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If you believe what you like in the gospel, and reject what you don’t like, it is not the gospel you believe, but yourself. ... St. Augustine of Hippo (354-430), Reply to Faustus the Manichaean
(How does this statement challenge you?)
Monthly forum on Christianity and spiriituality
Meets online the first Thursday of every month (beginning July 6) from 7:30 - 8:30 p.m. for prayer, teaching and discussion. Sign up for Zoom link and topic notifications. Suggested topics welcomed. No registration fee.
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Gn 13:2, 5-18; Ps 15:2-3a, 3bc-4ab, 5 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."
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Reflection on the Scriptures
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The Lord Jesus gives us freedom to choose which way we will go. Ask him for the wisdom to know which way will lead to life rather than to harm and destruction. See, I have set before you this day life and good, death and evil... Therefore choose life that you and your descendants may live (Deuteronomy 3:15-20). Choose this day whom you will serve (Joshua 24:15). Behold I set before
you the way of life and the way of death (Jeremiah 21:8). If we allow God's love and wisdom to rule our hearts, then we can trust in his guidance and help to follow his path of love, truth, and holiness. Let me love you, my Lord and my God, and see myself as I really am - a pilgrim in this world, a Christian called to respect and love all whose lives I touch, those in authority over me or those
under my authority, my friends and my enemies. Help me to conquer anger with gentleness, greed by generosity, apathy by fervor. Help me to forget myself and reach out towards others. (Prayer attributed to Clement XI of Rome)
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The Ascent of Mount Carmel, by St. John of the Cross E. Allison Peers Translation. Paperback, Kindle, Audio Book. Click here to purchase on Amazon.com BOOK THE THIRD Which treats of the
purgation of the active night of the memory and will. Gives instruction how the soul is to behave with respect to the apprehensions of these two faculties, that it may come to union with God, according to the two faculties aforementioned, in perfect hope and charity.
Chapter 2 Which treats of the natural apprehensions of the memory and describes how the soul must be voided of them in
order to be able to attain to union with God according to this faculty. 15. And if those questions and objections which arose above with respect to the understanding should also arise here (the objections, that is to say, that the soul is doing nothing, is wasting its time and is depriving itself of spiritual blessings which it might well receive through the memory), the answer to this has already been
given, and will be given again farther on, in our treatment of the passive night; wherefore there is no need for us to dwell upon it here. It is needful only to observe that, although at certain times the benefit of this suspension of forms and of all knowledge may not be realized, the spiritual man must not for that reason grow weary, for in His own time God will not fail to succour him. To attain so great a blessing it behoves the soul to endure much and to suffer with patience and
hope.
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