Keep alive within you and bring under wise control that courage which makes you long to undertake great works, which others might consider it folly to attempt.
- Sr. Elizabeth Euphrasia Pelletier, Embrace the
World (What kind of "great works" are you drawn to pursue these days?) _____ Christianity and Spirituality monthly forum Thursday, October 5, 2023: 7:30 - 8:30 CDT The Lord's Prayer and the Temple of Our Soul, by Jerry Truex, Ph.D. Sign up for Zoom
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Neh 8:1-4a, 5-6, 7b-12; Ps 19:8, 9, 10, 11 -Lk 10:1-12 Jesus appointed seventy-two other disciples
whom he sent ahead of him in pairs
to every town and place he intended
to visit.
He said to them,
"The harvest is abundant but the laborers are few;
so ask the master of the harvest
to send out laborers for his harvest.
Go on your way;
behold, I am sending you like lambs among wolves.
Carry no money bag, no sack, no sandals;
and greet no one along the way.
Into whatever house you enter, first say,
'Peace to this household.'
If a peaceful person lives there,
your peace will rest on him;
but if not, it will
return to you.
Stay in the same house and eat and drink what is offered to you,
for the laborer deserves his payment.
Do not move about from one house to another.
Whatever town you
enter and they welcome you,
eat what is set before you,
cure the sick in it and say to them,
'The Kingdom of God is at hand for you.'
Whatever town you enter and they do not
receive you,
go out into the streets and say,
'The dust of your town that clings to our feet,
even that we shake off against you.'
Yet know this: the Kingdom of God is at
hand.
I tell you,
it will be more tolerable for Sodom on that day than for that town."
Reflection on the Scriptures
Peace is the theme of the gospel as Luke relates the story of Jesus sending out the 72 to spread his word.
It won’t be easy. Not a lot of joy there as he compares them to the lambs among the wolves. We each carry the message of the gospel to the world by our actions and our example. How do I bring a message of joy and peace to those around me – my family, my colleagues, the people I meet every day? I sometimes feel like a lamb among the wolves in the choices I am struggle with and whether I live out the gospel. I pray today that I can find the joy in my relationship with God and the world and live
out that joy and peace in my life.
-by Carol Zuegner
St. John of the Cross and the Beginning of Contemplation by James Arraj From St. John of the Cross and Dr. C. J. Jung, Part II, Chapter 3. Inner Growth Books, 1986. Faith and divine union are the two key concepts that allow us to understand what St. John means by contemplation. In the Ascent, in order to illustrate the meaning of union, St. John uses the image of a pane of glass in the rays of the sun; the more the glass is purified the more it is transformed by the sunlight. It retains its own nature but becomes the sun by participation: "And God will so communicate His supernatural being to it that it will appear to be God Himself and will possess all that God Himself has."(8) This
conception of divine union is far from any pantheism, for human nature remains distinct, but it is also far removed from any simply moral union in which one might be called God-like because he obeys the law of God. Divine union in St. John's mind is a real participation in God's life through knowledge and love. If divine union is the goal, faith is the means. But St. John's conception of faith is not easy to grasp even for the person pursuing the life of prayer. "Like a blind man he must lean
on dark faith, accept it for his guide and light, and rest on nothing of what he understands, tastes, feels, or imagines."(9) The reality of faith so transcends human nature that St. John disconcertingly likens trying to explain it to attempting to describe colors to a blind man. Faith: "deprives and blinds a person of any other knowledge or science by which he may judge it. Other knowledge is acquired by the light of the intellect, but not the knowledge that faith gives. Faith nullifies the light of the intellect, and if this light is not darkened, the knowledge of faith is
lost."(10)
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