These words are from our New Testament reading for today, from Philippians: ‘Whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ. Indeed I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them as refuse, in order that I may gain Christ …’

The poems of St John of the Cross capture wonderfully the loss of all things in order to ‘gain Christ’. Here is part of one of them: ‘I went out seeking love, / and with unfaltering hope / I flew so high, so high, / that I overtook the prey. // That I might take the prey / of this adventuring in God / I had to fly so high / that I was lost from sight; / and though in this adventure / I faltered in my flight, / yet love had already flown so high / that I took the prey’.

May God bless you in your own adventure of prayer, and meet you profoundly this day.