Jesus doesn't want to impose himself upon us, but always leaves us to request his company. He wants us to act freely. And it is easy for us to act as though we have not heard him or recognized him, so that we are spared the trouble of asking him in. . . No one is more docile than Christ. No one is so readily available to heed
our wishes. He is faithful always.
- Louis Evely, Joy
(If you haven't done so lately, ask for the company of Jesus, and his guidance for your life.)
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2 Kgs 19:9b-11, 14-21, 31-35a, 36; Psalm 48:2-4, 10-11
Mt 7:6, 12-14
Jesus said to his disciples:
“Do not give what is holy to dogs, or throw your pearls before swine,
lest they trample them underfoot, and turn and tear you to pieces.
“Do to others whatever you would have them do to you.
This is the Law and the Prophets.
“Enter through the narrow gate;
for the gate is wide and the road broad that leads to destruction,
and those who enter through it are many.
How narrow the gate and constricted the road that leads to life.
And those who find it are few.”
Reflection on the Scriptures
At the center of the spirituality of Jesus is a self, centered in our being created in Christ, to continue God’s creation within us and through us to all of God’s Family. It is a life of being constantly created in my soul, my spirit, my heart and my relationships. . . The Spiritual Life is actually a lively life flowing into us and then
out all as the creative Love of the Creatively Infinite Mystery we call God.
The Spiritual Life is not, no! never totally about “me” and my self-improvement. Forget self-improvement. That is the wide road which wanders from side to side getting us nowhere except self-preoccupied spiritual-inferiority.
All prayer, devotion, sacraments included, are gifts designed exclusively as experiences of our being prepared to be a creational presence and gift from God to God’s family. Amazing! A “narrow way,” yes, because it is so counter-cultural, so opposed to self- perfection as a spiritual ideal. After we pray, after receiving any of the sacraments, we leave to live; we receive to donate; we say “yes” so as to say “here.”
The more I say “yes” to the creation I am, the less I am mine and more your’s.
- by Larry Gillick, S.J.
The Existence of God
by Francois Fenelon
SECTION XVII. Of the Sun
In fine, I would fain know how it comes to pass that the globe of the earth, which is so very hard, turns so regularly about that planet in a space where no solid body keeps it fast to regulate its course. Let men with the help of physics contrive the most ingenious reasons to explain this phenomenon; all their arguments, supposing them to be true,
will become proofs of the Deity. The more the great spring that directs the machine of the universe is exact, simple, constant, certain, and productive of abundance of useful effects, the more it is plain that a most potent and most artful hand knew how to pitch upon the spring which is the most perfect of all.
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