The Lord is my helper, and I will not be afraid. What can anyone do to me?
Exodus, Chapter 20, Verse 18-20
Now as all the people witnessed the thunder
and lightning, the blast of the shofar and the mountain smoking, they became afraid and trembled. So they took up a position
farther away and said to Moses, “You
speak to us, and we will listen; but do not let God speak to us, or we shall
die.” Moses answered the people, “Do not be afraid, for God has come only to test
you and put the fear of him upon you
so you do not sin.”
The Israelite’s were
afraid and preferred to have Moses mediate for them with God rather than having
a real relationship with God.
What is love? In his text On Loving
God, St. Bernard surveys the four types of love that Christians experience
as they grow in their relationship with God: loving one's self, selfish love,
loving God as God, and loving one's self in God. St. Bernard reminds us that
not only did God give us life, but He gave us Himself. For indeed, "God
deserves to be loved very much, yea, boundlessly, because He loved us first, He
infinite and we nothing, loved us, miserable sinners, with a love so great and
so free." St. Bernard reminds us that we are indebted to God for his love
and His sacrifice. Not only should we love God because it is what He deserves,
but also because loving God does not go without reward. Loving God is to our
advantage. The Lord rewards those who love Him with the blessed state of the
heavenly Fatherland, where sorrow and sadness cannot enter. St. Bernard's
medieval prose is poetic and full of clever imagery. His work is as beautiful
as it is knowledgeable.
Emmalon Davis, CCEL Staff Writer
While he was in prison, the Armenian Bishop Blaise (who suffered martyrdom in the fourth century) miraculously cured a little boy choking on a fishbone lodged in his throat. Ever since then, St. Blaise has been the patron saint of throats. Saint Blaise Sticks (pan bendito) are distributed on his feast and kept in the home to be eaten for a sore throat (see Foods). The most popular custom, however, is the Blessing of Throats. For this sacramental, a priest takes two crossed candles, puts them up to the recipient's throat, and prays: "Through the intercession of Saint Blaise, Bishop and Martyr, may the Lord free you from the evils of the throat and all other evils."
Blessing
of throats[2]
Things to Do
·
Take your children to Mass to receive the
blessing of throats today.
·
Establish a home altar with the blessed candles
(symbols of Saint Blaise) from the feast of the Presentation, February 2.
·
Visit this website
and learn more about St. Blaise and how he saved Dubrovnik in Croatia in the
12th century.
First Friday
In Phoenix our artist community celebrates open studio tours which are a good way to experience art and artists. Every
first Friday evening of each month you can take a free self-guided tour
of downtown Phoenix galleries, studios and art spaces. It's called First Friday. First Friday is organized by Artlink,
a nonprofit organization "...dedicated to bringing together artists,
the public, and businesses for a greater understanding, appreciation,
and promotion of the arts and the development of a strong and vital
downtown Phoenix arts community." (http://phoenix.about.com/cs/enter/a/firstfriday.htm)
This is a great way to celebrate first Friday's but I wish to offer your an even greater gift.
The prayer of the Church venerates and honors the Heart of Jesus . . . which, out of love for men, he allowed to be pierced by our sins."2
To those who show him love and who make reparation for sins, however, our Lord made a great pledge: "I promise you in the unfathomable mercy of my heart that my omnipotent love will procure the grace of final penitence for all those who receive communion on nine successive first Fridays of the month; they will not die in my disfavor, or without having received the sacraments, since my divine heart will be their sure refuge in the last moments of their life."4
To gain this grace, we must:
Receive holy Communion on nine consecutive first Fridays.
Have the intention of honoring the Sacred Heart of Jesus and of reaching final perseverance.
Offer each holy Communion as an act of atonement for offenses against the Blessed Sacrament.
Introductory Prayer
R. Amen.
Reading: Jn 19:31-37
Since it was the day of Preparation, in order to prevent the bodies from remaining on the cross on the Sabbath (for that Sabbath was a high day), the Jews asked Pilate that their legs might be broken, and that they might be taken away. So the soldiers came and broke the legs of the first, and of the other who had been crucified with him; but when they came to Jesus and saw that he was already dead, they did not break his legs. But one of the soldiers pierced his side with a spear, and at once there came out blood and water.
He who saw it has borne witness-his testimony is true, and he knows that he tells the truth-that you also may believe. For these things took place that the scripture might be fulfilled, "Not a bone of him shall be broken." And again another scripture says, "They shall look on him whom they have pierced."
Considerations5
The fullness of God is revealed and given to us in Christ, in the love of Christ, in Christ's heart. For it is the heart of him in whom "the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily." Were one to lose sight of this great plan of God-the overflow of love in the world through the Incarnation, the Redemption and Pentecost-he could not understand the refinement with which our Lord deals with us.
So, when we talk about the heart of Jesus, we stress the certainty of God's love and the truth of his commitment to us. When we recommend devotion to the Sacred Heart, we are recommending that we should give our whole selves to Jesus, to the whole Jesus-our souls, our feelings and thoughts, our words and actions, our joys.
That is what true devotion to the heart of Jesus means. It is knowing God and ourselves. It is looking at Jesus and turning to him, letting him encourage and teach and guide us. The only difficulty that could beset this devotion would be our own failure to understand the reality of an incarnate God.
But note that God does not say: "In exchange for your own heart, I will give you a will of pure spirit." No, he gives us a heart, a human heart, like Christ's. I don't have one heart for loving God and another for loving people. I love Christ and the Father and the Holy Spirit and our Lady with the same heart with which I love my parents and my friends. I shall never tire of repeating this. We must be very human, for otherwise we cannot be divine. . . .
If we don't learn from Jesus, we will never love. If, like some people, we were to think that to keep a clean heart, a heart worthy of God, means "not mixing it up, not contaminating it" with human affection, we would become insensitive to other people's pain and sorrow. We would be capable of only an "official charity," something dry and soulless. But ours would not be the true charity of Jesus Christ, which involves affection and human warmth. In saying this, I am not supporting the mistaken theories-pitiful excuses-that misdirect hearts away from God and lead them into occasions of sin and perdition. . . .
4. But I have still a further consideration to put before you. We have to fight vigorously to do good, precisely because it is difficult for us to resolve seriously to be just, and there is a long way to go before human relations are inspired by love and not hatred or indifference. We should also be aware that, even if we achieve a reasonable distribution of wealth and a harmonious organization of society, there will still be the suffering of illness, of misunderstanding, of loneliness, of the death of loved ones, of the experience of our own limitations.
Faced with the weight of all this, a Christian can find only one genuine answer, a definitive answer: Christ on the cross, a God who suffers and dies, a God who gives us his heart opened by a lance for the love of us all. Our Lord abominates injustice and condemns those who commit it. But he respects the freedom of each individual. He permits injustice to happen because, as a result of original sin, it is part and parcel of the human condition. Yet his heart is full of love for men. Our suffering, our sadness, our anguish, our hunger and thirst for justice . . . he took all these tortures on himself by means of the cross. . . .
Suffering is part of God's plans. This is the truth, however difficult it may be for us to understand it. It was difficult for Jesus Christ the man to undergo his passion: "Father, if you are willing, remove this cup from me; nevertheless, not my will, but yours, be done." In this tension of pleading and acceptance of the Father's will, Jesus goes calmly to his death, pardoning those who crucify him.
This supernatural acceptance of suffering was, precisely, the greatest of all conquests. By dying on the cross, Jesus overcame death. God brings life from death. The attitude of a child of God is not one of resignation to a possibly tragic fate; it is the sense of achievement of someone who has a foretaste of victory. In the name of this victorious love of Christ, we Christians should go out into the world to be sowers of peace and joy through everything we say and do. We have to fight-a fight of peace-against evil, against injustice, against sin. Thus do we serve notice that the present condition of mankind is not definitive. Only the love of God, shown in the heart of Christ, will attain our glorious spiritual triumph.
Devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus is of great antiquity in
the Church. It was St. Margaret Mary Alacoque, however, who made this
devotion widespread. In 1675, within the octave of the feast of Corpus
Christi, our Lord appeared to her and said: "Behold this heart which,
not withstanding the burning love for men with which it is consumed and
exhausted, meets with no other return from most Christians than
sacrilege, contempt, indifference and ingratitude, even in the sacrament
of my love [the Eucharist]. But what pierces my heart most deeply is
that I am subjected to these insults by persons especially consecrated
to my service."3
The great promise of the Sacred Heart is most consoling: the
grace of final perseverance and the joy of having Jesus' heart as our
sure refuge and infinite ocean of mercy in our last hour.
Almighty and everlasting God, look upon the heart of your
well-beloved Son and upon the praise and satisfaction which he offers to
you in the name of all sinners; and grant them pardon when they seek
your mercy. We ask this in the name of Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives
and reigns with you for ever and ever.
1. Love is revealed to us in the Incarnation, the redemptive
journey which Jesus Christ made on our earth, culminating in the supreme
sacrifice of the cross. And on the cross it showed itself through a new
sign: "One of the soldiers pierced his side with a spear, and at once
there came out blood and water." This water and blood of Jesus speak to
us of a self-sacrifice brought to the last extreme: "It is
finished"-everything is achieved, for the sake of love. . . .
2. Let us realize all the richness hidden in the words "the Sacred Heart
of Jesus." When we speak of a person's heart, we refer not just to his
sentiments, but to the whole person in his loving dealings with others.
In order to help us understand divine things, Scripture uses the
expression "heart" in its full human meaning, as the summary and source,
expression and ultimate basis, of one's thoughts, words and actions.
One is worth what one's heart is worth. . . .
3. Jesus on the cross, with his heart overflowing with love for us, is
such an eloquent commentary on the value of people and things that words
only get in the way. Men, their happiness and their lives, are so
important that the very Son of God gave himself to redeem and cleanse
and raise them up. "Who will not love this heart so wounded?" a
contemplative asks in this connection. "Who will not return love for
love? Who will not embrace a heart so pure? We, who are made of flesh,
will repay love with love. We will embrace our wounded One, whose hands
and feet ungodly men have nailed; we will cling to his side and to his
heart. Let us pray that we be worthy of linking our heart with his love
and of wounding it with a lance, for it is still hard and impenitent. .
. ." (http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/resources/prayers/devotions/to-our-lord-jesus-christ/first-friday-devotion/)
Daily Devotions/Prayers
Comments
Post a Comment