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Message of the Day
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"We are gifts from God to each other.
The richest facets of these gifts are found in our differences, which include gender, race, ethnicity, religion, sexual orientation, class, physical and mental abilities. Our learnings come from each other as we listen and value what each of us has to offer theologically and in all ways, out of our uniqueness."
- Mary Kay Sauter, Unmasking the
Holy
(Be open to the gift that you are, and the gifts that others you encounter have to offer this day.)
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Lectionary Readings
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ACTS 22:30; 23:6-11; PS 16:1-2, 5, 7-11; JN 17:20-26
R. Keep me safe, O God; you are my hope.
Keep me, O God, for in you I take refuge;
I say to the LORD, "My Lord are you."
O LORD, my allotted portion and my cup,
you it is who hold fast my lot.
I bless the LORD who
counsels me;
even in the night my heart exhorts me.
I set the LORD ever before me;
with him at my right hand I shall not be disturbed.
Therefore my heart is glad and my soul rejoices,
my body, too, abides in confidence;
Because you will not abandon my soul to the nether world,
nor will you suffer your faithful one to undergo
corruption.
You will show me the path to life,
fullness of joys in your presence,
the delights at your right hand forever.
USCCB Lectionary
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Reflection on the Gospel
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Jesus' prayer on the eve of his sacrifice shows the great love and trust he had for his beloved
disciples. He knew they would abandon him in his hour of trial, yet he entrusted to them the great task of spreading his name throughout the world and to the end of the ages. The Lord Jesus entrust us today with the same mission - to make him known and loved by all. Jesus died and rose again that all might be one as he and the Father are one. Do you love and accept all baptized Christians as your brothers and sisters in Christ?
The Lord Jesus included each one of us in his high priestly prayer at the last supper. He continues his high priestly office this very day as our intercessor at the right hand of the Father before the throne of heaven. Paul the Apostle tells us that it is "Christ Jesus, who died, yes, who was raised from the dead, who is at the right hand of God, who indeed intercedes for us" (Romans 8:34; see also Hebrews 7: 25). Do you join in Jesus' high priestly prayer that all who profess Jesus as
Lord may grow in love and unity together as brothers and sisters who have been redeemed through the precious blood shed for us on the cross?
"Heavenly Father, have mercy on all your people and heal the divisions in the body of Christ. May all Christian people throughout the world attain the unity for which Jesus prayed on the eve of his sacrifice. Renew in us the power of the Spirit that we may be a sign of that
unity and a means of its growth. Increase in us a fervent love for all our brothers and sisters in Jesus Christ."
DailyScripture.net
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Spiritual Reading
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The Cloud of Unknowing, by Anonymous That a man should not presume to work in this work before the time that he be lawfully cleansed in conscience of all his special deeds of sin.
BUT if thou asketh me when they should work in this work, then I answer thee
and I say: that not ere they have cleansed their conscience of all their special deeds of sin done before, after the common ordinance of Holy Church.
For in this work, a soul drieth up in it all the root and the ground of sin that will always live in it after confession, be it never so busy. And, therefore, whoso will travail in this work, let him fiirst cleanse his conscience; and afterward when he hath done that in
him is lawfully, let him dispose him boldly but meekly thereto. And let him think, that he hath full long been holden therefrom. For this is that work in the which a soul should travail all his lifetime, though he had never sinned deadly. And the whiles that a soul is dwelling in this deadly flesh, it shall evermore see and feel this cumbrous cloud of unknowing betwixt him and God. And not only that, but in pain of the original sin it shall evermore see and feel that some of all the creatures
that ever God made, or some of their works, will evermore press in remembrance betwixt it and God. And this is the right wisdom of God, that man, when he had sovereignty and lordship of all other creatures, because that he wilfully made him underling to the stirring of his subjects, leaving the bidding of God and his Maker; that right so after, when he would fulfill the bidding of God, he saw and felt all the creatures that should be beneath him, proudly press above him, betwixt him and his
God.- Chapter 28
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