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The Bible is not the light of the world, it is the light of the Church. But the world does not read the Bible, the world reads Christians! “You are the light of the world.”
- Charles Spurgeon (Envision your tasks for the day to come and invite the light of Christ to shine through you in these events.)
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Daily Readings
GAL 1:13-24; PS 139:1B-3, 13-14AB,
14C-15 LK 10:38-42 Jesus entered a village
where a woman whose name was Martha welcomed him.
She had a sister named Mary
who sat beside the Lord at his feet listening to him speak.
Martha, burdened with much
serving, came to him and said,
“Lord, do you not care
that my sister has left me by myself to do the serving?
Tell her to help me.”
The Lord said to her in reply,
“Martha, Martha, you are anxious and worried about many things.
There is need
of only one thing.
Mary has chosen the better part
and it will not be taken from her.”
Praying the Daily Gospels: A Guide to Meditation, by Philip St. Romain, 2018 (3rd ed.) Luke 10:38-42 (Mary and Martha) We are constantly required
to make decisions; at any moment we can direct our attention to many concerns. In the story of Mary and Martha, Jesus affirms Mary because she has chosen wisely in setting her priorities. The dishes can be done later Martha's fretting over the "details of hospitality" are less important than being present to the Son of God. * How do you make value decisions concerning the focus of your attention during each clay? What happens to your
attention when you do not consciously direct it toward a specific matter, either external or internal? * "God does not want our presents; he wants our presence" is an old aphorism. Spend some time simply being present to the Lord, basking in the rays of his love. * "Don't rock the boat" is a rule implicit in bureaucracies of all kinds. How much of this spirit has
pervaded your outlook? When is it appropriate to "rock the boat"? What are the risks?
Treatise on the Love of God, by St. Francis de Sales (1567-1622) ____________ Chapter 5: Of the condolence and complacency of love in the passion of our Lord. When I see my
Saviour on the Mount of Olives with his soul sorrowful even unto death:--Ah! Lord Jesus, say I, what can have brought the sorrows of death into the soul of life except love, which, exciting commiseration, drew thereby our miseries into thy sovereign heart? Now a devout soul, seeing this abyss of heaviness and distress in this divine lover, how can she be without a holily loving sorrow? But considering, on the other hand, that all the afflictions of her well-beloved proceed from no imperfection
or want of strength, but from the greatness of his dearest love, she cannot but melt away with a holy sorrowful love. So that she cries: I am black with sorrow by compassion, but beautiful with love by complacency; the anguish of my well-beloved has changed my colour: for how could a faithful lover behold such torments in him whom she loves more than her life, without swooning away and becoming all wan and wasted with grief. The tents of nomads, perpetually exposed to the injuries of weather and
war, are almost always ragged and covered with dust; and I, ever exposed to the griefs which by condolence I receive from the immeasurable travails of my divine Saviour, I am all covered with distress, and rent with sorrow. But because the pains of him I love come from his love, in what measure they afflict me by compassion, they delight me by complacency; for how could a faithful lover not take an extreme content to see herself so loved by her heavenly spouse? Wherefore the beauty of love is in
the ill-favour of sorrow. And if I wear mourning for the passion and death of my King, all swarthy and black with grief, I cease not to have an incomparable sweetness in seeing the excess of his love amid his travails and his sorrows; and the tents of Solomon, all embroidered and worked in an admirable variety of decorations, were never so lovely as I am content, and, consequently, sweet, amiable and agreeable, in the variety of the sentiments of love which I have amid those griefs. Love
equalizes lovers; Ah! I see him, this dear lover--he is a fire of love burning in a thorny bush of sorrow, and I am the same: I am all inflamed with love amid the thorny bushes of my griefs, I am a lily among thorns. Ah! do not even look at the horrors of my poignant sorrows, but see the beauty of my agreeable love. Alas! he suffers insupportable pains, this well-beloved divine lover: it is this which grieves me and makes me faint with anguish; but he takes pleasure in suffering, he loves his
torments, and dies with joy at dying with pain for me: wherefore as I am sorrowing over his pains, so I am all ravished with joy at his love; not only do I grieve with him, but I glorify myself in him.
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