Freedom

Day's Saints
Edwold the Hermit
John the Baptist

Gospel Mk 6:17-29
Herod was the one who had John the Baptist arrested and bound in prison
on account of Herodias,
the wife of his brother Philip, whom he had married.
John had said to Herod,
"It is not lawful for you to have your brother's wife."
Herodias harbored a grudge against him
and wanted to kill him but was unable to do so.
Herod feared John, knowing him to be a righteous and holy man,
and kept him in custody.
When he heard him speak he was very much perplexed,
yet he liked to listen to him.
She had an opportunity one day when Herod, on his birthday,
gave a banquet for his courtiers,
his military officers, and the leading men of Galilee.
Herodias' own daughter came in
and performed a dance that delighted Herod and his guests.
The king said to the girl,
"Ask of me whatever you wish and I will grant it to you."
He even swore many things to her,
"I will grant you whatever you ask of me,
even to half of my kingdom."
She went out and said to her mother,
"What shall I ask for?"
She replied, "The head of John the Baptist."
The girl hurried back to the king's presence and made her request,
"I want you to give me at once
on a platter the head of John the Baptist."
The king was deeply distressed,
but because of his oaths and the guests
he did not wish to break his word to her.
So he promptly dispatched an executioner with orders
to bring back his head.
He went off and beheaded him in the prison.
He brought in the head on a platter and gave it to the girl.
The girl in turn gave it to her mother.
When his disciples heard about it,
they came and took his body and laid it in a tomb.

+

I urge you as fellow lovers of Christ, to pray for the country in which you live, so that it is not disgraced by fools and madmen. Through the instigation of God, that country worked to liberate the world, and evil has been at work ever since devising ways to use its institutions against it. If it is lost, the world will regret it, because it is a sin to discard the liberty it has attained through the mercy and grace of God.

To disregard the sacrifices made by so many would be a sin beyond all measure, because freedom is a gift from God, and all too often is bought at the price of blood, pain and death, and our nation has been no stranger to any of these things.

God made us all, and there is no way He intended that the divisions among us were meant to be. Those who love evil and lawlessness and hatred are not Americans, but their country is in hell, and if you doubt it, do nothing, do not even pray a single Rosary to save it, and you will have your wish, but be certain that as many as the adherents of evil are, the number of those who are faithful to the things that made us great are like a great cloud illuminated by the glory of God because of His ardent love.

Political parties are part of being human beings, and since God made us all different and unique, we cannot function or even fathom how, to make our way in life with only a single voice. But the voice of God reverberates through the great cloud of those who love Him, drawing them to Him to enkindle the great fire that will  usher in the Kingdom of God in which will reside all those who love the Lord.

He made us to converse with one another, and to sit down in the hall of decision, and discuss the business of the country. Those who will not abide by the results of the people's choice, who wish to overthrow their decision will go down in history as great losers, who threw out the great blessing of the Lord's freedom. Use the freedom of God to to preserve human liberty which is so precious a gift, to do and seek His Will, otherwise only errors and failures will ensue to our great shame.

If you doubt and hesitate, ask the dead who gave their lives to preserve our freedom, what to do, and you cannot do wrong. Otherwise, you are saying that their sacrifice was wrong, and the evil one who hates liberty and humanity so much was right, and the hatreds and violence through which we have trod with such ardor and weariness will have been negated and may never return.

May the Lord of Heaven and Earth, Jesus Christ commune with us, imparting knowledge of His Will to us so that we may inherit what He wishes so ardently to be ours. He gave up His freedom to allow Himslef to be sacrificed by crucifixion, so that we would know freedom, and its cost. His cost is our gain, but the cost of evil is eternal disgrace that our pettiness should have prevailed at a time when men should have united to serve God and seek His Will so that we might gather as brothers and sisters united in God Himself.

Freedom is not in sexual indulgence, unholy marriages or the salughter of unborn children for the sake of convenience. Freedom is not in ways of devising the means of enslaving our brothers and sisters, and our country will not persist if its constituents pursue the path of slavery so that power might be had. That power will enslave all who enslaved others, because God will not permit enslavers to be free at the cost of slavery imposed on brothers and sisters. Those who seek to enslave will be disgraced and shamed forever. That pertains not only to our country, but to every country that seeks to enslave others by virtue of conquest and intimidation, killing opposition and forbidding brothers and sisters from thinking and acting in accord with truth and freedom.

Our status of being brothers and sisters to one another is a manifest of the Will of God. Political parties are not greater than Will of God which tells us "Love one another as I have loved you." Remember what His love cost Him and realize what we were born into. Rights and privileges must extend to all equally since God treats us all in equality. It is our humanity that is important, and not our privileges or our rights, for in seeking to preserve rights, all too often we find it necessary to step on the rights of someone else. There is no right to do evil, to  kill infants or to enslave other human beings, because our status as children of God is the origin of freedom, and so long as we seek God's Will in the things we gather ro discuss and decide as fellow citizens, we will reap the protection of our rights from God, and live in freedom to do His Will. 

It is shameful that those who have been elected and sat in decision making should decide to throw away everyone's freeom because they cannot abide the freedom all of a sudden, anymore. To do so is to repudiate the sacrifice of so many lives to preserve what we have, and to defend the right to live. Neither Stalin nor Hitler could impose their will on all human beings, and God stirred up His children to oppose and destroy them in order to protect freedom into which they were all born.

Freedom is not for the acquisition of things. Freedom is not for the enjoyment of pleasure. Freedom is not for the killing of innocents who have a right to live, once they have been conceived. Freedom is not for the killing of members of different races. These things have been told us by God who insists that we observe them so that everyone may pass through life and death to live and love forever. Those who have been freed, have no right to destroy others or destroy what others have worked so hard to create and preserve. But without vigilant and diligent concern for one another, none of us can be in the freedom of God. It exists in His love and nowhere else. Thus, to ignore the needs of others whose lives are in danger of extinction because they lack food, water and shelter, is to be like those who nailed the Savior to the cross.

Freedom

Day's Saints
Edwold the Hermit
John the Baptist

Gospel Mk 6:17-29
Herod was the one who had John the Baptist arrested and bound in prison
on account of Herodias,
the wife of his brother Philip, whom he had married.
John had said to Herod,
"It is not lawful for you to have your brother's wife."
Herodias harbored a grudge against him
and wanted to kill him but was unable to do so.
Herod feared John, knowing him to be a righteous and holy man,
and kept him in custody.
When he heard him speak he was very much perplexed,
yet he liked to listen to him.
She had an opportunity one day when Herod, on his birthday,
gave a banquet for his courtiers,
his military officers, and the leading men of Galilee.
Herodias' own daughter came in
and performed a dance that delighted Herod and his guests.
The king said to the girl,
"Ask of me whatever you wish and I will grant it to you."
He even swore many things to her,
"I will grant you whatever you ask of me,
even to half of my kingdom."
She went out and said to her mother,
"What shall I ask for?"
She replied, "The head of John the Baptist."
The girl hurried back to the king's presence and made her request,
"I want you to give me at once
on a platter the head of John the Baptist."
The king was deeply distressed,
but because of his oaths and the guests
he did not wish to break his word to her.
So he promptly dispatched an executioner with orders
to bring back his head.
He went off and beheaded him in the prison.
He brought in the head on a platter and gave it to the girl.
The girl in turn gave it to her mother.
When his disciples heard about it,
they came and took his body and laid it in a tomb.

+

I urge you as fellow lovers of Christ, to pray for the country in which you live, so that it is not disgraced by fools and madmen. Through the instigation of God, that country worked to liberate the world, and evil has been at work ever since devising ways to use its institutions against it. If it is lost, the world will regret it, because it is a sin to discard the liberty it has attained through the mercy and grace of God.

To disregard the sacrifices made by so many would be a sin beyond all measure, because freedom is a gift from God, and all too often is bought at the price of blood, pain and death, and our nation has been no stranger to any of these things.

God made us all, and there is no way He intended that the divisions among us were meant to be. Those who love evil and lawlessness and hatred are not Americans, but their country is in hell, and if you doubt it, do nothing, do not even pray a single Rosary to save it, and you will have your wish, but be certain that as many as the adherents of evil are, the number of those who are faithful to the things that made us great are like a great cloud illuminated by the glory of God because of His ardent love.

Political parties are part of being human beings, and since God made us all different and unique, we cannot function or even fathom how, to make our way in life with only a single voice. But the voice of God reverberates through the great cloud of those who love Him, drawing them to Him to enkindle the great fire that will  usher in the Kingdom of God in which will reside all those who love the Lord.

He made us to converse with one another, and to sit down in the hall of decision, and discuss the business of the country. Those who will not abide by the results of the people's choice, who wish to overthrow their decision will go down in history as great losers, who threw out the great blessing of the Lord's freedom. Use the freedom of God to to preserve human liberty which is so precious a gift, to do and seek His Will, otherwise only errors and failures will ensue to our great shame.

If you doubt and hesitate, ask the dead who gave their lives to preserve our freedom, what to do, and you cannot do wrong. Otherwise, you are saying that their sacrifice was wrong, and the evil one who hates liberty and humanity so much was right, and the hatreds and violence through which we have trod with such ardor and weariness will have been negated and may never return.

May the Lord of Heaven and Earth, Jesus Christ commune with us, imparting knowledge of His Will to us so that we may inherit what He wishes so ardently to be ours. He gave up His freedom to allow Himslef to be sacrificed by crucifixion, so that we would know freedom, and its cost. His cost is our gain, but the cost of evil is eternal disgrace that our pettiness should have prevailed at a time when men should have united to serve God and seek His Will so that we might gather as brothers and sisters united in God Himself.

Freedom is not in sexual indulgence, unholy marriages or the salughter of unborn children for the sake of convenience. Freedom is not in ways of devising the means of enslaving our brothers and sisters, and our country will not persist if its constituents pursue the path of slavery so that power might be had. That power will enslave all who enslaved others, because God will not permit enslavers to be free at the cost of slavery imposed on brothers and sisters. Those who seek to enslave will be disgraced and shamed forever. That pertains not only to our country, but to every country that seeks to enslave others by virtue of conquest and intimidation, killing opposition and forbidding brothers and sisters from thinking and acting in accord with truth and freedom.

Our status of being brothers and sisters to one another is a manifest of the Will of God. Political parties are not greater than Will of God which tells us "Love one another as I have loved you." Remember what His love cost Him and realize what we were born into. Rights and privileges must extend to all equally since God treats us all in equality. It is our humanity that is important, and not our privileges or our rights, for in seeking to preserve rights, all too often we find it necessary to step on the rights of someone else. There is no right to do evil, to  kill infants or to enslave other human beings, because our status as children of God is the origin of freedom, and so long as we seek God's Will in the things we gather ro discuss and decide as fellow citizens, we will reap the protection of our rights from God, and live in freedom to do His Will. 

It is shameful that those who have been elected and sat in decision making should decide to throw away everyone's freeom because they cannot abide the freedom all of a sudden, anymore. To do so is to repudiate the sacrifice of so many lives to preserve what we have, and to defend the right to live. Neither Stalin nor Hitler could impose their will on all human beings, and God stirred up His children to oppose and destroy them in order to protect freedom into which they were all born.

Freedom is not for the acquisition of things. Freedom is not for the enjoyment of pleasure. Freedom is not for the killing of innocents who have a right to live, once they have been conceived. Freedom is not for the killing of members of different races. These things have been told us by God who insists that we observe them so that everyone may pass through life and death to live and love forever. Those who have been freed, have no right to destroy others or destroy what others have worked so hard to create and preserve. But without vigilant and diligent concern for one another, none of us can be in the freedom of God. It exists in His love and nowhere else. Thus, to ignore the needs of others whose lives are in danger of extinction because they lack food, water and shelter, is to be like those who nailed the Savior to the cross.

Inside or Outside

Day's Saints
Joseph Calasanz, Benedictine

Gospel Mt 22:34-40
When the Pharisees heard that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees,
they gathered together, and one of them,
a scholar of the law, tested him by asking,
"Teacher, which commandment in the law is the greatest?"
He said to him,
"You shall love the Lord, your God, with all your heart,
with all your soul, and with all your mind.
This is the greatest and the first commandment.
The second is like it:
You shall love your neighbor as yourself.
The whole law and the prophets depend on these two commandments."

+

Whether in the storm or looking at it
from outside, it is astonishing to see.

Stormy weather has passed us by several times in the last few days. Tropical storms or their remnants have brought cool cloudy weather and some rain. A great deal more rain is needed in places where drought has taken hold amid horrendous heat. The smoke is damaging to the bodies of those forced to breathe it. My own trouble breathing has been exacerbated by it. While not incapacitated by the smoke, 

it has not been helpful.

All this is the result of changes in the atmosphere brought on partially by human activities and partly though the Will of God wishing to get our attention. While there might still be time to avert something far worse, there is very little time left.

Jesus quoted the Scriptures to those who questioned Him. "You shall love the Lord, your God, with all your heart." It is the same thing that has been said before about abandonment to God and the embrace of His Will so that there is nothing of this world that is in the place where Jesus should be. Detachment is necessary to endure or enjoy the Heaven to come.

Wherever you meet resistance to God in your own being or in the world about you, you come face to face not only with evil, but the conflict that can be deadly, trying to give yourself to Him in spite of temptations and the seductive pleasures at odds with the spiritual ideal of Jesus.

In order to help us do penance and deliver us from our own attachments to the things in the world, He is giving everyone an impetus to do what we should and which He has commanded.

God loves us, and because He does, we love one another. There is nothing sweeter than the pure love of a child for his parents, and even a pet cat or dog will love us because that is its function, and such animals will do anything they can to awin our love. How much more should we love the Lord. There is no room for half-hearted love of God, or indifference. Either we love Him completely or we do not love Him at all. It is a hard and bitter lesson to learn, but it echoes what He said about a rich man having a harder time entering heaven than for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle.

I say all this only to remind you of what He has already told you personally. He gives Himself as fully as He can, and wishes you would reciprocate because in the balance, we stand about to be judged and to lose Him at the moment before we are done would be a terrible disappointment.

Judgement is God's sole prerogative, and not ours. We may judge when we should not, because our morality is in its childhood. The mature Christian learns to refrain from judging and does his best to help others avoid God's judgement. Neither presume someone is lost, nor that someone who is lost is saved. We do not know. The courage to ask Him God to tell us where we are deficient will elicit the graces necessary to grow and mature because it will lead to the revelation of God to us and us to ourselves, so that we can see His goodness. That jusdgement is upon the world right now. For some it will be terrible, crushing blow, and for others, it will be a moment of being freed to soar in God.

Inside or Outside

Day's Saints
Joseph Calasanz, Benedictine

Gospel Mt 22:34-40
When the Pharisees heard that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees,
they gathered together, and one of them,
a scholar of the law, tested him by asking,
"Teacher, which commandment in the law is the greatest?"
He said to him,
"You shall love the Lord, your God, with all your heart,
with all your soul, and with all your mind.
This is the greatest and the first commandment.
The second is like it:
You shall love your neighbor as yourself.
The whole law and the prophets depend on these two commandments."

+

Whether in the storm or looking at it
from outside, it is astonishing to see.

Stormy weather has passed us by several times in the last few days. Tropical storms or their remnants have brought cool cloudy weather and some rain. A great deal more rain is needed in places where drought has taken hold amid horrendous heat. The smoke is damaging to the bodies of those forced to breathe it. My own trouble breathing has been exacerbated by it. While not incapacitated by the smoke, 

it has not been helpful.

All this is the result of changes in the atmosphere brought on partially by human activities and partly though the Will of God wishing to get our attention. While there might still be time to avert something far worse, there is very little time left.

Jesus quoted the Scriptures to those who questioned Him. "You shall love the Lord, your God, with all your heart." It is the same thing that has been said before about abandonment to God and the embrace of His Will so that there is nothing of this world that is in the place where Jesus should be. Detachment is necessary to endure or enjoy the Heaven to come.

Wherever you meet resistance to God in your own being or in the world about you, you come face to face not only with evil, but the conflict that can be deadly, trying to give yourself to Him in spite of temptations and the seductive pleasures at odds with the spiritual ideal of Jesus.

In order to help us do penance and deliver us from our own attachments to the things in the world, He is giving everyone an impetus to do what we should and which He has commanded.

God loves us, and because He does, we love one another. There is nothing sweeter than the pure love of a child for his parents, and even a pet cat or dog will love us because that is its function, and such animals will do anything they can to awin our love. How much more should we love the Lord. There is no room for half-hearted love of God, or indifference. Either we love Him completely or we do not love Him at all. It is a hard and bitter lesson to learn, but it echoes what He said about a rich man having a harder time entering heaven than for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle.

I say all this only to remind you of what He has already told you personally. He gives Himself as fully as He can, and wishes you would reciprocate because in the balance, we stand about to be judged and to lose Him at the moment before we are done would be a terrible disappointment.

Judgement is God's sole prerogative, and not ours. We may judge when we should not, because our morality is in its childhood. The mature Christian learns to refrain from judging and does his best to help others avoid God's judgement. Neither presume someone is lost, nor that someone who is lost is saved. We do not know. The courage to ask Him God to tell us where we are deficient will elicit the graces necessary to grow and mature because it will lead to the revelation of God to us and us to ourselves, so that we can see His goodness. That jusdgement is upon the world right now. For some it will be terrible, crushing blow, and for others, it will be a moment of being freed to soar in God.

Light

DAY'S SAINTS
Gunifort, Martyr
Queenship of Mary

Gospel Mt 19:23-30
Jesus said to his disciples:
"Amen, I say to you, it will be hard for one who is rich
to enter the Kingdom of heaven.
Again I say to you,
it is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle
than for one who is rich to enter the Kingdom of God."
When the disciples heard this, they were greatly astonished and said,
"Who then can be saved?"
Jesus looked at them and said,
"For men this is impossible,
but for God all things are possible."
Then Peter said to him in reply,
"We have given up everything and followed you.
What will there be for us?"
Jesus said to them, "Amen, I say to you
that you who have followed me, in the new age,
when the Son of Man is seated on his throne of glory,
will yourselves sit on twelve thrones,
judging the twelve tribes of Israel.
And everyone who has given up houses or brothers or sisters
or father or mother or children or lands
for the sake of my name will receive a hundred times more,
and will inherit eternal life.
But many who are first will be last, and the last will be first."

+

We see so little of His light; the
world is filled with His light.

No man who lies and promotes violence and prejudice and hate can enter Heaven, for there is no lie in Jesus, and the world to come is Jesus.

There is also no violence or hatred In Jesus, and anyone who seeks to promote himself as a follower of Jesus who lies, hates and commits violence against his brother will ever see the glory of God in eternity.

Where violence and lies spew from a man's mouth, there is no joy, no peace and no rest, and the causes they espouse cannot last because Jesus is uprooting all such growth in the Body Christ.

Jesus told the truth, even when it caused much dismay amongst those who followed Him and listened to what He had to say. In the world, one of the chief reasons for abandoning the world is to be free to surrender one's whole self to Jesus, and a man must be honest with God and himself to do any good in the world.

A person who lies, cheats, steals and commits violence cannot do any good in the world no matter what he thinks, because to do good one must be good, and if one is doing evil he is not good, but evil, and the results of all his works are all tainted with the corruption of the world. Nothing of the world goes where the Lord has in mind, except that lies and evil and immorality go to hell whence they came, there to suffer forever.

Woe to those who take away a person's freedom, and the things for which they worked so hard; such men are not followers of Jesus, and can never be. The person who says he loves Jesus but is in love with evil and sin cannot love Jesus who is the opposite of all such things. The joy of heaven consists in Jesus and His goodness and His love and nothing more. If you have any notion that you can commit sins and evil and still serve God you are mistaken and sadly misled. Rid yourself of the world and attachments to it, in order to be free of corruption and its stench, asking forgiveness for your sins and offering atonement so you may be free to live as Jesus lived.

The work of God is to transform us to be like Him, and true joy is knowing Jesus and reveling in Him as He is, and heaven is the ultimate expression of His joy. 

If a person has done nothing to be forgiven and has made no attempt to atone for sin has yet to begin the arduous journey that ends in God. Along the way we gain freedom, the ability to see God and know Him as He is, and has begun to be happy belonging to God. Beginning to see Him as He is persuades us to be more like Him, and our affection becomes deeper and more profound and lasting, while nothing of this world has any lasting fascination for us as His creation.

The journey to God begins in desiring to do His Will so that our taste is for the divine and not for the pleasures of this world. That is not to say that the world of God is insipid, for it has a savor for the holy, which surpasses all we have known in our life. He permitted us to taste the good things in the world and to savor them, in the hope that we will be drawn to the Source of all things and desire Him instead. The graces He gives, save us, and protect us and guide us, and no man lives who did not benefit from God's grace. If we have disappointed Him, it is because we were satisfied with the good things we found in life and never desired to see Him more clearly, or to embrace Him for affectionately in the midst of all our collected preferences.

Begin today to love the Lord.

Light

DAY'S SAINTS
Gunifort, Martyr
Queenship of Mary

Gospel Mt 19:23-30
Jesus said to his disciples:
"Amen, I say to you, it will be hard for one who is rich
to enter the Kingdom of heaven.
Again I say to you,
it is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle
than for one who is rich to enter the Kingdom of God."
When the disciples heard this, they were greatly astonished and said,
"Who then can be saved?"
Jesus looked at them and said,
"For men this is impossible,
but for God all things are possible."
Then Peter said to him in reply,
"We have given up everything and followed you.
What will there be for us?"
Jesus said to them, "Amen, I say to you
that you who have followed me, in the new age,
when the Son of Man is seated on his throne of glory,
will yourselves sit on twelve thrones,
judging the twelve tribes of Israel.
And everyone who has given up houses or brothers or sisters
or father or mother or children or lands
for the sake of my name will receive a hundred times more,
and will inherit eternal life.
But many who are first will be last, and the last will be first."

+

We see so little of His light; the
world is filled with His light.

No man who lies and promotes violence and prejudice and hate can enter Heaven, for there is no lie in Jesus, and the world to come is Jesus.

There is also no violence or hatred In Jesus, and anyone who seeks to promote himself as a follower of Jesus who lies, hates and commits violence against his brother will ever see the glory of God in eternity.

Where violence and lies spew from a man's mouth, there is no joy, no peace and no rest, and the causes they espouse cannot last because Jesus is uprooting all such growth in the Body Christ.

Jesus told the truth, even when it caused much dismay amongst those who followed Him and listened to what He had to say. In the world, one of the chief reasons for abandoning the world is to be free to surrender one's whole self to Jesus, and a man must be honest with God and himself to do any good in the world.

A person who lies, cheats, steals and commits violence cannot do any good in the world no matter what he thinks, because to do good one must be good, and if one is doing evil he is not good, but evil, and the results of all his works are all tainted with the corruption of the world. Nothing of the world goes where the Lord has in mind, except that lies and evil and immorality go to hell whence they came, there to suffer forever.

Woe to those who take away a person's freedom, and the things for which they worked so hard; such men are not followers of Jesus, and can never be. The person who says he loves Jesus but is in love with evil and sin cannot love Jesus who is the opposite of all such things. The joy of heaven consists in Jesus and His goodness and His love and nothing more. If you have any notion that you can commit sins and evil and still serve God you are mistaken and sadly misled. Rid yourself of the world and attachments to it, in order to be free of corruption and its stench, asking forgiveness for your sins and offering atonement so you may be free to live as Jesus lived.

The work of God is to transform us to be like Him, and true joy is knowing Jesus and reveling in Him as He is, and heaven is the ultimate expression of His joy. 

If a person has done nothing to be forgiven and has made no attempt to atone for sin has yet to begin the arduous journey that ends in God. Along the way we gain freedom, the ability to see God and know Him as He is, and has begun to be happy belonging to God. Beginning to see Him as He is persuades us to be more like Him, and our affection becomes deeper and more profound and lasting, while nothing of this world has any lasting fascination for us as His creation.

The journey to God begins in desiring to do His Will so that our taste is for the divine and not for the pleasures of this world. That is not to say that the world of God is insipid, for it has a savor for the holy, which surpasses all we have known in our life. He permitted us to taste the good things in the world and to savor them, in the hope that we will be drawn to the Source of all things and desire Him instead. The graces He gives, save us, and protect us and guide us, and no man lives who did not benefit from God's grace. If we have disappointed Him, it is because we were satisfied with the good things we found in life and never desired to see Him more clearly, or to embrace Him for affectionately in the midst of all our collected preferences.

Begin today to love the Lord.

Prayer and Desire

Day's Saints
Bernard of Clairvaux, Benedictine Cistercian
Amadour the Hermit

Gospel Mt 15:21-28
At that time, Jesus withdrew to the region of Tyre and Sidon.
And behold, a Canaanite woman of that district came and called out,
"Have pity on me, Lord, Son of David!
My daughter is tormented by a demon."
But Jesus did not say a word in answer to her.
Jesus' disciples came and asked him,
"Send her away, for she keeps calling out after us."
He said in reply,
"I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel."
But the woman came and did Jesus homage, saying, "Lord, help me."
He said in reply,
"It is not right to take the food of the children
and throw it to the dogs."
She said, "Please, Lord, for even the dogs eat the scraps
that fall from the table of their masters."
Then Jesus said to her in reply,
"O woman, great is your faith!
Let it be done for you as you wish."
And the woman's daughter was healed from that hour.

+

The woman in the parable wanted Jesus to deliver her daughter from a demon, and in spite of His rebuff, persisted in calling out to Him. Jesus' response was to deliver the woman's child of the demon. Not many are called to exorcise demons, but we can still offer prayers with the sweet incense of penance and  prayer of atonement for those in the clutches of evil.

If we want peace in the world among nations, then we need to pray for the deliverance of people in the power of evil, oppressed and worse.We should also pray for world peace, healing of climate and weather, and pray for an end of violent and inclement weather that causes people to die in heat, and wildfires that choke the air. 

At the same time we are praying for peace, we should pray for the end of wars. No one needs complain, otherwise, that wars are causing us grief. If we are not willing to pray in accordance with the needs of others crushed in war, then we can expect the same treatment ourselves.

The Memorare

Remember, O most gracious Virgin Mary,
that never was it known 
that anyone who fled to thy protection, 
implored thy help, 
or sought thy intercession, 
was left unaided. 
Inspired by this confidence 
I fly unto thee, 
O Virgin of virgins, my Mother. 
To thee do I come, 
before thee I stand, 
sinful and sorrowful. 
O Mother of the Word Incarnate,
despise not my petitions, 
but in thy mercy hear and answer me. 
Amen.

Prayer and Desire

Day's Saints
Bernard of Clairvaux, Benedictine Cistercian
Amadour the Hermit

Gospel Mt 15:21-28
At that time, Jesus withdrew to the region of Tyre and Sidon.
And behold, a Canaanite woman of that district came and called out,
"Have pity on me, Lord, Son of David!
My daughter is tormented by a demon."
But Jesus did not say a word in answer to her.
Jesus' disciples came and asked him,
"Send her away, for she keeps calling out after us."
He said in reply,
"I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel."
But the woman came and did Jesus homage, saying, "Lord, help me."
He said in reply,
"It is not right to take the food of the children
and throw it to the dogs."
She said, "Please, Lord, for even the dogs eat the scraps
that fall from the table of their masters."
Then Jesus said to her in reply,
"O woman, great is your faith!
Let it be done for you as you wish."
And the woman's daughter was healed from that hour.

+

The woman in the parable wanted Jesus to deliver her daughter from a demon, and in spite of His rebuff, persisted in calling out to Him. Jesus' response was to deliver the woman's child of the demon. Not many are called to exorcise demons, but we can still offer prayers with the sweet incense of penance and  prayer of atonement for those in the clutches of evil.

If we want peace in the world among nations, then we need to pray for the deliverance of people in the power of evil, oppressed and worse.We should also pray for world peace, healing of climate and weather, and pray for an end of violent and inclement weather that causes people to die in heat, and wildfires that choke the air. 

At the same time we are praying for peace, we should pray for the end of wars. No one needs complain, otherwise, that wars are causing us grief. If we are not willing to pray in accordance with the needs of others crushed in war, then we can expect the same treatment ourselves.

The Memorare

Remember, O most gracious Virgin Mary,
that never was it known 
that anyone who fled to thy protection, 
implored thy help, 
or sought thy intercession, 
was left unaided. 
Inspired by this confidence 
I fly unto thee, 
O Virgin of virgins, my Mother. 
To thee do I come, 
before thee I stand, 
sinful and sorrowful. 
O Mother of the Word Incarnate,
despise not my petitions, 
but in thy mercy hear and answer me. 
Amen.

Cross Passion and Life

The cross that spoke to St. Francis.

How can we make a pure offering of ourselves for the salvation of souls? Not without God, and not without love. Unselfishness is the means by which we become an acceptable offering to God. 

Suffering for someone else can be accomplished selfishly, or in a self centered way, and for spiritual people, who often are extremely sensitive, it is no small matter to be unselfish, to surpass self-centeredness. The suffering itself can purify us so that our offering is more purely of love, without the overtones of selfishness. The pinnacle of love is the abandonment of the soul to God, and as we become more like Him, we lose interest in ourselves, and our brothers and sisters become the center of our concern, because He wishes us to serve one another.

It is rather like falling asleep. Since sleep is the opposite of wakefulness, when it is hard to approach sleep, we wrestle with wakefulness and the edge of sleep. All too often, abandonment to God in a conscious act can sometimes allow us to surrender to sleep and to our God, in trust and in love. The desire to do something cannot extend into unconsciousness, because the very impulse to do something is activity, and sleep requires inactivity.

For some, prayer is verbal, and others pray without verbalizing, and still others pray by extending the will toward God for unification and service. For those who pray by willing, verbalization is undesireable, and occupying the will in loving focuses the being in God and He may then take the initiative to love in us and through us. For those who no longer enjoy consolations, it is obvious whether we are unselfish or not. Trusting God then is important, and surrender is paramount, even if in the process, it is necessary to endure absence of tangible, affective love. The strong current of His love can flow through us sensibly or not, but the more we love God instead of ourselves, the more we find ourselves united to Him, and sensible love pales in comparison to His love.

Sometimes, He touches us in an insensible way that affords certainty of His love and that He is pleased with us. Rather than asking for a favor, allow Him to bestow a gift when He wishes. Then, if you suffer, you can be certain of pleasing Him, and that He will make us unselfish so any offering however inconsequential, can be mighty in the power of the Lord. If we love God, and He asks us the favor of enduring His pain and suffering, it will not be difficult to acquiesce. If you have asked to share in His passion, you can suffer anything for love, because sacrifice expresses  love for the beloved without any reference to self. He will ask sacrifice of us because it is necessary to make sacrifice and surrender in order to learn how to be unselfish so as to be pleasing to the Himself. Isaac was asked to allow his father to sacrifice himself to God by allowing his father to kill him like a sacrificial lamb. Isaac and his father were spared the ordeal of death, and the Lord provided an animal so that a more conventional sacrifice might be made.

The passion of the Lord consisted of more than nails in the hands and feet. Most of all, it consisted of sacrifice of self which He could make as perfectly as was possible so that He might offer His suffering and death to His Father for our redemption, and the forgivenes of sins.

In the absence of visible wounds, there is the awareness of His sacrificial love, forever calling us back to him in longing, to participate in the love He had for His Father in entering the pact, like Isaac, to offer all His love and His own self to the Father in exchange for our spiritual freedom in union.

Thus, imitation becomes the epitome of love, with or without any outward sign. But if the prayer is granted, and we are put on display for the world to see, some will be full of hate and spite and will hurt us because they cannot abide what we are, another Christ.

Wearing a crucifix or a habit should express our longing to be like Jesus in obedience to His Will, and service to the children of God, and our longing for God should drive us to desire at least to constantly being more like Him in sacrifice and penance, always available to offer something to God for their sake, for their salvation and to requite His love of us.

For many, it is impossible to approach that level of conscious willing. The sensitivity of some affords no end of sacrificial love without bidding, but the one who realizes the level of love God evokes from us at the same time overflows with joy regardless, because of the proximity of achieving and receiving what He wishes to give.

To desire a participation in His passion-life is already to be fastened to His Heart as the means, through union, of identifying completely with His sacrifice. Thus, everything reminds of Him, and a person forgets himself to fall alsleep in perfect wakefullness, and the person and the Lord communicate with each other. This is the height of prayer, of participation in His passion-life and finding satisfaction of our existence that persists forever. The person who begins a life of prayer seeking consolation, prodigies and a pleasant life has already embarked on a program of self-emptying that will prove the quality of his mettle.

All is well with that soul that realizes he is pleasing to God, and can become more so with an application of  love. If he has desired that martyrdom of the stigmata, and is content that it was not given, love remains and is all the satisfaction needed. For the people of God and the people of the world, God has a client, a second self, who can preach, teach and do sacrifices and make surrender to God for their sake to obtain what is needed, even if all that is necessary is to persude the children of God in His Church, that a particular suffering is necessary and must be endured. For Jesus, it was necessary to suffer as He did and He did suffer according to the measure of the Father's infinite love. Thus, those are blessed, who participate willingly for love, in the passion of Christ, as a sacrifice for other people to know and love God as He is known by them. Immersion in the participation in His passion-life is seen by the participant as an opportunity to see and realize the depts of His love and sacrifice which was sufficient for our redemtion and salvation. We receive the assistance we need by providing spiritually for our brothers and sisters by prayer, penance and sacrifice in surrender to the Lord and His cross to afford the sure means of salvation for others, who are our realization of who Christ is and what He did. All motivation necessary is inherent in the sacaricing and the surrendering that we can do, because we love Jesus. Thus, if He asks us nothing, we are rich in His mercy and love and have that much to give to others whom we should love as we love Christ.

Our earthly self is subject to disappointments and misery, spiritually or in a physical or mental way,But the peace of God which is such an infallible way of judging things, can bring us a convincing certainty that the way of the cross is the way of Christ and the only way we, or the Church or the human race can get along in life.

We may think our cross is heavy because we are tired and we need a rest, but what cross do we carry, in reality, if God was in giving it to us? We may think that it is painful to hang from the nails in our hands and feet, and the lance in our side should have long ago been removed by the One who put it there. But if it is the Lord who put the nails and the lance where they are, can we really complain if we embarked deliberatley on a journey that was explicit;y meant to reveal the passion of the Lord to us? We may complain we are dying of thirst spiritually, but was aridity absent on His cross? He tasted the wine while He hung from the cross, and then, forgiving the world verbally, gave up His lofe and handed His spirit to the Father. Can we say we

Have we even tasted the wine ourselves? So you see, turning the point of view around to the other opens the heart to love and compassion strong enought to enable us to ask to participate in the passion of the Lord. It enables us to endure anything He might ask simply to obtain the love and grace other people need, and in the process, fulfill our time on the cross with Him to save someone else, even someone who may not deserve what they will receive, and even if they are unware they received anything at all.

We do what love demnds without thought of reward or merit, but merely for love. Measure all things by love, and you will see the cross in a whole new light.

Cross Passion and Life

The cross that spoke to St. Francis.

How can we make a pure offering of ourselves for the salvation of souls? Not without God, and not without love. Unselfishness is the means by which we become an acceptable offering to God. 

Suffering for someone else can be accomplished selfishly, or in a self centered way, and for spiritual people, who often are extremely sensitive, it is no small matter to be unselfish, to surpass self-centeredness. The suffering itself can purify us so that our offering is more purely of love, without the overtones of selfishness. The pinnacle of love is the abandonment of the soul to God, and as we become more like Him, we lose interest in ourselves, and our brothers and sisters become the center of our concern, because He wishes us to serve one another.

It is rather like falling asleep. Since sleep is the opposite of wakefulness, when it is hard to approach sleep, we wrestle with wakefulness and the edge of sleep. All too often, abandonment to God in a conscious act can sometimes allow us to surrender to sleep and to our God, in trust and in love. The desire to do something cannot extend into unconsciousness, because the very impulse to do something is activity, and sleep requires inactivity.

For some, prayer is verbal, and others pray without verbalizing, and still others pray by extending the will toward God for unification and service. For those who pray by willing, verbalization is undesireable, and occupying the will in loving focuses the being in God and He may then take the initiative to love in us and through us. For those who no longer enjoy consolations, it is obvious whether we are unselfish or not. Trusting God then is important, and surrender is paramount, even if in the process, it is necessary to endure absence of tangible, affective love. The strong current of His love can flow through us sensibly or not, but the more we love God instead of ourselves, the more we find ourselves united to Him, and sensible love pales in comparison to His love.

Sometimes, He touches us in an insensible way that affords certainty of His love and that He is pleased with us. Rather than asking for a favor, allow Him to bestow a gift when He wishes. Then, if you suffer, you can be certain of pleasing Him, and that He will make us unselfish so any offering however inconsequential, can be mighty in the power of the Lord. If we love God, and He asks us the favor of enduring His pain and suffering, it will not be difficult to acquiesce. If you have asked to share in His passion, you can suffer anything for love, because sacrifice expresses  love for the beloved without any reference to self. He will ask sacrifice of us because it is necessary to make sacrifice and surrender in order to learn how to be unselfish so as to be pleasing to the Himself. Isaac was asked to allow his father to sacrifice himself to God by allowing his father to kill him like a sacrificial lamb. Isaac and his father were spared the ordeal of death, and the Lord provided an animal so that a more conventional sacrifice might be made.

The passion of the Lord consisted of more than nails in the hands and feet. Most of all, it consisted of sacrifice of self which He could make as perfectly as was possible so that He might offer His suffering and death to His Father for our redemption, and the forgivenes of sins.

In the absence of visible wounds, there is the awareness of His sacrificial love, forever calling us back to him in longing, to participate in the love He had for His Father in entering the pact, like Isaac, to offer all His love and His own self to the Father in exchange for our spiritual freedom in union.

Thus, imitation becomes the epitome of love, with or without any outward sign. But if the prayer is granted, and we are put on display for the world to see, some will be full of hate and spite and will hurt us because they cannot abide what we are, another Christ.

Wearing a crucifix or a habit should express our longing to be like Jesus in obedience to His Will, and service to the children of God, and our longing for God should drive us to desire at least to constantly being more like Him in sacrifice and penance, always available to offer something to God for their sake, for their salvation and to requite His love of us.

For many, it is impossible to approach that level of conscious willing. The sensitivity of some affords no end of sacrificial love without bidding, but the one who realizes the level of love God evokes from us at the same time overflows with joy regardless, because of the proximity of achieving and receiving what He wishes to give.

To desire a participation in His passion-life is already to be fastened to His Heart as the means, through union, of identifying completely with His sacrifice. Thus, everything reminds of Him, and a person forgets himself to fall alsleep in perfect wakefullness, and the person and the Lord communicate with each other. This is the height of prayer, of participation in His passion-life and finding satisfaction of our existence that persists forever. The person who begins a life of prayer seeking consolation, prodigies and a pleasant life has already embarked on a program of self-emptying that will prove the quality of his mettle.

All is well with that soul that realizes he is pleasing to God, and can become more so with an application of  love. If he has desired that martyrdom of the stigmata, and is content that it was not given, love remains and is all the satisfaction needed. For the people of God and the people of the world, God has a client, a second self, who can preach, teach and do sacrifices and make surrender to God for their sake to obtain what is needed, even if all that is necessary is to persude the children of God in His Church, that a particular suffering is necessary and must be endured. For Jesus, it was necessary to suffer as He did and He did suffer according to the measure of the Father's infinite love. Thus, those are blessed, who participate willingly for love, in the passion of Christ, as a sacrifice for other people to know and love God as He is known by them. Immersion in the participation in His passion-life is seen by the participant as an opportunity to see and realize the depts of His love and sacrifice which was sufficient for our redemtion and salvation. We receive the assistance we need by providing spiritually for our brothers and sisters by prayer, penance and sacrifice in surrender to the Lord and His cross to afford the sure means of salvation for others, who are our realization of who Christ is and what He did. All motivation necessary is inherent in the sacaricing and the surrendering that we can do, because we love Jesus. Thus, if He asks us nothing, we are rich in His mercy and love and have that much to give to others whom we should love as we love Christ.

Our earthly self is subject to disappointments and misery, spiritually or in a physical or mental way,But the peace of God which is such an infallible way of judging things, can bring us a convincing certainty that the way of the cross is the way of Christ and the only way we, or the Church or the human race can get along in life.

We may think our cross is heavy because we are tired and we need a rest, but what cross do we carry, in reality, if God was in giving it to us? We may think that it is painful to hang from the nails in our hands and feet, and the lance in our side should have long ago been removed by the One who put it there. But if it is the Lord who put the nails and the lance where they are, can we really complain if we embarked deliberatley on a journey that was explicit;y meant to reveal the passion of the Lord to us? We may complain we are dying of thirst spiritually, but was aridity absent on His cross? He tasted the wine while He hung from the cross, and then, forgiving the world verbally, gave up His lofe and handed His spirit to the Father. Can we say we

Have we even tasted the wine ourselves? So you see, turning the point of view around to the other opens the heart to love and compassion strong enought to enable us to ask to participate in the passion of the Lord. It enables us to endure anything He might ask simply to obtain the love and grace other people need, and in the process, fulfill our time on the cross with Him to save someone else, even someone who may not deserve what they will receive, and even if they are unware they received anything at all.

We do what love demnds without thought of reward or merit, but merely for love. Measure all things by love, and you will see the cross in a whole new light.

Thursday

 There is some excitement in the air; it has been 80 or higher for most of this week, and now some clouds are gathering, and the temperature is dropping along with the barometer. At night, the temperatures did not drop very much from the daytime high of 92, yesterday. The temperature in my apartment is 83, and the temperature indicated on the computer is 79. Needless to say, some cooling is necessary. A tropical storm in Baja California (Mexico), is making its way north to northern California and Oregon, and a cold front is coming from the northwest, so it is a matter of time before it cools, and there may be thunderstorms. We do not get many of them in Seattle, but that is not to say we never get them. One year, around the Columbus Day festival, the Pacific Northwest got a hurricane force wind storm that is still remembered by those who experienced it.

In spite of the fact I have no telescope, there has been a metershower, and there is a rare annular eclipse soon. That would be exciting, but we usually cannot see a single star around the Seattle area; you have to go east of the Cascade mountiann into eastern Washington or Oregon for star-gazing. Nevertheless, I still get excited about star gazing because I used to have an 8 inch Celestron Schmidt-Cassegrain telescope. I got to see some awesome sights with that telescope.

I continue to say my Rosary every day in the evening. Sometimes He interrupts to lift me up in the midst of my prayers. It has been needed, and it was a wonderful surprise coming so intensely and unexpectedly.

As the weather has been so warm lately, sleep has been curtailed, and not enough, but I manage.

Best wishes to everyone, and God's abundant blessings on you all. Continue praying for peace and ahealing of our climate so the catastrophic weather events calm down.

mm

Thursday

 There is some excitement in the air; it has been 80 or higher for most of this week, and now some clouds are gathering, and the temperature is dropping along with the barometer. At night, the temperatures did not drop very much from the daytime high of 92, yesterday. The temperature in my apartment is 83, and the temperature indicated on the computer is 79. Needless to say, some cooling is necessary. A tropical storm in Baja California (Mexico), is making its way north to northern California and Oregon, and a cold front is coming from the northwest, so it is a matter of time before it cools, and there may be thunderstorms. We do not get many of them in Seattle, but that is not to say we never get them. One year, around the Columbus Day festival, the Pacific Northwest got a hurricane force wind storm that is still remembered by those who experienced it.

In spite of the fact I have no telescope, there has been a metershower, and there is a rare annular eclipse soon. That would be exciting, but we usually cannot see a single star around the Seattle area; you have to go east of the Cascade mountiann into eastern Washington or Oregon for star-gazing. Nevertheless, I still get excited about star gazing because I used to have an 8 inch Celestron Schmidt-Cassegrain telescope. I got to see some awesome sights with that telescope.

I continue to say my Rosary every day in the evening. Sometimes He interrupts to lift me up in the midst of my prayers. It has been needed, and it was a wonderful surprise coming so intensely and unexpectedly.

As the weather has been so warm lately, sleep has been curtailed, and not enough, but I manage.

Best wishes to everyone, and God's abundant blessings on you all. Continue praying for peace and ahealing of our climate so the catastrophic weather events calm down.

mm