Of all the movements, sensations and feelings of the soul, love is the only one in which the creature can
respond to the Creator and make some sort of similar return, however unequal it may be. For when God loves, all he desires is to be loved in return; the sole purpose of his love is to be loved, in the knowledge that those who love him are made happy by their love of him.
... St. Bernard of Clairvaux
(Loving is its own reward. When things don't make sense, simply return to
love and loving, and all shall be well.) |
EZ 36:23-28; PS 51:12-13, 14-15, 18-19
MT 22:1-14
Jesus again in reply spoke to the chief priests and the elders of the people in parables saying,
"The Kingdom of heaven may be likened
to a king
who gave a wedding feast for his son.
He dispatched his servants to summon the invited guests to the feast,
but they refused to come.
A second time he sent other servants, saying,
'Tell those invited: "Behold, I have prepared my banquet,
my calves and fattened cattle are killed,
and everything is ready; come to the feast."'
Some ignored the invitation and went away,
one to his farm, another to his business.
The rest laid hold of his servants,
mistreated
them, and killed them.
The king was enraged and sent his troops,
destroyed those murderers, and burned their city.
Then the king said to his servants, 'The feast is ready,
but those who were invited were not worthy to come.
Go out, therefore, into the main roads
and invite to the feast whomever you find.'
The servants went out into the streets
and gathered all they found, bad and good alike,
and the hall was filled with guests.
But when the king came in to meet the
guests
he saw a man there not dressed in a wedding garment.
He said to him, 'My friend, how is it
that you came in here without a wedding garment?'
But he was reduced to silence.
Then the king said to his attendants, 'Bind his hands and feet,
and cast him into the darkness outside,
where there will be wailing and grinding of teeth.'
Many are invited, but few are chosen."
Reflection on the Scriptures |
Today’s Gospel and Jesus’ ministry remind me to not write off people whom whose politics I don’t consider to be ‘good”. Both the King and Jesus knew that in order to be “good”, you first have to have a relationship with God. I find it is easier to be open to others who believe differently than me if I make time to sit with God. I am not saying that it is easy, just that somehow it is easier. That song: “All are welcome, all are welcome, all
are welcome in this place” keeps running through my head as I write this. So, for the next few weeks, I will try to be more inclusive and to look for common ground with others instead of seeing our differences. To not judge or dismiss anyone, but to welcome them as another child of God.
- by Julie
Kalkowski
Revelations of Divine
Love - by Julian of Norwich
Fourteenth Revelation, Chapter 51
“He is the Head, and we be His
members.” “Therefore our Father nor may nor will more blame assign to us than to His own Son, precious and worthy Christ” Also in this marvellous example I have teaching with me as it were the beginning of an A.B.C., whereby I have some understanding of our Lord’s meaning. For the secret things of
the Revelation be hid therein;—notwithstanding that all the Shewings are full of secret things. The sitting of the Father betokeneth His Godhead: that is to say, by shewing of rest and peace: for in the Godhead may be no travail. And that He shewed Himself as Lord, betokeneth His [governance] to our manhood. The standing of the Servant betokeneth travail; on one side, and on the left, betokeneth that he was not all worthy to stand even-right afore the Lord; his starting was the Godhead, and
the running was the Manhood: for the Godhead started from the Father into the Maiden’s womb, falling into the taking of our Kind. And in this falling he took great sore: the sore that He took was our flesh, in which He had also swiftly feeling of deadly pains. That he stood adread before the Lord and not even-right, betokeneth that His clothing was not seemly to stand in even-right afore the Lord, nor that might not, nor should not, be His office while He was a labourer; nor also He might not
sit in rest and peace with the Lord till He had won His peace rightfully with His hard travail; and that he stood by the left side [betokeneth] that the Father left His own Son, willingly, in the Manhood to suffer all man’s pains, without sparing of Him. By that his kirtle was in point to be ragged and rent, is understood the blows, the scourgings, the thorns and the nails, the drawing and the dragging, His tender flesh rending. (As I saw in some part [before] how the flesh was rent from
the skull, falling in pieces until the time when the bleeding ceased, and then it began to dry again, cleaving to the bone.) And by the struggling and writhing, groaning and moaning, is understood that He might never rise almightily from the time that He was fallen into the Maiden’s womb, till his body was slain and dead, He yielding the soul into the Father’s hands with all Mankind for whom He was sent.
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