“The poor are our children, born out of our love for God and His love for us. Let us love them as the Lord love us.” — Deacon Bob
Archive for the ‘Prayer and Meditation’ Category
Quote for the Day
Sunday, July 11th, 2010Quote for the Day
Thursday, July 8th, 2010“O Lord Jesus Christ, I entreat you to give me two graces before I die: first, that in my lifetime I may feel in body and soul as far as possible the pain you endured, dear Lord, in the hour of your most bitter suffering… and second, that I may feel in my heart as far as possible that excess of love by which you, O Son of God, were inflamed to undertake so cruel a suffering for us sinners.” — St. Francis of Assisi
Quote for the Day
Wednesday, July 7th, 2010“You must not grow weary of praying but soar aloft in ardent prayer till you enter the wonderful dwelling place, the house of God.” — St. Bonaventure, OFM
Quote for the Day
Thursday, June 24th, 2010“To think of Jesus is like a breath of new life. His kindness fills one to the brim. His sweetness is in overflowing measure.” — St. Clare of Assisi
Quote for the Day
Wednesday, June 23rd, 2010“I speak to God in a familiar way, like a son to his father. I speak in prayers and aspirations. I make known to him with childlike confidence everything that weighs on my soul.” — St. Conrad of Parzham, OFM Cap.
Quote for the Day
Saturday, May 29th, 2010“We are the objects of undying love on the part of God….. He is our father; even more he is our mother. He does not want to hurt us…” — Pope John Paul I, 1978
Quote for the Day
Thursday, May 20th, 2010“If we want to profit by our reading about God and His saints we must read with reverence. We must appreciate.” — Ven. Solanus Casey, OFM Cap.
Persevere in Prayer!
Thursday, April 29th, 2010I was listening to the radio recently and a guy whose name I did not quickly enough scribble down on paper, made a quoteable quote – something my Dad might say or some other wise plainly spoken person.
Whenever you begin to question whether your prayer is worth the time and effort, whenever nothing seems to be gained from it, remember: “If you sit on the railroad tracks long enough, eventually you will get hit.”
Perhaps the language different from what you would read in a spiritual classic, but it makes the point: Persevere in prayer!
Quote for the Day
Wednesday, April 21st, 2010“Prayer is the cup for drinking the grace of the Holy Spirit from the abundant fountain of delight, the Blessed Trinity.” — St. Bonaventure, OFM
Holy Saturday Meditation – The Great Silence
Saturday, April 3rd, 2010I was so busy on Good Friday between work at the office and services at both parishes, that I didn’t have time to post. There is nothing I could add to our experience of Good Friday beyond what is so beautifully given to us by the Church in its liturgy. Holding that huge, rough-sawn pine cross on my shoulder for all to venerate was a humbling experience for me, especially witnessing the devotion of those who came forward to reverence it.
Today is Holy Saturday. We are tempted to skip over it and think immediately to tonight and the Easter Vigil. But Holy Saturday has a special significance for us all that warrants our consideration. The Office of Readings today gives us a splendid meditation on the meaning of this day. I present it here in part, having translated it from the Italian copy I use.
From an ancient “Homily for Holy Saturday”. (PG 43, 439. 451. 462-463)
What has happened? Today over the earth there is a great silence, great silence and solitude. Great silence because the King sleeps: the earth is swallowed up with silence because the God-made-flesh slept and has awakened those that have slept for centuries. God is dead in the flesh and has descended to shake the kingdom of the dead.
He went to search out our first father, like the lost sheep. He wanted to descend to visit those who sat in the darkness and the shadow of death. God and his Son went to free Adam and Eve from the suffering that they found in prison.
The Lord entered near to them carrying the arms of victory in the cross. As soon as Adam, the father of all, saw him, beating his heart because of the wonder, he shouted out and said: “May the Lord be with all of us!” And Christ responding, said: “And with your spirit.” And he grasped his hand, shook him, saying: “Awaken, you who sleep, and rise from the dead, and Christ will illuminate you.”
I am your God, who has become your son; who for you and for these others who have their beginning from you and are now imprisoned, I now in my power order: “Leave!” To those that were in the darkness: “Be in the light!” To those that have died: “Rise!” I command you: “Awaken, you who sleep! I have not created you to remain in the prison of the hell. Rise from the dead. I am the life of those who have died. Rise, work of my hands! Rise, you who are created in my image! Rise, leave here! You in me and I in you are in fact of one indivisible nature.”…..
“Rise, go away from here. The enemy made you leave the garden of paradise. I however will not put you back in that garden, but I will put you on the heavenly throne. You were prohibited from touching the symbolic tree of life, but I am the life, I give you what I am. I have put the cherubim in place as your servants to keep you. Now, yes, the cherubim now adore you as if you were a god even though you are not God.
The heavenly throne is ready,… the room is prepared, the table is set, the eternal home is decorated, the gates are open. In other words, the reign of heaven is prepared for you from all eternity.”
Quote for the Day
Thursday, April 1st, 2010“God’s passionate love for his people – for humanity – is at the same time a forgiving love. It is so great that it turns God against himself, his love against his justice.” — Benedict XVI, Deus Caritas Est
A Prayer from Papa Luciani
Tuesday, March 23rd, 2010Here is a simple prayer, attributed to Papa Luciani, that we all could include in our night prayer.
I am asking you a grace, my Lord. I would like you to be nearby me when I close my eyes on the earth. I would llke you to hold my hand in yours, as a mother with her child in the hour of danger. Thank you, my Lord.
Papa Luciani, pray for us!
Quote for the Day
Tuesday, March 23rd, 2010“I gratefully accept both joy and tribulation from our heavenly Father for He knows best what is good for us.” — St. Conrad of Parzham, OFM Cap.
Faithfulness in Prayer
Thursday, March 11th, 2010The minor Office of None today has a reading from the Letter to the Hebrews (Heb. 10: 35-36) that one needs to reflect on once in a while when prayer turns dry and distracted.
“Do not abandon your faithfulness, for which is reserved a great reward. You have only to be constant in fidelity so that after having done the will of God you might obtain his promises.”
The Lord only asks us to be faithful to the tasks he assigns us. He alone will bring forth the fruit of our fidelity. Blessed Mother Teresa was fond of saying the God doesn’t ask for great successes, only faithfulness.
The Liturgy of the Hours is a great way of expressing our faithfulness in prayer, even if we are lacking in fervor or concentration on any particular day.
Early Morning Diaconal Thoughts
Thursday, March 11th, 2010I am up extra early this morning. I will be leaving for the office in about 15 minutes, having been up since 4 AM.
I strikes me that Lent is about half over now. I wonder if the world has made many changes since its beginning a few weeks ago. Lent is a time of sowing seeds and fertilization of the soil. We have to wait for the sudden eruption of growth that will undoubtedly occur. For us, time is such a linear thing, one day leading to the next and a lifetime being about 75 years, that we tend to think God is slouching, delaying and is chronically late. The truth of the matter is time is ever present in God’s sight and present for all time. The seeds of change sown during Lent will come to fruition and a great harvest will be gathered. We may not be living our earthly lives at that time, but we will see the fruit in the life to come.
The ordination prayer for deacons begins, “Draw near, we pray, Almighty God, giver of every grace, who apportion every order and assign every office; who remain unchanged, but make all things new.” God makes all things new even in his immutability, his perfection, his stability. Newness in the midst of the eternal “now,” the eternal constancy characteristic of God. It is God who gives us our calling, our office, as deacons and who calls us into the workings of his trinitarian life through the outpouring of the Holy Spirit who binds us to his Son, Jesus in his oneness with the Father. Through our ordination, we are given an authority which comes from the Father, the authority of compassion, forming us into the Icon of Jesus the Servant. Our union with Jesus in this way is truly an outpouring of the Holy Spirit into the world, an outpouring which has lasting effects.
May God bless each of you today in a special way.
Hope and the Transfiguration
Friday, February 26th, 2010Here is a suggestion for your meditation tonight and tomorrow in preparation for Sunday’s celebration of the Eucharist.
Contemplate on “The Transfiguration and Hope”.
I will elaborate in next Monday’s post, after I have preached on it at the weekend’s Masses.
Quote for the Day
Monday, February 22nd, 2010“Clearly, what God wants above all is our will which we received as a free gift from God in creation and possess as though our own.” — St. Joseph of Cupertino, OFM Conv.
Quote for the Day
Thursday, February 4th, 2010“From God’s perspective, one hidden act of repentance, one little gesture of selfless love, one moment of true forgiveness is all that is needed to bring God from his throne to run to his returning son and to fill the heavens wit sounds of divine joy.” — Henri J. M. Nouwen, The Return of the Prodigal Son, pg 116
Quote for the Day
Monday, February 1st, 2010“Lord, take me as I am, with all my defects, my sins, and make me become what you wish.” — Pope John Paul I
Claiming God’s Love and our Original Goodness
Friday, January 29th, 2010Fr. Henri J.M. Nouwen wrote the following in his book, The Return of the Prodigal Son.
“I do not think I am alone in this struggle to claim God’s first love and my original goodness. Beneath much human assertiveness, competitiveness, and rivalry; beneath much self-confidence and even arrogance, there is often a very insecure heart, much less sure of itself than outward behavior would lead one to believe. I have often been shocked to discover that men and women with obvious talents and with many rewards for their accomplishments have so many doubts about their own goodness. Instead of experiencing their outward successes as a sign of their inner beauty, they live them as a cover-up for their sense of personal worthlessness. Not a few have said to me: ‘If people only knew what goes on in my innermost self, they would stop their applause and praise.” — Henri J. M. Nouwen, The Return of the Prodigal Son, pg. 108.
The more often I preach on Sundays, the more often I find myself in preparation thinking about humanity’s “Original Dignity”, or if you will as Nouwen says, “Original Goodness”. It is so counter-cultural actually. To reclaim our original goodness, our relationship with God as sons and daughters, we must allow God to find us. We must not hide as Adam and Eve did after their sin. God comes looking for us. We need only show ourselves. We don’t have to be all that assertive, and certainly not filled with a competitve spirit that our contemporary culture seems to force on us.
We are loved by God as we are.