Lectio Divina — “Prevented”
Memorial of Saint Teresa of Jesus, Virgin and Doctor of the Church
Thursday of the Twenty-eighth Week in Ordinary Time
Weekly Theme: Reduced
1. Lectio — The Word
Luke 11:47–54
“You have taken away the key of knowledge. You yourselves did not enter and you stopped those trying to enter.”
In today’s Gospel, Jesus delivers a rather uncomfortable indictment of the scholars of the law. They possess the keys to knowledge, yet rather than opening doors, they have prevented others from entering. They have transformed what ought to have been an invitation into an obstacle.
I find it rather remarkable that a key, an instrument designed to open something, can become an instrument of exclusion. But perhaps the greater tragedy is that the scholars have not merely prevented others from entering; they have prevented themselves.
And I must ask whether I have done much the same thing.
Have I reduced my faith to a collection of fences, rules, and comfortable habits? Have I become so preoccupied with preventing what might go wrong that I have prevented the Holy Spirit from accomplishing what might go right?
Perhaps the most dangerous gate at The Glenn is not the one I have forgotten to close, but the one I have forgotten how to open.
2. Meditatio — The Reflection
This week’s project here at The Glenn has been the installation of electric netting. Its purpose is rather straightforward: to prevent the sheep from abandoning the abundant green pasture for the overgrazed ground of their familiar night paddock, while hopefully preventing the local coyote pack from making another meal of my lambs.
There is something wonderfully paradoxical about this arrangement. I am erecting a barrier to give the sheep greater freedom to flourish. I am restricting their movements precisely because their instinct for security keeps drawing them away from the nourishment available to them.
And there, standing before my electric netting, I recognize myself.
How often have I reduced my own life to the familiar confines of what I already know? How often have I retreated into the overgrazed pasture of habit, convinced that its familiarity is preferable to the uncertainty of something greater?
I have erected invisible fences around my creativity, my relationships, my faith, and perhaps even my understanding of God.
Some fences are necessary. Others are merely monuments to my fears.
Pope Francis reminds me in Laudato Si’ that human creativity is a gift, and that those possessing particular talents have a responsibility to develop them for the advancement of the common good. He also reminds me that I must constantly reconsider the goals, effects, context, and ethical limits of my activity, especially when it involves the exercise of power.
That distinction is important. The question is not simply whether I have the power to erect a fence, but whether the fence serves life.
The electric netting around my sheep may serve the common good by protecting the flock and allowing the pasture to recover. But what of the fences I have erected around my own God-given talents? Are they protecting something precious, or preventing something good?
Today the Church celebrates Saint Teresa of Ávila, a woman whose spiritual journey was hardly one of uninterrupted tranquility. She encountered resistance, misunderstanding, illness, and her own limitations. Yet she refused to allow these obstacles to prevent her from pursuing the deeper interior life to which God was calling her.
Her Interior Castle presents the soul not as a fenced pasture but as a dwelling of many rooms, inviting an ever-deeper journey toward communion with God.
Perhaps my difficulty is that I have reduced the castle to a single comfortable room and misplaced the key.
Saint Teresa teaches me that contemplation is not an escape from the world but a transformation of my relationship with it. Prayer does not prevent action; properly understood, it gives action its direction.
If I am to practice an integral ecology here at The Glenn, I must recognize that my responsibility extends beyond the protection of sheep and the management of pasture. It includes the cultivation of the gifts God has entrusted to me for the benefit of others.
After all, the Lord has not entrusted me with talents merely to prevent me from losing them.
He expects me to use them.
And perhaps the most important fence I need to move today is the one I have erected around my own heart.
3. Oratio — The Prayer
Lord Jesus Christ,
You who are the Gate through which Your sheep enter and find pasture, forgive me for the times I have prevented myself and others from entering more deeply into Your love.
Thank You for the gifts You have entrusted to me, for the land I care for, the creatures I protect, and the opportunities You provide for me to serve the common good.
Give me the wisdom to distinguish between boundaries that protect life and barriers that prevent love.
When I am tempted to reduce my calling to what is familiar, comfortable, and safe, remind me that Your grace is greater than my fears.
Through the intercession of Saint Teresa of Jesus, teach me to enter the interior castle of my soul, where You await me with a love that cannot be contained by any fence of my own construction.
May my contemplation bear fruit in action, my creativity become service, and my stewardship of The Glenn become an expression of Your care for all creation.
Prevent me, Lord, from preventing Your will.
Amen.
4. Contemplatio — The Contemplation
Magnifica Humanitas, Paragraph 135 — Communication and the Collective Imagination
Saint Teresa of Ávila lived in an age when religious communication was largely confined to manuscripts, sermons, correspondence, and personal encounters. Yet her writings have continued to shape the spiritual imagination of generations.
Her Interior Castle was more than a transmission of information about prayer. It created a way of imagining the human soul and its relationship with God.
And this morning, as I consider the electric fences here at The Glenn, I find myself contemplating the fences that modern communication can erect around the human imagination.
In paragraph 135 of Magnifica Humanitas, Pope Leo XIV reminds me that communication does more than convey information. It creates culture. The images, narratives, and ideas circulating through digital environments shape how I perceive reality, what I desire, and ultimately how I choose to live.
The Pope insists that the digital environment is not some separate, imaginary existence. What happens there enters into the very fabric of everyday human relationships.
This strikes rather close to home.
I spend considerable time communicating through digital platforms, including these daily Lectio Divina reflections. I employ modern technology, including artificial intelligence, to help express thoughts that begin with Scripture and the ordinary happenings here at The Glenn.
But am I using these tools to open doors or to close them?
Am I cultivating a richer understanding of creation, faith, and human dignity, or am I reducing their complexity to attractive images, convenient explanations, and easily consumed conclusions?
The scholars of the law in today’s Gospel possessed knowledge, but their use of it prevented others from entering.
Could I possess more information than ever before and yet become less capable of wisdom?
Could my use of technology prevent the very contemplation it is intended to communicate?
Saint Teresa would surely remind me that no amount of information about the interior castle can substitute for actually entering it.
An algorithm may help me arrange my words, but it cannot pray them for me. It may generate an image of The Glenn, but it cannot stand in the pasture and experience the wonder of creation. It may explain the writings of Saint Teresa, but it cannot surrender my heart to God.
That remains my responsibility.
And so I contemplate two very different kinds of boundaries.
One is the electric netting that prevents my sheep from returning to depleted pasture and helps protect them from predators.
The other is the invisible boundary I may construct whenever I allow technology, fear, habit, or self-sufficiency to reduce my openness to God and neighbor.
The first may preserve life. The second may impoverish it.
The challenge of Magnifica Humanitas is not to reject technological progress but to ensure that it serves the truth and dignity of the human person.
The challenge of Saint Teresa is not to abandon the world but to discover God within the depths of the soul and allow that encounter to transform the world.
And the challenge of today’s Gospel is not merely to possess the key of knowledge, but to use it to enter and to help others enter.
Perhaps I have spent too much of my life asking what I must prevent, and too little asking what God is trying to make possible.
The sheep may need a fence to lead them toward greener pasture.
But I need grace to recognize when the fence has become my prison.
And I must not reduce the boundless generosity of God to the narrow dimensions of my own imagination.
Saint Teresa of Jesus, pray for me, that I may never allow my limitations to prevent the work of God’s grace.
5. Actio — Living the Word
Today, as I finish installing the electric netting at The Glenn, I will examine one invisible fence I have erected around my life.
I will ask myself whether it protects something genuinely good or merely preserves my comfort.
Then I will take one concrete action to use a neglected God-given talent in service to someone else.
In the spirit of Laudato Si’, I will also remember that protecting my sheep, preserving the pasture, and respecting the coyotes’ place in creation are not entirely separate responsibilities. Each requires discernment within the larger community of life.
And in the spirit of synodality, I will ask whether my words and actions invite others to participate or unintentionally prevent them from entering.
Today’s resolution: I will not allow the fear of making a mistake to prevent me from doing something good.
6. Song Pairing
Be Not Afraid
This hymn reminds me that God’s invitation does not promise a life without obstacles. Rather, it promises His presence as I move beyond the boundaries of fear. It seems an especially appropriate accompaniment to Saint Teresa’s courageous journey of prayer and reform.
7. Movie Pairing
The Shawshank Redemption
A story of confinement, perseverance, and hope. Its prison walls provide a striking metaphor for the invisible barriers I construct around my own possibilities. The film invites me to consider whether I have become so accustomed to my limitations that I mistake confinement for security.
8. Poetic Reflection — “Prevented”
Eight verses for the day
I built a fence upon the land, To keep my wandering sheep at hand. Yet in my heart, another grew, Preventing grace from breaking through.
I reduced God’s gifts to what I knew, And feared the fields beyond my view. Saint Teresa, teach my soul to see, The Gate stands open, calling me.