God desires us to live as close as we can to the life that Jesus Christ lived. That is the broad avenue to perfect happiness. Most of us know by experience that in proportion as we have followed Him, we have found happiness. And we know by still larger experience that as we turn away from Him the world gets dark, and life ceases to be worth living.
- George Hodges 

ZEP 3:14-18;    IS 12:2-6;    LK 1:39-56

R. Among you is the great and Holy One of Israel.

God indeed is my savior;
I am confident and unafraid.
My strength and my courage is the LORD,
and he has been my savior.
With joy you will draw water
at the fountain of salvation.

Give thanks to the LORD, acclaim his name;
among the nations make known his deeds,
proclaim how exalted is his name.

Sing praise to the LORD for his glorious achievement;
let this be known throughout all the earth.
Shout with exultation, O city of Zion,
for great in your midst 
is the Holy One of Israel!





During the month of May we give thanks to Mary and all of her blessings upon us.  On this final day of May we wrap up a month during which we celebrated in thanksgiving for our mothers on Mother's Day, marked new beginnings with graduation ceremonies and welcome the season of summer. 

What a gift today to take time to pray with the story from Luke of Mary visiting her cousin Elizabeth when they were both expecting their sons, Jesus and John.  Usually when I spend time with this reading, I focus on Elizabeth as I always hoped to become a mother and it was not until I was in my late 30's when my daughters were born.  Elizabeth's story of faith and solidarity is compelling.

Today I am overwhelmed by Mary's amazing witness to God's love.  She tells Elizabeth:  "My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord.  My spirit rejoices in God my Savior, for he has looked with favor on his lowly servant."   She goes on to tell Elizabeth:  "He has filled the hungry with good things and the rich he has sent away empty."

I am struck by the calm confidence Mary has in God's steadfast love.  She took enormous risk to accept the invitation of that love, but she trusted.  I hear Mary calling me to be open and available to God's love of me.  I too am God's lowly servant who is hungry for the goodness of the Lord.  Mary wants me to celebrate the gift of God's love with her rather than passively praying about her life.  She assures me God loves me as he loves her.

- by Mary Lee Brock

Selected Quotes from St. John of the Cross on the Journey of the Soul to God by Contemplation

- from Ascent of Mt. Carmel

Bk. 3. Ch. 2. #2. All these sensory means and exercises of the faculties must be left behind and in silence so that God Himself may effect the divine union of the soul. As a result one has to follow this method of disencumbering, emptying, and depriving the faculties of their natural rights and operations to make room for the inflow and illumination of the supernatural. If a person does not turn his eyes from his natural capacity, he will not attain to so lofty a communication; rather he will hinder it. 

#3. If it is true that the soul must journey by knowing God through what He is not, rather than through what He is, it must journey, insofar as possible, by way of the denial and rejection of natural and supernatural apprehensions. This is our task now with the memory. We must draw it away from its natural props and capacities and raise it above itself (above all distinct knowledge and apprehensible possession) to supreme hope in the incomprehensible God. 

#4. The annihilation of the memory in regard to all forms (including the five senses) is an absolute requirement for union with God. This union cannot be wrought without a complete separation of the memory from all forms that are not God. In great forgetfulness it is absorbed in a supreme good. 

#8. Once he has the habit of union he no longer experiences these lapses of memory in matters concerning his moral and natural life. All the operations of the memory and other faculties in this state are divine.

- compiled by James and Tyra Arraj