Usually I take a week off to make my annual retreat. Last time, before I took up my assignment as associate pastor here at St. John's, I went to a Franciscan retreat center in Buffalo/Niagara, New York. The place is so beautiful  with 400 areas of wooded land, and it is a sister institution for the University of St. Bonaventure. There are a lot of weekend retreats for the university students and other groups. The director of the retreat center gave me a ride from the airport, and within a couple of hours I was given a grand tour of the place. He introduced me to the friars who would help me with everything so that I could pray well in solitude. They gave me a hermitage for my whole week of prayer. They also informed me to come to the main house for meals and Mass. 
It was a great relieve for me to spend some time in total silence and solitude. Since my ordination, I make sure  to take a week for a private and silent retreat, and I select a  place where I can be comfortable and away from my busy priestly ministries. The place I selected this year was one of the best for great solitude and silence. To spend a week of prayer without seeing anyone or talking to anyone; in a world without radio, music, television, and daily newspapers scares me just to think about it! But I was determined as I  am every year. Determined to pray.
Anyone who has tried to pray has at one time or another found it difficult. The first two days are very difficult. This is often the common complain: "I cannot experience the presence of God; it seems to me that God is absent when I pray. I am distracted constantly; I seem restless, preoccupied." Theses difficulties which we experience can normally block our relationship with God. These difficulties are bound to happen, but if we give up, then we are losing a lot of grace which God bestows upon us through our personal relation with him. We can always get through these difficulties with courage and understanding and with right help.
Dryness is one of the difficulties people commonly experience when they pray. We feel dryness in prayer because we do not experience the presence of God, or we are not having the desire to pray. When we feel the absence of God, we think that we are talking to ourselves. The grace to pray comes to us when the Holy Spirit within us calls out to the Father: "Abba, Father!" The feeling of dryness for a beginner in prayer is normal. It is the time God purifies our intention and desire to serve Him and follow Him. Grace comes to us and works in our own nature. Dryness in prayer can happen to us through our human nature and through a particular given situation. Then it is totally dependent upon our psychological and physical well-being. The feeling of dryness can actually turn out to be a source of grace and spiritual consolation when we finally experience His presence in us. Or, the dryness may be the result of laxity or unfaithfulness on our part.

If we miss prayer time often or cut it short, if we begin to tolerate certain sin in our lives, if we fill our hearts and minds with "worldly things," we may experience deep and intense dryness in prayer. Prayer can be compared with physical fitness. Physical fitness becomes more difficult when we do it sporadically. The solution to remove the dryness in prayer is repentance and to return to our deeds of love for Him.
God's plan for us is to have an ultimate union with Him. This union takes place in our lives as we pilgrim on earth, and it is to last forever in the next life with Him. This indwelling experience of God deepens in our lives when we become more faithful in prayer, battle through dryness, and remain totally steadfast. Temptations to shorten our time of prayer or to drop them altogether come at this period, but we need to resist the temptation. Getting out of the habit of prayer will make it more difficult to pray, and we might lose the "visitation of the Lord." The process of prayer will then become even more distracted when our lives are involved with painful experiences.
When trials, difficulties of any sort, and temptations come in our lives, it is the sign of God's tender love for us. God often permits it to bring steadfastness and seriousness of character which He wants us to have. (James 1:2-4) The very source of trials, temptations, or suffering of any kind can be turned into sweetness as St. Francis of Assisi experienced in his life if we look at it with great hope and faith. Hudson Taylor was a great missionary to China who wrote the following words which might help us to go through trials and suffering with great hope and faith: "It doesn't matter, really, how great the pressure is. It only matters where the pressure lies. See that it never comes between you and the Lord. The greater the pressure, the more it presses you to His breast." Remember the words of St. James: "Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you men of double mind." (James 4: 7-8)   
The Holy Scriptures teach us about the suffering and trials to come our way when we attempt to follow Christ faithfully. It is the suffering of death to self and carrying our daily cross faithfully. The very name Christian means 'follower of Christ,' which means we (the followers of Christ), must take up our daily cross and follow Him. It is the only way to salvation: "Beloved, do not be surprised that a trial by fire is occurring among you, as if something strange were happening to you. But rejoice to the extent that you share in the sufferings of Christ, so that when his glory is revealed, you may also rejoice exultantly. If you are insulted for the name of Christ, blessed are you, for the Spirit of glory and of God rests upon you. But let no one among you be made to suffer as a murderer, a thief, an evildoer, or as an intriguer. But whoever is made to suffer as a Christian should not be ashamed, but glorify God because of the name." (1 Peter 4:12-16)