20/04/2023

I am the "poor man who called and the Lord heard him". We are all born "poor", helpless, totally dependant on our mothers. We all grow to be children and remain "poor" even if we are born in a palace. Worldly riches, however, can and do conceal the poverty of the human soul within the body of a pampered child who soon grows to become dependant on and in love with  the riches that prevent the camel from passing through the eye of the needle.

We in the West have become so rich that we have insulated ourselves from God by a culture that sees our success in scientifically controlling not only base matter but even our life itself, as the one and only reality. Life still comes to an end, however, but we  continue trying to deny the weakness of our our now revealed "poverty" by "celebrating the life" of the dead one whose remains after cremation fit into a container that can be carried in one hand.

I thank God that I began my life in the love of a family which, although not perfect, sincerely tried to practise the faith the Truth of which the Apostles defended before the Sanhedrin. I have always been "poor" for I have often wasted the grace that comes from God. I have often stripped myself of this grace and become truly "destitute "in sin. True wealth is to be found only in the Love of Father, Son and Holy Spirit that is freely available so that "Anyone who believes in the Son has eternal Life". 

The Incarnation, Death and Resurrection has given us all the Holy Spirit "without reserve" and thus we "the poor" can die into riches way, way beyond our imagining. The choice is ours.

Dear Lord you know me. I know that empty words are no prayer. Let me in sincere poverty implore your forgiveness and love to be showered on all who are known to me. May Mary and all the saints plead for your grace to be accepted by all of us still enthralled by Devil, World and Flesh and may the souls of the departed become aware that their pains are Justice tempered with Mercy for it is only through the suffering of Jesus that our sins can be forgiven.