Message of 6-25-12
Published: Mon, 06/25/12
A Daily Spiritual Seed
- resources for prayer and spiritual growth
Message of the Day
Go in where you will, God sees you; light your lamp, God sees you; quench its light, God sees you. Fear God who ever beholds you. If you will sin, seek a place where God cannot see you, then do what you will.
- Augustine of Hippo -
(Good luck finding such a place! How does it feel to know that you are always "seen" by God?)
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Lectionary Readings of the Day
http://www.usccb.org/calendar/index.cfm?showLit=1&action=month
2 Kgs 17:5-8, 13-15a, 18; Ps 60:3, 4-5, 12-13; Mt 7:1-5
R. (7b) Help us with your right hand, O Lord, and answer us.
O God, you have rejected us and broken our defenses;
you have been angry; rally us!
You have rocked the country and split it open;
repair the cracks in it, for it is tottering.
You have made your people feel hardships;
you have given us stupefying wine.
Have not you, O God, rejected us,
so that you go not forth, O God, with our armies?
Give us aid against the foe,
for worthless is the help of men.
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Reflection on the Gospel
- from Daily Bread
http://www.preacherexchange.com/daily_bread.htm
Why do you notice the splinter in your brother’s eye, but do not perceive the wooden beam in your own eye?
It’s always easier to notice other people’s wrongdoing. It’s more fun, too. The news cycle brings crazy stories of scandal and crime into our homes 24 hours a day. But those actions we condemn the most in others might also be found in our own past. And if they aren’t, we still might have to admit that the only reason we haven’t done the same things ourselves is because we were too afraid to try or we didn’t have the opportunity. If we concentrate on strengthening our own character instead of condemning others, we can avoid the evil of hypocrisy that Jesus so detested.
Lord, for forgiveness when we judge others instead of ourselves, we pray.
- by Portia Clark
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Spiritual Reading
The Adornment of the Spiritual Marriage
by St. John of Rusybroeck (1293-1381)
In this unity, the spirit must always either be like unto God through grace and virtue, or unlike unto God through mortal sin. For, that man has been made after the likeness of God, means that he has been created in the grace of God; the which grace is a God-formed light, which shines through us and makes us like to God; and without this light, which makes us God-like, we cannot be united with God supernaturally, even though we cannot lose the image of God nor our natural unity with Him [58] . If we lose the likeness, that is, the grace of God, we are damned. And therefore, whenever God finds within us some capacity for the reception of His grace, it is His pleasure and His free goodness to make us through His gifts, full of life, and like unto Him. This always happens whenever we turn to Him with our whole will; for at that very moment, Christ comes to us and in us, both with means and without means, that is, with the virtues and above the virtues. And He impresses His image and His likeness in us, namely Himself and His gifts: and He redeems us from sin, and makes us free and like unto Himself. And in that same working, through which God redeems us from sins, and makes us free and like unto Him through charity, the spirit immerses itself in fruitive love [59] . And here there take place a meeting and a union which are without means and above nature, and wherein our highest blessedness consists. Although all that He gives us from love and free goodness is natural to God, for us, according to our condition, it is accidental and supernatural. For before, we were strangers and unlike unto God; and afterwards, becoming like Him, have received union with God.
- Chapter 58: Showing how one is like God unto grace and unlike God through mortal sin.
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