Invoking the name of God

If prayer is the essence of the spiritual life, then invocation is the essence of prayer. What you have to do is invoke, and it is upon the divine name which you invoke that you concentrate. The name is a centre, a focus, a support, and the proper basis for this crystallization of spirit and soul. It must become our life. The name itself has the power to create its own space, and since it may bre pronounced in every setting and on every occasion, it has the capacity to turn every moment into a spiritual retreat. The name is not plaything, and invocation is not recreation. Those who would enter upon the way of the nameshould realize that it will demand all that they are. He who aspires to this practice should therefore being only after having first vowed to continue to the very end of his life. (James S Cutsinger).