A Retreat for Lay People by Ronald Knox

I now can see why C.S. Lewis called Ronald Knox the wittiest man in Europe. At times I kept forgetting I wasn't reading Chesterton but was reading a collection of Monsignor Knox's talks he'd given on many retreats for us regular folk - a.k.a. lay people.

These are really wonderful because Knox seemingly effortlessly combines practical advice, inspirational thoughts, and unexpected ways to think about God and our relationship with him. I got a kick out of the times when Knox would say "my own translation of this Scripture might give a better sense" and I'd remember that, of course, the Knox Bible was done by this priest who had such a chatty, friendly style in these talks.

I read a chapter each morning with my coffee and it was the perfect start to my day. Here's a sample of some of the down-to-earth yet utterly surprising images that delighted me and have stuck with me.

Being alive to God means something a little more complicated; it means that the thought of God is at the very apex of our unconscious minds all the time, overflowing all the time into our conscious thoughts, our conscious acts. ...

We read of the patriarch Enoch, that he walked with God. We usually, I think, get the wrong idea of that word "walked in the Old Testament. We think of it as if it meant going on a kind of pilgrimage, laboriously plodding on and on, along a path that has been mapped out for you, but of course it doesn't; it means walking up and down, strolling about at your leisure, taking a turn up and down the front lawn—that is the sort of picture we want to have in our minds when we hear about people walking with God. Enoch walked to and fro, went about his daily business and his daily pleasures, but always with God.

If only we were more like that! If only we could walk through the world at God's heels—so close to him, so alive to his presence, that we could share everything with him, refer to him every moment of sunshine, every shadow of uncertainty in our lives; accept everything he sends with conscious gratitude; obey the least whisper of his call! Even if it is sitting in a room where its master is at work, see who the dog, though it is half asleep on the floor, is awake all the time to him; he has merely to throw a word to it and you will hear it rapping its tail on the floor, for very pleasure that some notice has been taken of it—if we could be grateful, instinctively grateful, for every breath of grace that passes over our souls, and acknowledge it, at once, as God's gift!