|
It is only imperfection that complains of what is imperfect. The more perfect we are, the more gentle and quiet we become toward the defects of others.
- Francois de la Mothe Fenelon, Selections in the Writings of Fenelon, Letter XXXVII
(And toward our own as well. Be gentle with yourself regarding your imperfections, praying for the grace to improve.)
|
|
|
1 JN 4:7-10; PS 72:1-2, 3-4, 7-8
MK 6:34-44
When Jesus saw the vast crowd, his heart was moved with pity for them,
for they were like sheep without a shepherd;
and he began to teach them many things.
By now it was already late and his disciples approached him and said,
“This is a deserted place and it is already very late.
Dismiss them so that they can go
to the surrounding farms and villages
and buy themselves something to eat.”
He said to them in reply,
“Give them some food yourselves.”
But they said to him,
“Are we to buy two hundred days’ wages worth of food
and give it to them to eat?”
He asked them, “How many loaves do you have? Go and see.”
And when they had found out they said,
“Five loaves and two fish.”
So he gave orders to have them sit down in groups on the green grass.
The people took their places in rows by hundreds and by fifties.
Then, taking the five loaves and the two fish and looking up to heaven,
he said the blessing, broke the loaves, and gave them to his disciples
to set before the people;
he also divided the two fish among them all.
They all ate and were satisfied.
And they picked up twelve wicker baskets full of fragments
and what was left of the fish.
Those who ate of the loaves were five thousand men.
USCCB Lectionary
|
|
|
|
Praying the Daily Gospels: A Guide to Meditation, by Philip St. Romain,
2018 (3rd ed.)
____________
Mark 6:34-44 (Jesus feeds thousands)
Jesus is no mere spiritual Messiah. His concern for our spiritual well-being is matched by his understanding of the importance of our bodily needs. He knows well that hungry people are not overly interested in theology, so he feeds them bread and fish.
• Spend some time with the passage “Give them some food yourselves.” How do you feel about being an ambassador for Christ?
• What kind of responsibility do you feel toward the poor and hungry in your community?
Paperback, Kindle and eBook
|
|
|
|
|
Treatise on the Love of God, by St. Francis de Sales (1567-1622)
____________
BOOK I: CONTAINING A PREPARATION FOR THE WHOLE TREATISE
Chapter 10: That the union to which love aspires is spiritual
Now according as the ecstasy is greater, either above us or below us, by so much more it hinders the soul from returning to itself, and from doing operations contrary to the ecstasy in which it is. So those angelic men who are ravished in God and heavenly things, lose altogether, as long as their ecstasy lasts, the use and attention of the senses, movement, and all exterior actions,
because their soul, in order to apply its power and activity more entirely and attentively to that divine object, retires and withdraws them from all its other faculties, to turn them in that direction. And in like manner brutish men give up all the use of their reason and understanding to bury themselves in sensual pleasure. The first mystically imitate Elias taken up in the fiery chariot amid the angels: the others Nabuchodonosor brutalized and debased to the rank of savage
beasts.
|
|
|
|
|
