Lift up your heart to Him, sometimes even at your meals, and when you are in company; the least little remembrance will always be acceptable to Him. You need not cry very loud; he is nearer to us than we are aware of.
… Brother Lawrence (c.1605-1691), The Practice of the Presence of God
(Small acts of attentiveness to God: resolve to do so this day.)
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HEB 7:25—8:6; PS 40:7-8A, 8B-9, 10, 17
MK 3:7-12
Jesus withdrew toward the sea with his disciples.
A large number of people followed from Galilee and from Judea.
Hearing what he was doing,
a large number of people came to him also from Jerusalem,
from Idumea, from beyond the Jordan,
and from the neighborhood of Tyre and Sidon.
He told his disciples to have a boat ready for him because of the crowd,
so that they would not crush him.
He had cured many and, as a result, those who had diseases
were pressing upon him to touch him.
And whenever unclean spirits saw him they would fall down before him
and shout, "You are the Son of God."
He warned them sternly not to make him known.
Reflection on the Scriptures |
We live in a society that tends to dismiss the sick and the poor. We are told that because sick people can spread germs, we should avoid them: “Stay clear of anyone coughing with a runny nose or you’ll get sick too.” We are told that the poor are poor because of some deficiency, usually a moral deficiency: “If they weren’t so lazy, then they wouldn’t be so poor!” Society encourages us to isolate
ourselves from the sick and poor – to make ourselves inaccessible to them. In such a culture, the sick and poor begin to feel unwanted and unloved.
So it’s refreshing to see Jesus walk among the sick and poor in today’s Gospel. It’s refreshing to see how many people flock to see him and to receive his healing, love and grace. They came from all over Judea. And Jesus doesn’t avoid them. He mingles with them, allowing himself to be touched and so healing them: “those who had diseases were pressing upon him to touch him.” In short, he makes himself
accessible so they can know the Good News of God’s love for them. In this way, Jesus serves as God’s intercessor: “Jesus is always able to save those who approach God through him, since he lives forever to make intercession for them.”
- John Shea, S.J.
Revelations of Divine Love
- by Julian of Norwich
Fourteenth Revelation, Chapter 54
“Faith is nought else but a right understanding, with true belief and sure trust, of our Being: that we are in God, and God is in us: Whom we see not”
And our faith is a Virtue that cometh of our Nature-Substance into our Sense-soul by the Holy Ghost; in which all our virtues come to us: for without that, no man may receive virtue. For it is nought else but a right understanding, with true belief, and sure trust, of our Being: that we are in God, and God in us, Whom we see not. And this virtue, with all other that God hath ordained to us coming therein, worketh in us great
things. For Christ’s merciful working is in us, and we graciously accord to Him through the gifts and the virtues of the Holy Ghost. This working maketh that we are Christ’s children, and Christian in living.
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