We cannot know whether we love God, although there may be strong reason for thinking so; but there can be no doubt about whether we love our neighbor or no. Be sure that, in proportion as you advance in fraternal charity, you are increasing your love of God, for His Majesty bears so tender an affection for us that I cannot doubt He will repay our love for others by augmenting, in a thousand different ways, that which we bear for Him.
- Teresa of Avila (1515-1582), The Interior Castle

("Love one another . . ." )

COL 1:15-20;    PS 100:1-5;    LK 5:33-39

R. Come with joy into the presence of the Lord.

Sing joyfully to the LORD, all you lands;
serve the LORD with gladness;
come before him with joyful song.

Know that the LORD is God;
he made us, his we are;
his people, the flock he tends.

Enter his gates with thanksgiving,
his courts with praise;
Give thanks to him; bless his name.

For he is good,
the LORD, whose kindness endures forever,
and his faithfulness, to all generations.







The scribes and Pharisees question the fact that the disciples of Jesus act differently than those of John the Baptist, but Jesus indicates that the question is not what their correct manner of life should be but rather how they are responding to God.  This is rather reminiscent of what Paul says about the diversity of gifts and offices in I Corinthians 12 or even what Ecclesiastes has to say in chapter 3 about a time for giving birth and a time for dying, a time for planting and a time for uprooting what has been planted. . . 

Does this mean anything for us?  We live in an age of change like the world has never before seen, and we are more accustomed to changing, growing, and leaving good things behind.  We might have a certain nostalgia for the safety and dependability those good things offered, but we press on in many areas nonetheless. 

We have to ask how our religious practice, our standards, our entire lives --- but certainly not our faith and who we believe in --- call for new wineskins and what they must look like. 

- by Chas Kestermeier, S.J.

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

- from Dark Night of the Soul

Bk 1, Ch. 12. #2. The first and principal benefit caused by the arid and dark night of contemplation: the knowledge of oneself and of one's misery. 

#3. The soul learns to commune with God with more respect and more courtesy. 

#4. God will enlighten the soul, giving it knowledge, not only of its lowliness and wretchedness, but of the greatness and excellence of God. He cleanses and frees the understanding that it may understand the truth. 

#7. From the aridities and voids of this night of the desire, the soul draws spiritual humility. 

- compiled by James and Tyra Arraj