Christian recollection (Christianity)

In the Christian spiritual life recollection signifies a concentration of one's attention, or awareness, and other powers on God or on the expression of God in whatever closely relates to Him. It is the precursor of spiritual contemplation, the drawing together of the forces of inner life. The act of recollection may occur voluntarily and sporadically, as in moments of spiritual concentration, worship or service. It also may become habitual as an acquisition of the sense of the presence of God.

Recollection is essential to meaningful worship and takes the form of attention to prayer: its sounds, meanings, and object (the source of power which can grant fulfilment). In its higher stages, recollection during prayer or prayerful worship is no longer of the body of prayer (sound), or its soul (meaning or intention). It is rather an absorbed recollection of the spirit of prayer, that is, God. These degrees of recollection are acquired, or initiated by the religious. There is another degree, infused contemplation or infused recollection, which is said to operate under the grace or charismatic gift of the Holy Spirit since it cannot be cultivated by an individual's own efforts. This is considered the first degree of true, mystical prayer, in which the soul and all its faculties are gathered and concentrated on God. It is an absorption which, as St Theresa of Avila taught, leads to the transforming union or mystical marriage and the beatific vision of the divine world. In St Theresa's presentation, "The Interior Castle", there are three degrees of prayerful recollection. Two are preparatory, the third is true recollection when the faculties of the soul are gathered. The fourth state of prayer is the fruition of union, the mystical rapture itself.

Thomas Merton refers to recollection as necessary in order to meditate. The mind has to be drawn from all that prevents attention to God in the heart, and so the senses have to be recollected. This cannot be done at the moment of prayer if the senses have been uncontrolled all day, and so "moderate" recollection has to be preserved all the time, by living in an atmosphere of faith and with moments of prayer and attention to God. This is done through resisting the appeals that society makes to the senses, through the media for example, and through giving up luxuries until one has sufficient self control to use them without becoming their slaves.