Daily Thought

The Gentle Way To live in a gentle way, it is important to respect ourselves, never growing irritated with ourselves or our imperfections. Although it is but reasonable that we should be displeased and grieved at our own faults, we need to guard against being bitter, angry, or fretful about them. Many people fall into the error of being angry because they have been angry, or impatient because they have given way to impatience; this keeps them in a chronic state of irritation, strengthens the impressions made, and prepares one for a fresh fall on the first occasion. Moreover, all this anger and irritation against one’s self fosters pride, springing as it does from self-love, which is disturbed and upset by its own imperfection. What we need is a quiet, steady, firm displeasure at our own faults. A judge who speaks deliberately and calmly when he gives sentence will punish vice more effectively than speaking in an impetuous and passionate way, for in that case he would be punishing...

Great Thoughts On The Call To Holiness To be holy does not require being a bishop, a priest or a religious. We are frequently tempted to think that holiness is only for those who can withdraw from ordinary affairs to spend much time in prayer. That is not the case. We are all called to be holy by living our lives with love and by bearing witness in everything we do, wherever we find ourselves. Are you called to the consecrated life? Be holy by living out your commitment with joy. Are you married? Be holy by loving and caring for your husband or wife, as Christ does for the Church. Do you work for a living? Be holy by labouring with integrity and skill in the service of your brothers and sisters. Are you a parent or grandparent? Be holy by patiently teaching the little ones how to follow Jesus. Are you in a position of authority? Be holy by working for the common good and renouncing personal gain.[14] 15. Let the grace of your baptism bear fruit in a path of holiness. Let everythi...

Walking with Jesus Lectio John 14:1–6 Meditatio “… so that where I am you also may be.” This passage marks a transition in John’s Gospel. Jesus knows he will no longer be physically accessible to his disciples. But Jesus reveals that they will still have access to him, only in a different way. Through the Holy Spirit, Jesus will be present in his followers, and that presence will be nourished by the Holy Eucharist. The disciples don’t completely understand this. They want to be where Jesus is. Jesus tells them that he will return and take them where he is. And Thomas, speaking for so many of us, says exactly the opposite of what Jesus just said—“but we don’t know where you’re going, so we don’t know the way.” Jesus responds to Thomas in a way completely different from the way the question was posed: no address, no directions. His response is himself. The place that Jesus wants to take us to  is  the Father. He is preparing us for direct contact wit...

Helping People Get Closer To The Lord A Clear Sign We Are Responding To God's Love       Our love of God is merely a response to His love. He loved us first.  Ours is the love God places in our souls so that we too are able to love. That is why we ask him, Lord, give me the love with which you want me to love you.      We correspond with the love of God when we love others; when we see in them the dignity proper to the human person, made as it has been in the image and likeness of God, created with an immortal soul and called to give glory to God for all eternity. Love is to approach that wounded man we come across on our journey each day; it is to bind up his wounds, restore him to health and take care of him in all things. We must exert ourselves on his behalf, making a serious effort in order to bring him to God. Separation from God is always the greatest of evils, and those thus separated from him are in need of our help and ou...

Proposing The Faith (Daily Meditation from The Magnificat) Doesn’t proposing the Faith mean proclaiming the Father’s love in the world? Doesn’t the Gospel require, from one end to another, that it be proclaimed in the world and against the “world”? Doesn’t the Gospel present the Faith as a choice to be made in the world, between the “world” and the Kingdom of heaven, a choice bought for us by Christ, and for which he gives us the strength?… And, lastly, in order for the Faith truly to become this choice, doesn’t it need to be connected with the “Be converted!”? Isn’t Faith for us a “turning back” and a “reversal”? Can the apostolate be anything other than a living contradiction between that in us which God has made his own and the things before our eyes that remain foreign to us? Is the Kingdom of heaven not suffering violence everywhere we look? Doesn’t this violence pervade and penetrate the world from one end to the other, through all its parts, wherever God’s Dominion runs up...

Stay Close To The Lord             My Jesus, true center of my life, let my attention be so fixed on You that I may be aware of You in everything I do. I will never separate myself from You by undue anxiety or overeagerness for success. In the good works which I perform, I want You to take charge. I desire to surrender myself entirely to You in all my occupations. No longer shall my will lead me on, but Yours. I shall always strive to make my best efforts. The results are yours to decide. My greatest joy from now on will be to work for love of You. Amen.     from  My Daily Bread  p.381

Pope Francis On The Holy Spirit Dear brothers and sisters, we need to let ourselves be imbued with the light of the Holy Spirit, so that He introduces us into the Truth of God, who is the only Lord of our lives. In this Year of Faith let us ask ourselves if we have actually taken a few steps to get to know Christ and the truths of faith more, by reading and meditating on the Scriptures, studying the Catechism, steadily approaching the Sacraments. But at the same time let us ask ourselves what steps we are taking so that the faith directs our whole existence. Do not be a ‘part-time” Christian, at certain moments, in certain circumstances, in certain choices, be Christian at all times! The truth of Christ, that the Holy Spirit teaches us and gives us, always and forever involves our daily lives. Let us invoke him more often, to guide us on the path of Christ's disciples. Pope Francis−Wednesday Audience May 15, 2013

What Does Love Like? What does love look like? It has the hands to help others. It has the feet to hasten to the poor and needy. It has eyes to see misery and want. It has the ears to hear the sighs and sorrows of men and women. That is what love looks like. St. Augustine  

The Bread that Keeps Us from Getting Lost Now, this surely is a very true interpretation of the purpose of Holy Communion. It is to give me the courage to persevere. Too often probably to me…has come the same swift change from presumption to despair. Perhaps I had thought that I had finally quelled some temptation or sin that had long bothered me. A chance sermon or a passage in a book, or the remark of a friend, and at once the old world has come back to me. Or it may be that it was some trifling but frequent failure that for long distressed me, and then was for a time overcome and driven from power. Always, however, the result was that, however successful for the moment, I found myself ultimately returning whither I had first begun. All the exceptional efforts and fierce resolutions and elaborate addition of prayers, all the feeling of having done great things, ended at best in a respite, which, after all the stress, appeared a complete victory. I thought to myself that the batt...

Conversion—The Ultimate Reality Check I often think that the ideal of our perfection that we set up, and often go through torture to achieve, may not be God's idea of how He wants us to be at all. That may be something quite different that we never would have thought of, and what seems like a failure to us may really be something bringing us closer to His will for us. Caryll Houselander

Happy Birthday Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI! Make sure that every person, of whatever background, can find in you a welcoming heart. Pope Benedict XVI 

Welcome Home! Christ asks for a home in your soul, where he can be at rest with you, where he can talk easily to you, where you and he, alone together, can laugh and be silent and be delighted with one another. Caryll Houselander

A Born Again Experience I used to regard it as extremely difficult and demanding to do what God's mercy was suggesting to me. I myself was held in bonds by the innumerable errors of my previous life, from which I did not believe I could possibly be delivered, so I was disposed to acquiesce in my clinging vices and to indulge my sins .... But after that, by the help of the water of new birth, the stain of my former life was washed away, and a light from above, serene and pure, was infused into my reconciled heart ... a second birth restored me to a new man. Then, in a wondrous manner every doubt began to fade.... I clearly understood that what had first lived within me, enslaved by the vices of the flesh, was earthly and that what, instead, the Holy Spirit had wrought within me was divine and heavenly. (Ad Donatum 3-4)     St. Cyprian

Why Humility Is Important       Humility, which gives preference to others, is not very popular today principally because men have forgotten the Greatness of God. By expanding our puny little self to the Infinite, we have made the true Infinity of God seem trivial. The less knowledge we have of anything, the less significant it seems. Our hatred of a person often decreases as we learn to know him better. A boy graduating from high school is generally not as humble as when he graduates from medical school. At eighteen he thought he knew it all; at twenty-eight he feels himself ignorant in the face of the medical science he has yet to acquire. So it is with God. Because we do not pray or contemplate or love Him, we become vain and proud; but when we know Him better, we feel a deep sense of dependence which tempers our false independence. Pride is the child of ignorance, humility the offspring of knowledge.  Proud people think themselves to be ...

Living In The Light Lectio John 3:16–21 Meditatio “God so loved the world that he gave his only-begotten Son …” A true gift is given out of love with no strings attached. The receiver may either accept it with joy, hugging or kissing the giver, or disregard its value and reject it, perhaps ignoring the giver. Jesus compares himself to a gift given to humanity by his Father, who gives us his only-begotten Son so that we may have eternal life through him. The Father offers us his unconditional love. As a loving Father, he only wants the best for us, and he offers this great gift to all. Will we accept this offer and open our hearts to his love? Or will we refuse to accept him and turn away from his love? Will we live in the light or walk in darkness? Jesus is the light of the world. It is easier and safer to travel during the day than at night, because street signs and landmarks are visible. But at night, even where there are streetlights, it’s easier to make a wrong turn or...

No One Is Beyond God's Mercy In today’s Gospel reading, Jesus used a parable about two men who were in debt to illustrate how a sin­ful woman could end up being more honored in the kingdom of God than a devoted, educated Pharisee. In essence, Jesus told his dinner host, a Pharisee named Simon, that this woman’s act of love, gratitude, and devotion far surpassed his mea­ger attempts at hospitality. So let’s look at her example to see what we can learn about the kind of devotion that both pleases the Lord and lifts us up to his presence. First, we can say that prayer is for sinners. According to Simon, this woman was a hopelessly incurable sinner unworthy of God’s forgive­ness. But she shows that those who see their sin and their need are the ones most likely to turn to the Lord for healing and forgiveness. They are also more likely to shower him with praise and worship in response to his mercy. In contrast, people like Simon, those who underestimate their need for mercy, als...

The Annunciation & Christian Sacrifice Christian sacrifice does not consist in a giving of what God would not have without us but in our becoming totally receptive and letting ourselves be completely taken over by him. Letting God act on us—that is Christian sacrifice. Ratzinger, J. (2004). Introduction to Christianity (Revised Edition). (J. R. Foster, Trans.) (p. 283). San Francisco: Ignatius Press.

Divine Mercy — Something Worth Talking About! “My child, you are My delight, you are the comfort of My Heart. I grant you as many graces as you can hold. As often as you want to make Me happy, speak to the world about My great and unfathomable mercy.” St. Faustina — Diary #164

The Resurrection Challenges Us To Break Out! He is not here... he is risen! This is the message that sustains our hope and turns it into concrete gestures of charity. How greatly we need to let our frailty be anointed by this experience! How greatly we need to let our faith be revived! How greatly we need our myopic horizons to be challenged and renewed by this message! Christ is risen, and with him, he makes our hope and creativity rise so that we can face our present problems in the knowledge that we are not alone. To celebrate Easter is to believe once more that God constantly breaks into our personal histories, challenging our “conventions”, those fixed ways of thinking and acting that end up paralyzing us. To celebrate Easter is to allow Jesus to triumph over the craven fear that so often assails us and tries to bury every kind of hope. The stone before the tomb shared in this, the women of the Gospel shared in this, and now the invitation is addressed once more to you and...

Love Increases The More It Is Given This is part of the mystery of the Risen Jesus, of the humility of God: he asks men and women for their contribution. He needs their assent. The Lord asks us to set out for him. He asks us to become fishers for him. He asks us to trust him and to act according to the guidance of his Word. He expects us to take this Word of his as more important than our own experiences and perceptions. He asks us to act and to live on the basis of his Word. But then something remarkable happens. When the disciples return Jesus does not need their fish. He has already prepared breakfast, and now invites the disciples to eat it; he is the host who provides them with food. The gift is mysterious but nevertheless not hard to decipher. The bread is he himself: I am the bread of life. He is the grain of wheat that dies and now bears fruit a hundredfold and is abundant for everyone until the end of time. His cross on which he gave himself is the miraculous multiplicat...

God's Amazing Love Jesus loved me and gave himself up for me. This is the great truth that consoles us. Jesus shows his love by giving his life. He loves each of us as if each one were the sole object of his affections. We should meditate often on this truth: God loves me. This surpasses the most improbable expectations of the human heart. No one — without divine Revelation — would dare to guess at or acknowledge this sublime vocation to which each and every person is called: to be God's son or daughter, called to live a close relationship as a friend, to participate in the very Life of the three divine Persons. Considered with earthbound eyes, it seems a dream, or scarcely credible, but it is the truth, the great truth that should move us to  correspond.  Jesus never stops loving us, helping us, protecting us,  talking to us, not even in our moments of sheer ingratitude, or after we have committed the greatest disloyalty. Perhaps it was during such sad circumsta...

Easter Joy! Easter is the greatest feast of our faith.  We are an Easter people, a people marked by joyfulness.  Jesus is raised.  He has conquered sin and death.  His victory is our victory.  His death means our redemption.  His resurrection means our salvation.  How could a person not be filled with joy over such wonderful news? Every genuine Christian cannot help but be transformed by the Easter event.  All is changed:  darkness to light, doubt to faith, selfishness to generosity, despair to hope, sin to grace, and death to eternal life. Easter should have profound ramifications on our outlook and attitude, our disposition and demeanor.  How can a person be both a Christian and frowning, grumpy, pessimistic, sour, disagreeable, or negative?  They cannot!  These features are like oil and water.  They simply do not mix.  Easter Christians are just the opposite:  smiling, cheerful, optimistic, upbeat, hap...

We Are An Easter People Do not abandon yourselves to despair. We are the Easter people and hallelujah is our song. St. John Paul II

Easter Is All About Rekindling Enthusiasm! Lectio Matthew 28:8–15 Meditatio “Say, ‘his disciples came by night and stole him.’ ” The religious authorities didn’t know what to make of Jesus’ disappearance, and wanted to squelch any rumors at the outset. So they came up with a tale about theft. People would buy it, they thought. And people did buy it. The story was still circulating when Matthew’s Gospel reached its final edit, several decades later. A deep gulf had been dredged between people who passionately believed in the resurrection of Jesus and others who emphatically did not. Our world today is both similar to that world and different from it. The gulf is present, but seldom mentioned. There is little evidence of passionate belief. Why does the somber season of Lent come so naturally, while the joyous season of Easter seems so challenging? By way of an answer, how often do we think of Easter, once the feast itself has passed? In some cultures, peopl...