'Something which has existed since the beginning,

that we have heard,

and we have seen with our own eyes;

that we have watched

and touched with our hands:

the Word who is Life - that is our subject.' (1 John 1:1)

 

 

When we pray using 'Imaginative Contemplation', a key element in The Spiritual Exercises of St Ignatius of Loyola and the Ignatian tradition, we too hear, see, watch and touch the Lord, bringing our senses and imagination to prayer in an intimate encounter with Jesus in the Gospels.

We imagine the scene, very much as we may do when we read a novel for example, and let the action unfold, becoming a part of it.  We encounter Jesus who comes to our house to stay, or gives us bread, or heals our infirmities, or asks us for a drink, or any number of other possibilities.  In a way, we become part of the 'many other signs that Jesus worked' that are not recorded in the Bible (see John 20:30), as we eat, drink, walk, talk and rest with Jesus in a deeply personal and intimate way.

Try it, and see...