Daily Thought

Asking For Grace   We must consider our neighbor in relationship to God, Who wants us to love him ... and we are to be interested in him even when this is distasteful for us. The resistance of the inferior part of our soul will be overcome by the frequent performance of good acts. To this end, however, we must center our prayers and meditations of the love of our neighbor, having first implored the love of God. We must ask for the grace to love especially those we do not like very much.   St. Fancis de Sales

Fight The Good Fight        Every Christian must be thoroughly convinced that his spiritual life can in no way be viewed as the quiet unfolding of an inconsequential life without any problems; rather it must be viewed as the scene of a constant and sometimes painful battle, which will not end until death ―a struggle against evil, temptation and the sin that is in him. This combat is inevitable, but is to be understood as an extremely positive reality, because, as Saint Catherine of Siena says, “without war there is no peace”; without combat there is not victory. And this combat is, correctly viewed, the place of our purification, of our spiritual growth, where we learn to know ourselves in our weakness and to know God in His infinite mercy. This combat is the definitive place of our transfiguration and glorification.   Searching For & Maintaining Peace ― A Small Treatise On Peace Of Heart p.9 by Fr. Jacques Philippe

What Faith Is Really All About For what faith basically means is just that this shortfall we all have in our love is made up by the surplus of Jesus Christ’s love, acting on our behalf. He simply tells us that God himself has poured out among us a superabundance of his love and has thus made good in advance all our deficiency. Ultimately, faith means nothing other than admitting that we have this kind of shortfall; it means opening our hand and accepting a gift. In its simplest and innermost form, faith is nothing but reaching that point in love at which we recognize that we, too, need to be given something. Faith is thus that stage in love which really distinguishes it as love; it consists in overcoming the complacency and self-satisfaction of the person who says, “I have done everything, I don’t need any further help.” It is only in “faith” like this that selfishness, the real opposite of love, comes to an end. To that extent, faith is already present in and with true loving; it...

Our Mission Is Set       "My soul aches for the loneliness of this generation. Too many are unloved. Too many do not know the secure love of a holy family. Too many are unaware of the great love their God has for them. This must change. Dear soul of the Kingdom, you are chosen to assist Me in this mission of love. You must bring My words to others. Do you know of someone who is sad and struggling? Do you see pain or bitterness in your friends? Bring My words to them and I promise you that I will minister to their souls. I will surround them with heavenly love and tenderness. Any mistakes they have made will be forgiven. I do not seek to condemn anyone. I came to the world to save souls, to rescue them. I am returning to the world to reclaim it for souls. You are My blessed apostle. You must assist Me. You know that I love you. I will heal you and place you on the path that is marked out for you. And then you must bring Me to others. You must comfort others wi...

Salt For The Earth — Light For The World "You are the salt of the earth! You are the light of the world!"  ( Mt  5:13-14) Dear Young People of the Seventeenth World Youth Day, Chers Frères et Soeurs, 1. On a hillside near the lake of Galilee, Jesus's disciples listened to his gentle and urgent voice; as  gentle  as the landscape of Galilee itself, as  urgent  as a call to choose between life and death, between truth and falsehood. The Lord spoke words of life that would echo for ever in the hearts of his followers. Today he is speaking the same words to you, the young people of Toronto and Ontario, of the whole of Canada, of the United States, of the Caribbean, of Spanish-speaking America and Portuguese-speaking America, of Europe, Africa, Asia and Oceania. Listen to the voice of Jesus in the depths of your hearts! His words tell you  who you are as Christians . They tell you  what you must do to remain in his love . 2. But Jesus of...

Christians & Politics       Christian cooperation in building a just and peaceful society does not stop at paying taxes; it must also extend itself to the promotion of common values such as the family, the defense of life, solidarity with the poor, peace. There is also another sphere in which Christians must make a contribution to politics. It does not have to do with the content of politics so much as its methods, its style.      Christians must help to remove the poison from the climate of contentiousness in politics, bring back greater respect, composure and dignity to relationships between parties. Respect for one’s neighbor, clemency, capacity for self-criticism: These are the traits that a disciple of Christ must have in all things, even in politics.      It is undignified for a Christian to give himself over to insults, sarcasm, brawling with his adversaries. If, as Jesus says, those who call their brother “stupid” ar...

The Effects of Charity In Daily Life   THE VOICE OF CHRIST:  1. My CHILD, when true charity fills your soul, it brings many wonderful effects into your daily life. These effects are due to the fact that charity looks for Me in all things. In his desire for a more perfect union with Me, the charitable man seeks to be more like Me in his daily life.  2. Since love always seeks to express itself in some form of self-sacrifice, the charitable man seeks to offer his attention and help to his fellowmen for My sake. Following My words, "You did it to Me," he seeks to serve Me in the people who need his help.  3. The man of charity is patient in many circumstances which arouse others to anger or disgust. He refuses to become impatient because he is keenly aware of My great patience with him and with all sinners. In his love for Me he prefers to reflect My patience and meekness, rather than anger or revenge. When compelled to defend his rights, he does so without har...

How To See The World There are ten thousand ways of looking at this world, but only one right way. The man of pleasure has his way, the man of gain his, and the man of intellect his. Poor men and rich men, governors and governed, prosperous and discontented, learned and unlearned, each has his own way of looking at the things which come before him, and each has a wrong way. There is but one right way; it is the way in which God looks at the world. Aim at looking at it in God’s way. Aim at seeing things as God sees them. Aim at forming judgments about persons, events, ranks, fortunes, changes, objects, such as God forms. Aim at looking at this life as God looks at it. Aim at looking at the life to come, and the world unseen, as God does. Aim at “seeing the King in his beauty.” All things that we see are but shadows to us and delusions, unless we enter into what they really mean. It is not an easy thing to learn that new language which Christ has brought us. He has interpreted all ...

The Glorious Struggle of Prayer At the start of today’s celebration, we addressed this prayer to the Lord: “Create in us a generous and steadfast heart, so that we may always serve you with fidelity and purity of spirit” (Collect). By our own efforts, we cannot give ourselves such a heart. Only God can do this, and so in the prayer we ask him to give it to us as his “creation”. In this way, we come to the theme of prayer, which is central to this Sunday’s scriptural readings and challenges all of us who are gathered here for the canonization of new Saints. The Saints attained the goal. Thanks to prayer, they had a generous and steadfast heart. They prayed mightily; they fought and they were victorious. So pray! Like Moses, who was above all a man of God, a man of prayer. We see him today in the battle against Amalek, standing atop the hill with his arms raised. From time to time, however, his arms would grow weary and fall, and then the tide would turn against the people. So Aa...

Staying On The Path God  Has Chosen      If a fowler goes straight to a partridge’s nest, the bird will show herself to him and pretend to be weak and lame. She will rise up as if to make a great flight and then fall down all of a sudden as though unable to go any further. All this is done so that the hunter will keep after her, think he can catch her easily, and thus be distracted from finding her little ones outside the nest. When he has chased her for a while and fancies he has caught her, she takes to the air and escapes.       Thus too, when our enemy sees a man who by God’s inspiration undertakes a profession and way of life suitable to his advancement in heavenly love he persuades him to take some other path, apparently of greater perfection. Having once lured the man from his first path, little by little he makes it impossible for him to follow the second. Next he proposes a third way to the man. All this is so that by busying himse...

God’s Love Always Sustains Us        Awareness of God's undying love sustains us in our laborious and stimulating work for justice and the development of peoples, amid successes and failures, in the ceaseless pursuit of a just ordering of human affairs. God's love calls us to move beyond the limited and the ephemeral, it gives us the courage to continue seeking and working for the benefit of all, even if this cannot be achieved immediately and if what we are able to achieve, alongside political authorities and those working in the field of economics, is always less than we might wish. God gives us the strength to fight and to suffer for love of the common good, because he is our All, our greatest hope.   Pope Benedict XVI - Caritas en Veritate #78 

Helpful Words To Guide This Day In The Love of God & Love Of Neighbor Live totally for God and for the love He has poured out on you. Put up with all your defects. Being a good servant of God does not consist in living in the midst of consolations and delights, without any dislike or repugnance for the good. If that were the case, neither Saint Catherine of Siena nor others would have served the Lord worthily! To be a good servant of God means to have a great love for your neighbor; to have an inviolable resolution to follow the Divine Will; to have a deep humility and simplicity in trusting God and in being able to rise from your falls. It means having patience with yourself in your daily failings and peacefully tolerating your neighbor with all his or her imperfections.  Saint Francis de Sales (Letters 409; O. XIII, pp. 313-314)

Help Amidst Stormy Seas The disciples struggled to cross the stormy sea, straining at the oars all night long until Jesus finally came to them in the fourth watch—which would have been between three and six o’clock in the morning! That’s a long time to be fighting such violent seas. You would think that, after having seen Jesus multiply the loaves and fishes, they might have called out to him—or at least to God—for help. But instead, they kept on trying to make the crossing on their own. Then, when Jesus did appear, they were so scared that they didn’t recognize him. Even Peter, the chief apostle, wavered in his faith and sank into the raging waters! What a contrast when Jesus and the disciples landed in Gennesaret! The people recognized him and immediately sent out word so that people far and wide could come and hear him. There was excitement in the air, as many were healed by doing nothing more than touching Jesus’ cloak! Isn’t it funny that the disciples showed this lack ...

Love Is Always Within Reach        Love is within reach of the child, of the invalid who has been confined to a hospital bed for a lengthy period, of the businessman, of the doctor who hardly has a minute to spare ... because sanctity is a matter of love, and of the effort we make to reach the Master with the help of grace. We have to give a new meaning to life, together with all its joys and exhilarations, its pains and woes. Sanctity requires a fight against conformity, against lukewarmness, against an easy-going worldly attitude. It demands heroism - not in extraordinary situations that we are unlikely to encounter, but in continual fidelity to our task in the unremarkable duties of each day.    from   In Conversation with God

TAKING TIME TO ASK   He granted their request because they trusted in Him.  (1 Chronicles 5: 20)  Sometimes, amid the demands and the frustrations of everyday life, we forget to slow ourselves down long enough to talk with God. Instead of turning our thoughts and prayers to Him, we rely upon our own resources. Instead of praying for strength and courage, we seek to manufacture it within ourselves. Instead of asking God for guidance, we depend only upon our own limited wisdom. The results of such behaviors are unfortunate and, on occasion, tragic.  Are you in need? Ask God to sustain you. Are you troubled? Take your worries to Him in prayer. Are you weary? Seek God's strength. In all things great and small, seek God's wisdom and His grace. He hears your prayers, and He will answer. All you must do is ask.  l Lord, when I have questions or fears, let me turn to You. When I am weak, let me seek Your strength. When I am discouraged, Father, keep me...

                   Who Are The Saints? The saints are those who struggle right up to the end of their lives, who always get up each time they stumble, each time they fall, and courageously embark on their way once more with humility, love, and hope.                     St. Josemaría Escrivá, The Forge

Christian Optimism       Christian optimism is not a sugary optimism; nor is it mere human confidence that everything will turn out all right.      It is an optimism that sinks its roots in an awareness of our freedom, and in the sure knowledge of the power of grace. It is an optimism which leads us to make demands on ourselves, to struggle to respond at every moment to God's calls. St. Jose María Escrivá Victory #659

ST. THOMAS MORE PRAYER  Grant me, O Lord, good digestion, and also something to digest.  Grant me a healthy body, and the necessary good humor to maintain it.  Grant me a simple soul that knows to treasure all that is good and that doesn't frighten easily at the sight of evil, but rather finds the means to put things back in their place.  Give me a soul that knows not boredom, grumblings, sighs and laments,  nor excess of stress, because of that obstructing thing called "I."   Grant me, O Lord, a sense of good humor. Allow me the grace to be able to take a joke to discover in life a bit of joy, and to be able to share it with others. Amen.  - Saint Thomas More 

She Got It! Celebrating The Little Flower True Charity consists in bearing with all the defects of our neighbor, in not being surprised at his failings, and in being edified by his least virtues; Charity must not remain shut up in the depths of the heart, for no man lighteth a candle and putteth it under a bushel, but upon a candlestick, that it may shine to all that are in the house. (Cf. Matthew 5:15). It seems to me that this candle represents the Charity which ought to enlighten and make joyful, not only those who are dearest to me, but all who are in the house. St. Thérèse of Lisieux