New Year - The Return of the King

<p>Happy New Year! In an epic changeover from 2020 to 2021 we chat about the anticipation of Jesus showing up this year. But we also want to capture what God has done this year as well. We walk through an Examen prayer exercise for this season, and invite you to join us as we launch into what 2021 has for us!</p> <p>----</p> <p>(This is a practice by Vinita Hampton Wright from Ignatius Spirituality) </p> <p>Step One: Become aware of God’s presence.</p> <p>One way of doing this is to ask the Holy Spirit to help you review the year with a holy perspective—with wisdom, grace, and faith. Ask for the grace to tear yourself away from your own patterns of thinking and seeing so that you can see your life more as God sees it. Of course you will see your failings—but God sees you as a beloved daughter or son who has a future and a hope. Of course you will see your accomplishments—but God sees your deeper self, the person behind all the activity, a person made in God’s image.</p> <p>Step Two: Review the year with gratitude.</p> <p>As you use this holy perspective to review the year, pay attention to the good gifts from the year ending. Name specifically those that come to memory now, and thank God for them.</p> <p>Step Three: Pay attention to your emotions.</p> <p>Think over the year again, and notice your emotional reactions. What memories speak most loudly to you? What events, conversations, relationships, or activities bring up the most emotion now, as you remember them? Ask God to help you linger with these emotions, whether they are pleasant or disturbing. Ask for help in understanding why you feel as you do. What can you learn about yourself or about your situation as you dwell in your emotional responses?</p> <p>Step Four: Choose one feature of the year and pray from it.</p> <p>While you are lingering with your memories and emotions, settle on one feature. Perhaps it is a single event, or maybe it’s a pattern of your own behavior that has come to mind as you reviewed the year. Whatever it is that