Message of 7-24-12

Published: Tue, 07/24/12


A Daily Spiritual Seed
- resources for prayer and spiritual growth


Message of the Day

The power to appreciate and to open the heart is indispensable to the awakening and the maintenance of the mystical appetite. But all the raptures they bring put together are not so effective as the icy chill of a disappointment in knowing that you alone, my God, are stable. It is through sorrow, and not through joy, that your Godhead gradually assumes, in our sentient faculty, the higher Reality it possesses in the nature of things."
- Teilhard de Chardin, Writings in Times of War -

(What disappointments are you experiencing at this time in life? How can they help you lean on God more fully?)

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Lectionary Readings of the Day
   http://www.usccb.org/calendar/index.cfm?showLit=1&action=month

Mi 7:14-15, 18-20;    Ps 85:2-4, 5-6, 7-8;    Mt 12:46-50

R. (8a) Lord, show us your mercy and love.

You have favored, O LORD, your land;
you have brought back the captives of Jacob.
You have forgiven the guilt of your people;
you have covered all their sins.
You have withdrawn all your wrath;
you have revoked your burning anger.

Restore us, O God our savior,
and abandon your displeasure against us.
Will you be ever angry with us,
prolonging your anger to all generations?

Will you not instead give us life;
and shall not your people rejoice in you?
Show us, O LORD, your kindness,
and grant us your salvation.

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Reflection on the Gospel
- from Daily Bread
  http://www.preacherexchange.com/daily_bread.htm

For whoever does the will of my heavenly Father is my brother, and sister, and mother.

With these words, Jesus expands our concept of family. With him there are no divisions, no separations among people. We are all brothers and sisters of Jesus if we do the will of his Father, who is our Father. It becomes clear that Jesus is my brother; the victim of sex trafficking is my sister; the child dying of thirst or hunger is my child; the homeless man is my uncle; the girl ostracized because of her sexual orientation is my sister; and the list is endless. The only people who earned Jesus' scorn were the hypocrites, never the victims, the bullied or the misunderstood.

Heavenly Father, help us to treat everyone as a member of our immediate family, we pray.

- by Portia Clark

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Spiritual Reading
The Way of Perfection
  - by Teresa of Avila (1515-1582)

- Describes the difference between perfection in the lives of contemplatives and in the lives of those who are content with mental prayer. Explains how it is sometimes possible for God to raise a distracted soul to perfect contemplation and the reason for this. This chapter and that which comes next are to be noted carefully.

It is the queen which gives the king most trouble in this game (chess) and all the other pieces support her. There is no queen who can beat this King as well as humility can; for humility brought Him down from Heaven into the Virgin's womb and with humility we can draw Him into our souls by a single hair. Be sure that He will give most humility to him who has most already and least to him who has least. I cannot understand how humility exists, or can exist, without love, or love without humility, and it is impossible for these two virtues to exist save where there is great detachment from all created things.

- Chapter 16

(Keep in mind that she is writing to sisters in a cloistered contemplative order.)

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