Make me what Thou wouldst have me. I bargain for nothing. I make no terms. I seek for no previous information whither Thou art taking me. I will be what Thou wilt make me, and all that Thou wilt make me. I say not, I will follow Thee whithersoever Thou goest, for I am weak, but I give myself to Thee, to lead me anywhither
- John Henry Cardinal Newman (1801-1890), Parochial Sermons, v.V.
(Try to pray this prayer of surrender as sincerely as possible. Notice your areas of resistance, and offer them to God for conversion.)
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Heb 2:5-12; Psalm 8:2ab and 5, 6-7, 8-9
Mk 1:21-28
Jesus came to Capernaum with his followers,
and on the sabbath he entered the synagogue and taught.
The people were astonished at his teaching,
for he taught them as one having authority and not as the scribes.
In their synagogue was a man with an unclean spirit;
he cried out, “What have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth?
Have you come to destroy us?
I know who you are–the Holy One of God!”
Jesus rebuked him and said, “Quiet! Come out of him!”
The unclean spirit convulsed him and with a loud cry came out of him.
All were amazed and asked one another,
“What is this?
A new teaching with authority.
He commands even the unclean spirits and they obey him.”
His fame spread everywhere throughout the whole region of Galilee.
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Reflection on the Scriptures
For someone/something to have authority in our lives, we have to give it to them. Many times when we give others authority, when we trust them or elect them or look to them, they abuse the authority or trust. Take advantage. As I was thinking and praying with all this, it occurred to me that Jesus did just the opposite. The people in this story were praising him, recognizing his
authority and responds by helping, encouraging us to hold our own authority. He healed the man with the unclean spirit. Essentially, he returned the man to himself. I think of the dignity that he returns to the woman caught in adultery and the living water he gives to the Samaritan woman, both stories in the Gospel of John, as other examples of this. All throughout the gospels people are trying to raise him up as king, and in return he is healing and inviting us to
reclaim our own authority, dignity and power.
We are invited into relationship with the Divine through Jesus. I believe Jesus is showing us that the relationship is not one of giving all our authority to him, but the encouragement to maintain our own authority and power and work with him. For example, I hear myself praying, “just tell me what you want.” The response I hear now is “What do you want? I will work with you.” In my
spiritual direction practice, I often hear people pondering/praying/asking what God wants of them, what is “God’s will” for them. I hear an invitation from Jesus in today’s reading and many others in the gospels to ask instead, what is the heart’s desire/will. Jesus is encouraging us to claim and live from our own interior authority.
Where/How else might Jesus be inviting us to reclaim our personal authority?
- by Amy Hoover
The Son of God Became Human
From The Catechism of the Catholic Church
Part One, Section Two, Chapter Two
Article 3: He Was Conceived by the Power of the Holy Spirit, and Born of the Virgin Mary
Paragraph 1: The Son of God Became Man
II. THE INCARNATION
461 Taking up St. John's expression, "The Word became flesh",82 The Church calls "Incarnation" the fact that the Son of God assumed a human nature in order to accomplish our salvation in it. In a hymn cited by St. Paul, the Church sings the mystery of the Incarnation:
Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. and being found in human form he humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even death on a cross.83
(Footnote references in the Catechism.)
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