What kind of world do we have when we overcome this kind of thinking? We acknowledge that we have the sick and healthy but we go beyond that, and it doesn't influence us. This is being recollected.
A Jesuit priest commented on this word in his Lenten sermon that was written up in the Peace Weekly. 潛心 are the Chinese characters for the word we could express by 'recollection'. Knowing, but not necessarily having the knowing influence us would be his definition. During his talk all kinds of coughing was heard, but recollected (attentiveness) means that it didn't distract those present from listening. Those who are taken up with the coughing are captured by it.
When we pray we have many worldly thoughts that come to mind. 'Recollection' means we are able to empty ourselves.
Our aim in prayer is to be one with God. We know what God wills for us, and we work to implement it. We do not try to get God to do our will. Often our oneness with God is of the type where we want to control God, which comes from pride.
Believing in money we are controlled by money, believing in power we are controlled by power. We are controlled by what we believe. Jesus should be our hero. We listen to the words of Jesus and make sure they are his words, and not our words.
What is happiness? Is it possible to speak about happiness to those who believe that no matter what they do they will not be happy? We often decide what happiness means for us: mentally deciding what is happiness and what is unhappiness. But is unhappiness really unhappiness? A person who fails the exam for college has just taken the first step in a new world that wasn't even suspected.
We need to become attentive to what will bring true happiness. God, Jesus lives in me, how can I not be happy? Even if poor or not healthy, Christ lives in me. This for a Christian is mind-boggling.
He concludes his talk with the ways to achieve this attentiveness. First: God gives us only what is good. Secondly: need to understand the will of God. Thirdly: carry out God's will. One of the biggest distances we have in life is the distance from the head to the heart, and the distance from the heart to the feet is even greater.
One of the Korean proverbs similar to the English: once bitten twice shy--- once we have had a bad experience we are careful not to repeat it. Very difficult to abandon completely what we have experienced in the past. Being recollected is one of the ways we go about doing this.
Without effort this is not accomplished. We want prayer to be easy, and we want to approach God without effort-- not caring about what he desires. Is this not being interested in what the spouse wants, and desiring only what I want?
We need to know what we are thinking. It is in this recollection that we have attentiveness and we come to an understanding of God's will. The priest's desire was for us to to be recollected as the topic of choice for Lent.
