Message of the Day
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"The Bride of Christ,
the Church, in its human, all too human aspect, can be unfaithful to him. But he never ceases to give himself to her who is his body. He makes her mother of living truth for us, a place of rebirth."
- Olivier Clement [20th C], The Roots of Christian Mysticism
(How is Christian community a place of encounter with Christ for you?)
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Readings of the Day
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IS 65:17-21; PS 30:2, 4-6, 11-13; JN 4:43-54
R. I will praise you, Lord, for you have rescued me.
I will extol you, O LORD, for you drew me clear
and did not let my enemies rejoice over me.
O LORD, you brought me up from the nether world;
you preserved me from among those going down into the pit.
Sing praise to the LORD, you his faithful ones,
and give thanks to his holy name.
For his anger lasts but a moment;
a lifetime, his
good will.
At nightfall, weeping enters in,
but with the dawn, rejoicing.
"Hear, O LORD, and have pity on me;
O LORD, be my helper."
You changed my mourning into dancing;
O LORD, my God, forever will I give you thanks.
USCCB lectionary
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Reflection on the Gospel
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Unless you people see signs and wonders, you will not believe.
If Jesus were to perform miracles in our modern world, would people believe? Have we lost the
gift of awe, forgotten how to wonder? Our technology now provides instant explanations and easily generates lifelike special effects. Knowledge is often deemed more valuable than actual experience. Yet the questions that occupy our deepest longings take time, and openness to mystery, to answer. Compassion, love, forgiveness and healing must be experienced to be fully understood, and they are rarely achieved instantly.
Help me, Lord, to "unplug" my life this Lent, so that I can be more open to the mystery of your gift of salvation.- Mary Joshi
Daily Bread
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Spiritual Reading
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The Book of Supreme Truth, by St. John of Rusybroeck (1293-1381) The most profitable stirrings which such a man can feel, and for which he is best fitted, are heavenly weal and hellish woe, and the ability to respond to these two with fit and proper works. For heavenly weal lifts a man up above all things into an untrammelled power of praising and loving God in every way
that his heart and his soul desire. After this comes hellish woe, and casts him down into a misery, and into a lack of all the comfort and consolation that he experienced before. In this woe, weal sometimes shows itself, and brings with it a hope which none can gainsay. And then the man falls back again into a despair in which he can find no consolation. When a man feels God within himself with rich and full grace, this I call heavenly health; for then he is wise and clear of understanding,
rich and outflowing with heavenly teachings, ardent and generous in charity, drunken and overflowing with joy, strong in feeling, bold and ever ready in all the things which he knows to be well pleasing to God; and such-like things without number, which may only be known by those who feel them. But when the scale of love goes down, and God hides Himself with all His graces, then the man falls back into dereliction and torment and dark misery, as though he should never more recover: and then he
feels himself to be nought else but a poor sinner, who knows little or nothing of God. He scorns every consolation that creatures may give him; and the taste and consolation of God he does not receive. And then his reason says within him: Where is now thy God?
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Chapter 6: Of heavenly weal and hellish woe. Amazon.com link
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