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Message of the Day
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Today we can no longer so easily say that if a being on this earth walks erect, lights a fire and works on a stone, it must be a human being. We can only say that it is a human if it thinks and speaks and freely questions the whole of the world and its existence, even if it cannot answer this one total question.
- Karl Rahner, "The Little Word, 'God'" in "Grace in Freedom" (The spiritual nature of human beings . . . Where have you been searching for meaning lately?)
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Lectionary Readings
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JGS 11:29-39; PS 40:5, 7-10; MT 22:1-14
R. Here I am, Lord; I come to do your will.
Blessed the man who makes the LORD his trust;
who turns not to idolatry
or to those who stray after falsehood.
Sacrifice or oblation you wished not,
but ears open to obedience you gave me.
Burnt offerings or sin-offerings you sought not;
then said I, "Behold I come."
"In the written scroll it is prescribed for me.
To do your will, O my God, is my delight,
and your law is within my heart!"
I announced your justice in the vast assembly;
I did not restrain my lips, as you, O LORD, know.
USCCB Lectionary
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Reflection on the Gospel
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Dieterich Bonhoeffer, a Lutheran pastor and theologian in Germany who died for his faith under Hitler's Nazi rule, contrasted "cheap grace" and "costly grace". "Cheap grace is the grace we bestow on ourselves... the preaching of forgiveness without requiring repentance... grace without discipleship, grace without the cross, grace without Jesus Christ, living and incarnate... Costly grace is the gospel which must be sought again and again, the gift which must be asked for, the door at which a man must knock. Such grace is costly because it calls us to follow Jesus Christ. It is costly because it costs a man his life, and it is grace because it gives a man the only true life."
God invites each of us as his friends to his heavenly banquet that we may celebrate with him and share in his joy. Are you ready to feast at the Lord's banquet table? "Lord Jesus, may I always know the joy of living in your presence and grow in the hope of seeing you face to face in your everlasting kingdom."
DailyScripture.net
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Spiritual Reading
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The Cloud of Unknowing, by Anonymous That a man should weigh each thought and each stirring after that it is, and always eschew recklessness in venial sin.
I SAY not this for that I trow that thou, or any other such as I speak of, be guilty and cumbered with any such sins; but for that I would that thou weighest each thought and each stirring after that it is, and for I would that thou travailedst busily to destroy the first stirring and thought of these things that thou mayest thus sin in. For one thing I tell thee; that who weigheth not, or setteth little by, the first thought-yea, although it be no sin unto him-that he, whosoever that he be, shall not eschew recklessness in venial sin. Venial sin shall no man utterly eschew in this deadly life. But recklessness in venial sin should always be eschewed of all the true disciples of perfection; and else I have no wonder though they soon sin deadly. - Chapter 12
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