On the feast of the Sacred Heart of Jesus I am reminded of Saint Bernard’s image in Sermon 61 on the Song of Songs. There the sainted Cistercian abbot likens the pierced heart of Jesus Christ, and the wounds in his hand and feet to the clefts in a rock. “The secrets of his heart are laid open through his wounds.” (61:4)
What more can be said of our Lord, our Shepherd and our friend?
A blessed feast of the Sacred Heart of Jesus!
O God, who in martyrdom have brought true faith to its highest expression, graciously grant that, strengthened through the intercession of Saints John Fisher and Thomas More, we may confirm by the witness of our life the faith we profess with our lips.
The events of today require us to seek divine assistance. Actually the events of every day require us to seek divine assistance. Give me the grace good Lord, to set the world at
naught; to set my mind fast upon Thee and not to hang upon the blast of men’s
mouths. Gladly to be thinking of God, piteously to call for His help, to lean
unto the comfort of God, busily to labor to love Him. Gladly to bear my
purgatory here, to be joyful of tribulations, to walk the narrow way that
leadeth to life.
The Sacrament of Confession (aka Reconciliation or Penance) is a source of a new life for the Christian. It sets the soul ablaze in the love of God. It radically re-orients your life anew.
O God, who through Saint Romuald renewed the manner of life of hermits in your Church, grant that, denying ourselves and following Christ, we may merit to reach the heavenly realms of high.
“Sit in your cell as in paradise. Put the whole world behind you and forget it. Watch your thoughts like a good fisherman watching for fish. The path you must follow is in the Psalms — never leave it…. And if your mind wanders as you read, do not give up; hurry back and apply your mind to the words once more. Realize above all that you are in God’s presence, and stand there with the attitude of one who stands before the emperor…”
Saint Romuald (+1027)
The desire and capacity to linger in joy, beauty and truth is liturgically not easy to do these days with the absence of octaves following a major feasts. Eight days are not too long, not too complicated, not too esoteric to extend our prayer! And I don’t mean to merely lament the ansence of an official 8-day period of liturgical prayer. The Church has retained the octaves of Christmas and Easter but the rest are sadly gone. At least for now. I think it was a colossal mistake of the reform of the Missal by Pope Paul VI to jettison the octave, especially the octave of Pentecost.
How often do we need to slowly meditate on the Gifts and Fruits of the Holy Spirit and beg for the grace to integrate grace into our lives. We need the opportunity to understand concretely the action of the Spirit in our lives and we need to hear the beautify music, poetry and preaching connected with the Pentecost’s octave. The Pope even he wepted when he realized the change he made without thinking the whole thing through; the implications are significant; the absence of the Pentecost octave is diasasterous event for the Church. Why is it problematic? It is so because we are Church, a people of the Way, who rely on the Holy Spirit to guide each-and-every step we take in living the Gospel and seeking the face of God.
I share the opinion with many others that one of the re-reforms of the Missal that still needs to be investigated is the restauration of the Pentecost Octave. However, I would also advocate the implementation of the Assumption and Epiphany octaves. Apparently, I am not alone: the editor of America magazine Jesuit Father Drew Christiansen is saying the same thing and he’s quoting a friend, Benedictine Father Mark Daniel Kirby in his “Of Many Things” article this week.
The Lord loves parables. Today’s parable is the one about the mustard seed growing into a big tree for all the birds to make a home. A fitting typology for heaven. But it is only a metaphor but a reality: the small becomes great. As Sofia Cavalletti said, “The person who at a certain point becomes aware of the dynamic nature of the Kingdom of God, which is like a mustard seed, will gradually come to see this dynamism filling the universe and empowering man and his history” (Religious Potential of the Child, 165). Jesus, in today’s gospel, fixes our attention on the place we have in His Father’s Kingdom here on earth and with Him in heave: our growth, transformation and conversaion is slow and purpose-filled. It is a recognition of the Mystery.
We need perspective, we need a good review of what’s happening in the press regarding the state of Catholicism. At least I do. The ever-well spoken George Weigel takes on us on a brief journey….
The American mainstream media, reflecting deeper currents in American culture, typically treats “religion” as a private lifestyle choice: a personal option one may exercise to make sense out of life (and death) through certain rituals embodied in communities. That the “choice” in question has anything to do with adherence to the truth, as one is grasped and transformed by that truth; that those rituals embody religious truth in a unique way that links the believer to the very life of God; that those communities are formed by, and accountable to, truths that can be rationally explicated in a body of knowledge called “theology” — say what? To treat religion as a lifestyle choice leaves little room for the very concept of “truth,” unless it be the anorexic postmodern notion of “your truth” and “my truth” (which means that Khalid Sheikh Muhammad’s “truth” is just as much “truth” as Pope Benedict XVI’s). In the sandbox of self-absorption that is so much of postmodern culture, there is little or no room for the truth.
Perhaps we should take a hint from a recent Church Council on this matter:
“Theology relies on the written Word of God, taken together with sacred Tradition, as on a permanent foundation. By this Word it is most firmly strengthened and constantly rejuvenated, as it searches out, under the light of faith, the full truth stored up in the mystery of Christ.” (Dogmatic Constitution on Divine Revelation)
Read the whole article here.
Georeg Weigel
“Don’t Know Much about Theology …”
National Review online
June 12, 2012
In a June 13, 2012 column on the First Things website, George Weigel published a few brief reflections on his visit to Argentina and the evangelization work being done that resulted in what is being called the “Aparecida Document” (the full text is below) which is a collation of the documents from the Fifth General Assembly of Bishops of Latin America and the Caribbean (CELAM) of 2007. Weigel is naming the very long Aparecida Document as the master plan of evangelization. We ought to take note.