“We mostly spend [our] lives conjugating three verbs: to Want, to Have, and to Do... forgetting that none of these verbs have any ultimate
significance, except so far as they are transcended by and included in, the fundamental verb, to Be.
- Evelyn Underhill (Take time in prayer simply resting in the awareness that God is God for you this moment.)
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1 Pt 2:2-5, 9-12; PS 100:2, 3, 4, 5
Mk 10:46-52
As Jesus was leaving Jericho with his disciples and a sizable crowd,
Bartimaeus, a blind man, the son of Timaeus,
sat by the roadside begging.
On hearing that it was Jesus of Nazareth,
he began to cry out and say,
“Jesus, son of David, have pity on me.”
And many rebuked him, telling him to be silent.
But he kept calling out all the more, “Son of David, have pity on me.”
Jesus stopped and said, “Call him.”
So they called the blind man, saying to him,
“Take courage; get up, Jesus is calling you.”
He threw aside his cloak, sprang up, and came to Jesus.
Jesus said to him in reply, “What do you want me
to do for you?”
The blind man replied to him, “Master, I want to see.”
Jesus told him, “Go your way; your faith has saved you.”
Immediately he received his sight
and followed him
on the way.
Reflection on the Scriptures
In today’s first reading Peter tells us, now that we “have tasted that the Lord is good,” to long for pure spiritual milk, like newborn infants. Just as my baby
granddaughter looks lovingly, longingly, into my eyes as I feed her the bottle filled with the pure milk she so desperately desires, I need to lovingly gaze upon Jesus in the many ways he is available to me: in the Eucharist, in his Word, in the people around me, in people in need, in nature, in community with other Christians. Peter says that doing so will help build a follower of Christ into a spiritual house for the Lord.
I need to trust Jesus the way my grandbaby trusts me, and I need to be aware that Jesus’ love surrounds me and sustains me the way my granddaughter realizes her vulnerability and dependence.
Bartimaeus exhibits that same focus, that same trust, in today’s Gospel. Realizing and articulating our own
needs, may we jump up and go to the Lord whenever we hear his voice.
by Cindy Murphy McMahon
Psychic Energy and Contemplation by James
Arraj From St. John of the Cross and Dr. C. J. Jung, Part III, Chapter 7. Inner Growth Books, 1986. Temptations and Contemplation Finally, if the person is being called by God to a high degree of spirituality, he or she can
be subjected to the most extreme temptations of all, a kind of final outburst of sensuality. "For to some the angel of Satan presents himself namely, the spirit of fornication - that he may buffet their senses with abominable and violent temptations, and trouble their spirits with vile considerations and representations which are most visible to the imagination, which things at times are a greater affliction
to them than death."(24) The form of this first temptation parallels St. John's discussion of the sin of spiritual lust. Acute purity of spiritual intent is matched by gross sensuality. "At other times in
this night there is added to these things the spirit of blasphemy, which roams abroad, setting in the path of all the conceptions and thoughts of the soul intolerable blasphemies. These it sometimes suggests to the imagination with such violence that the soul almost utters them, which is a grave torment to it."(25) Here, again, the structure of this
phenomenon is similar to the first temptation; the dwelling of consciousness on the infinite purity and goodness of God again has the impact of calling into being a counter-movement which attempts to balance it.
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