her I sat on the bed and felt sad to see a life ebbing away that had never really begun. She had been a miserable creature who had never engaged with life, work or relationships. To hold a conversation with her was always an effort and she was continuously having health problems. Her story came back to me that she had been named after a child that was lost not long before she had been conceived. Finding a lucid moment, I asked how she had felt about that? Her reaction surprised me and with strength in her voice she said adamantly ‘I felt that it was a terrible injustice.’
Fri 8th May – A New Lease of Life
Continuing the story of my aunt from yesterday’s posting. Her reaction to being named after her dead sister seemed to carry a lifetime of pain and hurt. It was as if she had waited for so many years for someone to ask that question. From lapsing in and out of a coma she became fully alert and quite animated. My suggestion that we should cut ties with her little sister brought great satisfaction and she fully engaged in the process of releasing that child to Christ. I quickly noticed how she had now lost all interest in dying and as I was leaving, her two spindly legs were dangling over the side of the bed. I later learned that she got up and made her way downstairs on her own and unaided because she was hungry! Her recovery was remarkable, as was her inner transformation, and the last twenty years were by far her best. Her carers described her ‘as such a lovely woman’ and would not have believed the disconsolate woman she had been in her earlier years.
Sat 9th May – A Brother Substitute
Years ago, I was called to a domestic dispute that seemed to be a clear case of prejudice. A man was refusing to attend his grandson’s christening on the grounds that he had fallen out with his son and wanted nothing to do with the family of the girl he was with. The family were annoyed with him and while the row was blazing, he kept saying, ‘My son is dead to me.’ Sensing that this was a loaded statement, I gently asked, ‘Who is dead to you?’ He immediately replied, ‘My brother, that my son is named after, we worked together as builders and were very close, but he fell to his death from a roof. His loss was too much to bear and I never grieved him. So, my son became a substitute, and at the same age as my brother got killed, he left home’. Then he went on, ‘I suppose it’s not about that christening after all, it’s more about me’. Needless to say, I had to agree!
Sun 10th May – Ascension ‘26
For forty days after his resurrection Jesus prepared his disciples for the fact that very shortly he was going to leave them but that in his leaving he would remain with them in a new way.
The person he first appeared to after he rose from the dead was Mary Magdalene, who had been his closest companion. She hadnt recognized him at first until he called her by name. With a heart bursting with excitement you can just imagine the drive she made in his direction order to embrace him. To her he said, ‘Mary, do not cling to me because I have not yet ascended to my God and to your God’. Notice the phrase, ‘Do not cling’. Later he would say to his disciples, ‘It is for your own good that I am going because If I do not go the Paraclete, the Holy Spirit cannot come.’ He also made some very paradoxical remarks like, ‘In a short time you will no longer see me and then you will see me again’. Also, ‘I am going away but shortly I will return’.
The main trust of all his teaching around all that time was to teach them the importance of not clinging to what was, of letting go; that if they refused to let him go they could not have him in that new way. He was really saying that while once I was with you now I will be within you. Physically he would be absent but spiritually he would remain and so his final words were, ‘I will be with you always, even to the end of time’.
The Buddist tradition teaches a similar truth, namely that suffering is caused by attachment. (Discomfort is not the same as suffering) The more we hold on to things, or to people, or the past, the more suffering we create for ourselves. We become insecure and then jealousy can destroy what we have and want the most. The more we learn to let go the greater our capacity to have and to truly love. There are so many who flounder, sometimes for decades, in unresolved grief. There may have been a loss or a series of losses he or she has never got over. Someone has died or a relationship has broken up and years later they are still holding on to that person for dear life. So he or she has an existence rather than a life and lives in the past with little or no hope for the future. The mistaken belief is the more I hold on the more I have, while the real truth is that the more I let go the more I will feel connected. Just consider the things and people we try to hold onto and notice the damage it does to us and to the relationship.
Usually at Mass we are not challenged to do anything too physical beyond maybe blessing ourselves and genuflecting. So instead today I am going to offer you a little exercise. I am always conscious of how easy it is to get stuck in unresolved grief and for anyone who has lost a loved one and feels that they have never regained their peace and contentment this little exercise may be of help.
First if you feel comfortable doing so just close your eyes and think of the person closest to you who has passed on. Imagine him or her beside you and if there is anything you never had a chance to say to that person take this opportunity to do so now. It may work both ways and he or she may wish to apologise to you and ask your forgiveness for some hurt they caused you.
Next notice in the encounter how much you would like to hold tightly to that person. Now see yourself clinging tightly with your two fists clenched as if you are determined not to let go. As you hold tighter bring your fists closer to your heart. Notice how your body tenses and your heart space closes down. Hold that for a few moments, long enough to realize that you are only half-breathing and half-alive. Next slowly stretch out your arms and open out your hands. In doing so you are releasing your loved one to the Lord. However also notice what has happened to your heart space – how it has opened out and you are now free to invite that loved one and Christ into your heart.
If you have done so that is the greatest expression of love you can show to anyone who has died – giving them the freedom to move on and giving yourself permission to live fully once again.
This is the great truth of the Ascension that it is in not clinging to what was, that we open our hearts to what is, and while our loved one is no longer with us as they were, they remain with us wherever we are because now we carry them in our hearts.
Mon 11th May – Back Trouble-Back There!
A man who was named after his uncle who had been murdered was a successful businessman for many years. Then his business folded and while out of work his back seemed to cave in and he was preparing for a serious but risky operation. So often back trouble is ‘back there’ and he realized how identified he had been with his uncle all his life even to the point of owning the same premises, having the same interests and being given his gun. There had been no justice around this uncle’s murder, and it was classed as an ‘unfortunate accident. This was in direct contradiction to the man’s death bed confession over what had happened. Realizing the unconscious tie between himself and his uncle he entered into a ritual of forgiving on behalf of his uncle and family and commending him to the Light. Remarkably in a very short time his back pain ceased, and the operation was cancelled. To the best of my knowledge he never again had back problems.