A man of vision?

I got an eye exam yesterday and made a startling discovery -- my eyesight has gotten worse. I was suspicious of that fact during the hunting season this fall when I had trouble seeing sharply with binoculars and rifle scopes.

Amazingly, it didn't seem to hurt my performance. I made two great shots on deer, a 285-yarder in Montana on a mule deer that went through both shoulders, both lungs and the heart, and a 50-yarder in Minnesota on a whitetail buck that went through the lungs and heart. The shot in Montana was my longest ever.

After I finished the exam and ordered new glasses, this thought hit me: How are my spiritual eyes? Is my faith vision clear? I think we should ask ourselves these question every day. I went to confession last Saturday and the priest recommended that I take at least 10 minutes of personal prayer a day. For me, that's the key to keeping my spiritual vision clear. Otherwise, all kinds of things can distort my vision and fog my view of God.

So far, I'm doing pretty well on the personal prayer. I've started to re-read a book I read a number of years ago by a religious named Brother Lawrence. It's called Practice of the Presence of God. It's simple and I highly recommend it. Brother Lawrence lived in the 17th century and had an amazing gift for experiencing the presence of God in his daily life. I hope to have a similar experience.