Adoration Of The Blessed Sacrament

Seeing a person kneeling before a monstrance with a Holy Communion inside almost looks like a still-life painting but my first experience tells me that the act of adoration is not static.  Perhaps the words "adoration of the Blessed Sacrament" do not connote much activity.  Perhaps those are not the best words to describe the time one is spending with Christ.

Spending time with the Lord is not a static event, nor is it a silent soliloquy.  To begin, one must have faith in Christ.  The next step in to believe that Christ is truly present, that He is right there, listening.  Then a dialog begins: one prays from the heart, Christ listens and  acknowledges [1].


[1] I spent time before the Blessed Sacrament this afternoon, my first time kneeling before a monstrance.  I went into the small chapel half-heartedly, thinking that I would benefit from it just from "going through the motions" without really expecting anything, but then I had hoped that I would see some kind of sign that Christ was present.  Of course, it was not realistic to expect it: it was a passing thought, a secret fantasy.  From a past experience, I should know better: there are no  secrets one can keep from Christ.   I closed my eyes.  I saw a noticeable darkness.  I did not like it.  I knew I was in a bit of trouble.  I then reconciled myself to God.  When I opened my eyes, I saw spots of colored light on the left side of the monstrance (I was kneeling on the left side of the monstrance).  I looked back to see if anyone else saw it, and wondered if they were from the sunlight shining through a stained glass window in the back of the chapel.  I turned back and looked again, the round colored spots of light were still present.  I turned my head back a second time to see where the sunlight was coming in from -- it was not evident -- the sun was not shining in from that direction.  I looked back and the colored lights were gone.  Fine.  Then I concluded it was physics but was not entirely convinced that it was.  I thought again, this time not so secretively, and said to the Lord in my mind that if what I saw was some kind of sign, I would like to see that again.  The second time the light was different.  I saw very subtle, small rays of light, again only on the left side of the monstrance, on the purple cloth that served as the background behind the monstrance, varying from lighter purple to darker purple.  I knew that this could not have been sunlight for there was no sunlight coming from the right side.  The right side was a painted wall with no windows.  I was still unconvinced.  I thought that this time my eyes were playing tricks with me and with that thought, the light show disappeared.  Finally, I thought that if Peter could deny Christ three times, I certainly could have a third try.  Nothing happened for a while.  Then I saw the monstrance casting a shadow on the purple cloth behind it.  This time, the shadow fell to the right of the monstrance.  This made scientific sense because I did see sunlight peek through the stained glass windows on the left side, causing the shadow to appear.  It was a shadow like any other, no spots of color, no gradation of purple -- it was simply a dark shadow showing the intricacies of the monstrance on a purple cloth.  It lasted for a little while longer than expected, considering the two previous light shows were both of shorter duration (actually the first light show lingered a bit longer than the second, maybe even longer than the last, considering I turned my head around twice -- how long it lasted I do not know).  So what is my conclusion?  If I was shown the presence of Christ, I am thankful.  If I was fantasizing--I do not know why I would be in the first place--it was a fantasy I did not choreograph.  Why was I not shown an even more fantastical light show the third time?  I think because someone is upset that I had so little faith and wanted to point out how dumb I was not to know the difference between what is worldly and what is other-worldly.  In order to show that the first two were other-worldly, the third one had to be worldly to show the contrast.  For me, the contrast worked: I am convinced the the first two light shows were not rooted in physics.