Everyone who takes the spiritual life seriously can relate to the image that the prophet Ezekiel proposes of “dry bones.” Often in prayer we go through periods of “dry bones” where we get no consolations despite our best efforts. Even St. Teresa of Kolkata talked about years of dryness in her diary. The prophet sees what happens with dry bones. First, they come together. I take that to mean that we must keep at our prayer, we must not use the dryness as an excuse to slack off in prayer. Next, we wait, we wait for the wind of the Spirit to blow through our dryness to provide warmth and consolation. Only if we stick with our prayer despite the dryness will we be there when the Spirit descends.
