Wednesday, September 27, 2017

ST. VINCENT de PAUL

“Are any among you sick? They should call for the elders of the church and have them pray over them, anointing them with oil in the name of the Lord. The prayer of faith will save the sick, and the Lord will raise them up; and anyone who has committed sins will be forgiven.” -James 5:14-15

Psalm 91, verse 5-6

⁵ You shall not fear the terror of the night nor the arrow that flies by day, ⁶ nor the pestilence that roams in darkness, nor the plague that ravages at noon.

In the military, units of archers are men who are expert at hitting a mark or target.

Sin is the act of violating God's will. Sin can also be viewed as anything that violates the ideal relationship between an individual and God; or as any diversion from the ideal order for human living. To sin has been defined as "to miss the mark" to have a hardened heart, a loss of love for God, a disposition of the heart to depart from God because of inordinate self-love

We need to live the Shema Israel. Every day, every action of ours should be metaphorically speaking target practice aiming to love God with our whole heart, mind, soul and strength. We should exemplify this with the proper attitude toward wealth and be completely occupied with good deeds and alms-giving.

Leaders Organize not Hesitate[1]

He that hesitates is lost. Yet, to act to quickly is also to be rash. Paul wrote to bring order to a church in chaos. Like our modern world churches can be in chaos when there is no leadership. The Corinthian’s were abusing their gifts and calling attention to themselves rather than to Christ. Paul therefore suggests for them to do everything “decently and in order.” John Maxwell submits that there is a leadership lesson that can bring peace to chaos.

Identify and pursue your top priorities (v.1).
Seek to practice what will benefit the most people (v.2-12).
Communicate clearly (v. 7-8).
See things through the eyes of an outsider (v. 23-25).
Order activities simply for the purpose of adding value to others (v. 26-33).
Make sure everything is done in an appropriate manner (v. 40).

Feast of St. Vincent de Paul[2]

Having lived and worked in Belgium it is interesting to note the little “d” from “de Paul” normally denotes that Vincent was of a royal blood line.

St. Vincent de Paul was a great apostle of charity, and brought a great revival of the priesthood in the 17th century. He was born near Dax in the Landes (France) in 1581. As a young priest he was captured by Moorish pirates who carried him to Africa. He was sold into slavery, but freed in 1607 when he converted his owner. Having returned to France, he became successively a parish priest and chaplain to the galley-slaves. He founded a religious Congregation under the title of Priests of the Mission or Lazarists (now known as Vincentians), and he bound them by a special way to undertake the apostolic work of charity; he sent them to preach missions, especially to the ignorant peasants of that time, and to establish seminaries. In order to help poor girls, invalids, and the insane, sick and unemployed, he and St. Louise de Marillac founded the Congregation of the Daughters of Charity, now better known as the Sisters of St. Vincent. St. Vincent worked tirelessly to help those in need: the impoverished, the sick, the enslaved, the abandoned, the ignored. He died in 1660 at St. Lazarus's house, Paris. His motto: "Let us love God; but at the price of our hands and sweat of our face."

Remembering that, "God sees you"

Pope Francis is starting Caritas’ global a 2-year campaign today which promotes a ‘culture of encounter’, which is aiming to build stronger communities. Caritas is mobilising its organisations in over 160 countries to look at the causes of migration, bust myths about migrants and to bring migrants and communities closer together. “I invite all of you to remember who the migrants are in your families and communities. Who are the people from afar who are often right in front of our eyes, but whom we often do not see? Now is the time to see them and reach out to them. Now is the time to Share the Journey.”