31/07/2023

I have never noticed before that the "golden calf" was certainly not an elegant work of art as were the idols that were worshiped as gods and goddesses in Egypt and other nations amongst which the Israelites were to live for the next thousand years. Moses was certainly vexed. Throwing things about along with stamping the foot is still a characteristic of a human who is committed to a certainty that is defied by others. Three notable examples of this tendency in my lifetime are Mussolini, Hitler and Stalin and the millions of other petty tyrants that still fill the world today.

Even allowing for the low melting point of Gold, Aaron would have had to construct a primitive furnace to melt the gold that he collected from the people but the result of "the throwing of the gold into the fire" would have been a misshapen lump of gold that he chose to call a "calf".

The descendants of Adam and Eve who were not blessed by God's direct providence filled the world from East to West. They all tried to make sense of their being and of the vastness of the Cosmos they witnessed in the daily round governed by sun and moon. They created myths to provide an intelligible structure for their awareness of being alone in time and space.

God chose to help one nation to understand "awareness of being". The record of this, the Old Testament, is the history of one people amongst millions. I try to understand the history as as factual as any other written text from the beginning of time. But I try not to judge harshly and where there is a difficulty use the example of Jesus to help me.

Jesus at no time criticised the Scriptures that he read in the Synagogue. He came to complete them. His words are filled with references and direct quotations from the earliest to the latest scrolls He himself speaks to us in parables and we too can use a similar technique to allegorise "Moses and the Prophets".We must not, however, come to believe our own interpretations to the extent that a different interpretation than ours fills us with rage against someone else.. 

We must never forget that in obeying  the first Commandment we have to obey all the others and that Jesus' dying words were a direct quotation from the psalms. God's complete revelation is the Bible. He also promises to be for all time in the Church that has preserved the physical books and the message of the Holy Spirit which informs them with the Love that is Father Son and Holy Spirit.

Dear Lord, help us all whose being is filled with media nonsense that captures our senses and fills our memory excluding the prayer with which we should fill our beings. St Ignatius knew the problem of how to beat the "world" but his first as it were "worker priests" were soon lost to the World they were to tackle head on. May Mary lead all your Saints to the greater glory of God and may this sinful servant know the benefit of their prayers and the grace that you pour out from your side. What a horror, terror, must have filled your humanity for you to cry out; "Eli, Eli Lama Sabachthani" with your dying breath.

 30/07/2023

All humans, all mammals have brain. We know that the brain is coded to control instincts and receive input from the sensors that are our senses. The control that is perceived as actions is encoded in the physical brains. Dog and cat lovers are frequently delighted by the intelligence they see in the eyes and memory of their pets. These animals seem to have an awareness of "being"that mimics our own. 

The development from nothing by God of his creation is recorded as "days" in Genesis and the first humans are welcomed into paradise, the garden.The bodies and their control unit, the brain, are for God a logical development from his first spark of light over millions of earthly time but the only souls, human, are taken from himself images and likenesses of his perfection that receive their "being" at the moment of conception and thus mankind is created body and soul. Both body and soul are God's creation and thus we all have intelligence to encounter our Creator and intelligence to understand how to use our freedom to justify his image and likeness and become  joy to his Being.

God himself told Adam to avoid the fruit that brought with it knowledge of Good and Evil. Adam's freedom allowed him the choice. Solomon prayed for the Wisdom to know the difference. St Paul knows that all the human beings are created to be holy and Jesus confirms that he has broken the power of Satan but also leaves us in the Freedom that was misused as soon as mankind was left alone in the Garden.

Dear Lord you know how the power of "intelligence" has led and still leads many of us away from the "pearl" that is true Wisdom. Let this "purity of  conscience" be fed by your grace and let my soul only know your will and my actions follow your ways to the Good that you are. May, Mary who knows you and your ways better than any of us help us to find our own ways of being with Jesus who is with us to the end of time and let us all in Heaven, in Purgatory and  on Earth make our own prayers and petitions to Father, Son and Holy Spirit. 

 29/07/2023

The Universe, God's Creation, is spectacular in its vastness of time and space which is a "Big Bang"growing ever-greater. Within this observable creation there is nothing greater or more spectacular than the hybrid body and soul called Man who can look at the Universe and begin to name the stars. 

Mankind in his flesh is the summit of creation but there is something within his body that is greater than the Universe. Each soul is a potentially perfect and everlasting spirit that has been created to know, love and cooperate with the Lord our God and to share His Joy in the "Good" that is creation.

Our body is the reality God has given to each of us to do his will on earth. The stages of Creation, the days of  "Genesis", has within it much to be studied but the peak, the highest form of bodily life is mammalian. We share our bodily structure with all other mammals and with them depend on blood to circulate through our bodies all that keeps us alive.

Abraham understood this. He knew that the Creator had to be acknowledged, and thanked for so great a gift as the vastness of the heavens and the power of being that was contained in his own puny body. He was touched by God's Love and knew the need to respond. He knew that there was nothing that could be given to the Creator that matched the wonder of his life and the depths of the gratitude that he felt.

The renewal of the Covenant that took place on Mt. Sinai had to be sealed by the offering by Mankind of Life in its totality. It was the blood of our fellow mammals, the highest form of earthly life that Moses gave back to IAMIAM for he had revealed to Abraham that he could not accept the sacrifice of a human being.

The Being that is God does not exist in created time. He knew then as he knows now that he himself as Son would give up his own human flesh and blood, begotten of the Virgin Mary and that he would accept it and return it as mercy and our Spiritual Food.

Dear Lord, let my words be found by others for they are the sincerity of my soul. May the prayers of Mary who now understands in its fulness the purpose for which she has been created lead all the Angels and saints in the joyful, never ending moment that is the worship of Father, Son and Holy Spirit, the moment for which we have all been created.

 28/07/2023

The truth of Scriptures is the Holy Word of God spoken first to Adam in the Garden and confirmed to Moses in the wilderness of Sinai, We are all created  in the earthly reality of our being to recognize and praise God. God is portrayed as "jealous". 

He knows and is the only Being that exists of itself . The laws of the Cosmos are the never changing "code"that is integral to and inseparable from all material being. The greatest to smallest distances of time and space can never change. Mankind can observe them and understand how their being is organised but he can never control them.

God shares his being with mankind but limits our freedom within the vastness of the Universe to his will which wants only holiness for his children. He knows that human freedom is capable of great deeds within the Physical Universe but wants us to maintain our souls within the Holiness of Love.

We can do this only by accepting that our bodily and mental acts have to always remain within the limits of Love revealed on Sinai. Within the millions of seconds of earthly life that is our opportunity to know, love and serve, our souls have to know only Father, Son and Holy Spirit, and confirm this Faith by the deeds of our freedom that conform willingly to the will of God as revealed to Moses and fully realised by Jesus of Nazareth, Son of the Father, True God from True God, Begotten not Made, of one being with the Father through whom all things were made.

Jealous? Only that within the Glory of his being not one of us should destroy the rich soil that has been fertilized by the humility of so Glorious and Loving a Creator. God wants us to cling fast to him not because he is "Jealous" of any created being but because of his Love for us he cannot let us destroy our souls that are "Image and Likeness of himself, a Glorious Creation. God is total Mercy.

Dear Lord help me this day to be without sin and let my sorrow for all the sinful waste of your gift of life be sincere and never fading. May Mary whose faultless care of the baby that you were must have filled her soul with a unique Love pray with all Saints that your Loving Mercy break open the crusted top soil that keeps the seeds that you sow from entering so many hearts in this world.

 27/07/2023

"Man does not live by bread alone but by every word that comes from God." The history of the Israelites wanderings is filled with fantastic events that are hard to believe really happened. The whole of the Revelation of the Old Testament consists of events that challenge belief. During his preparation in the desert Jesus answered the temptation to change stones into bread using the quotation from the Old Testament that immediately came into my mind when I was confronted with the First Reading of today's mass.

How can it be that the "People of God" could ever backslide after witnessing the Revelation on Mt Sinai?How could they ever lose sight of God who has never completely withdrawn his care, his "targeted providence" from them? 

The New Testament is the commentary on the completion by the Word of the events known in the Beginning. It is too short to be a "live broadcast" Jesus, the Word of God is with us and is welcomed first by Mary who accepted the message of an Angel. God is something greater than Spirit but has his Providence enacted by Angels and Humans and gives each individual Human the freedom to accept or deny his revealed will for us.

So, why do I struggle to believe the Thunder, Clouds and Lightening of Mount Sinai? I have no trouble in accepting and believing without quibble the record of  conception, the miracles of his life, death in torment and Resurrection of the Son that is the New Testament, the record of events much more beyond human understanding than those of the Old. Could it be that Jesus' message is directed to each little one of us and need not be filtered by a Worldly human institution be it Nation or Church?

Dear Lord you know that I am troubled in my heart by the fear of arriving at the end of this life consumed with fear, the result of guilt. May I be accepted into your mercy and allowed to suffer here or in Purgatory as penance for all the sins that I have committed during my life. May Mary lead all of Heaven in prayer for your Mercy to be shown to and accepted by all the struggling souls on earth and may all sinners and Holy Souls be truly penitent and know that you are our God.

 26/07/2023

The Israelites had become dissatisfied with their wanderings which seemed to be going nowhere. It is probably not true that they were totally without food. They had left Egypt with their livestock and were living like the Bedouin of the desert so they were loth to use their capital, their flocks, to meet their daily needs. 

We are living in a world that is crammed full of people but lacking the Israelites communal sense of the nearness of God. In the empty desert  they became aware of the Glory of God but they lacked consistency. God kept his side of the Covenant with descendants of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob but only the heart of Moses and Aaron were fully open to receive his grace. Thus the people soon slipped away from the dedication that following the ways of IAMIAM always demands.

Jesus' sower is looking to grow individual ears of corn. We are born to be persons who know God, who know that we are created as a soul which is a being, an "IS" that only I am, and known as such by Father, Son and Holy Spirit. We are in a new relationship with God. Jesus did not come to renew a covenant with a people. He is with us to save the souls of individuals who are the "rich soil" of his parable.

There is only one "truly" rich soil among all the created souls that have ever lived or will ever live on this Earth. The Daughter of Joachim and Anna is a perfect human being, the "rich soil" out of which the seed that is God will fill the Earth with grace for the souls that in their individual worship become united into the unseen "Mystical Church"of Christ's sacrificed and resurrected body.

Dear Lord, forgive me my trespasses and guard me in the shadow of your wings. It is too hard for me to look at the institutional Church and know that it is You on Earth. My prayers and meditations may be wrong headed but they are my sought for sincerity. May Mary whose parents are remembered by Peter's Church today pray that that Institution separates itself from her worldliness and return to the desert where Jesus, Moses and  the Baptist prepared to do your will on Earth.

 25/07/2023

Today's Psalm communicates the joy that we have all felt especially in our youth when with a clear conscience  we go about our daily tasks. It is not too hot or too cold, the sun is shinning brightly and we cycle off to school, or to work just happy to be alive..

St Paul speaks of a more lasting joy that he has and that we too can share by accepting that our lives are the gift of God , that we are weak vessels but that our prayers are all heard and that we build up a community of faithful souls that will be with the Risen Lord.

Only Jesus has been the perfect man and only his mother the perfect woman. It is only too easy to see the earnestness of the mother of James and John as she approaches Jesus with her two sons. Those two must have been embarrassed by the forwardness of their mother who was treating them as they would always be in her eyes, her children. For her part, she was not letting, "that Peter" or his brother get in front of her sons in the race for power in that new Kingdom that Jesus was to establish.

For us today that incident from 2,000 years ago is easily understood as a wrong expectation on the part of all the disciples. Just as the mother of James and John did, they anticipated that the "Kingdom" of  his teaching was to be a worldly one, as the "Messiah" was to an earthly ruler. 

We hear everything that Jesus says and does in the Gospels in the light of the Resurrection. The Gospels themselves were also finalised in this same light. But at the time the mother of James and John sought an advantage for her sons no-one except Jesus himself knew where the wandering Rabbi was to take them.

Dear Lord, only you are and were on earth the perfect man. Apostles soon became bishops and had to administrate an earthly organisation rather than continue to lead us on the spiritual path that leads to the Eternal Life of Heaven. The only historical time we can look back to as an example of a Perfect Church is when you walked with us. I pray that with the help of your Mother praying through the Holy Spirit I can become closer to you and fulfill my place in this creation of  "Our Father". Amen

 24/07/2023

The Exodus of the whole people, Israel, from Egypt is not the only mass movement of tribes recorded in human history. Something like it is still happening with terrible results for many of the would be migrants.The Old Testament interprets the Providence of God mainly in human terms and attributes to God human emotions. Today an irritated IAMIAM prepares to answer the murmurings of his people by creating a path through the sea for them to follow to safety and to teach the Egyptians a lesson. 

The justified anger displayed by Jesus in the Temple when he confronted the money changers and animal sellers was as part of his "true man" as were his bodily needs, but Father, Son and Holy Spirit are only Love; not the human sentimental love of the fluttering heart or the desire of the fluttering eyelids but the steady flow of goodwill and encouragement we have for our children. God wants the best for his children.

Jesus is not a "sign" that comes from God. He is the "best" that God wills for us. We must know him  from the scriptures and follow his example of the "Golden Rule". We have to consider others' needs before our own we have to do this in our lifetimes for this is the "best" and only chance we can ever be given. Jesus is our salvation.

In the Gospel, the devout among the Scribes and Pharisees have cornered Jesus as a mass of modern  journalists might corner a politician or celebrity and hope to distract him into a misjudged comment. Jesus does not debate with them or with us. 

It is when we are without belief in our own faith; it is when we do not trust the message that is in our own created being, it  is when a "but"begins to answer a "hard saying" that we ask for a sign from God and join the ranks of scribes and pharisees whose pride and self-love leads them to challenge God to his face. Their rejoinder to God's self manifestation is " You say you are God. OK? Prove it!!"There is a very simple "best" that God requires from us all and that is an unconditional "yes"to his revelation of his Being revealed in Jesus' life, death and Resurrection.

Dear Lord let my being be always ready to accept your will for me. Let my acceptance be unclouded by selfishness. I truly atone for my sins but have been driven out of the Church you founded on Peter. Is it possible that I can still be in a Church that is founded on your Love and Mercy. A Church which is truly your Mystical Body on Earth and thus uncontaminated  by any sin?

 23/07/2023

St Paul assures us that even though we sometimes feel that we are an empty shell, alone in an empty but echoing void and have no ways of either understanding our loneliness that is also longing, nor communicating the beings, our emptiness still is, to  God, who is always present. Father Son and Holy Spirit never lose sight of us and in the person of the Holy Spirit will always bring us the words to pray for and accept the merciful Love that is the Trinity of Persons and oneness of being, one God.

Today Jesus speaks of the devil. I do not think that I am alone in being bothered by this personification of my disobedience to the Will of God during my lifetime. Jesus defeated the power of Satan during the space of time he was in the tomb. We can see the corpse on the cross but we cannot see into the tomb until the Mary of yesterday's mass-reading accosts the gardener "Sir, if you have taken him away where have you put him".

As a baptised child, I was always aware of my sins. I lied and stole. I disobeyed my parents. This was always explained to me in my tearful contrition as "giving in" to the temptation of the Devil. But I knew then and still know now that the petty sins of childhood and the more serious sins of teenage and adulthood were all of them my own doing. 

We have all been created to freely co-operate in the Holiness of the Creator who was left in the temporary tomb on Good Friday. There is no doubt that he was dead, spices were left to disguise the decay of the flesh of the true man, begotten not made.  On Sunday morning that body was the new life of the Resurrection. The devil's power was broken but why is it that we are still sinful humanity. The Evergreater God has no evil in him we are all created to live in his holiness on this Earth and to "shine like the sun in the kingdom of our Father". May Our Lady and all the Saints help us in our weakness!!

Dear Lord let my ears hear the words that are life. I want to be with you for I know that there is nothing without you and more than nothing if I refuse the grace that you pour out on me and all sinners. The devil has no power to force me into sin and the freedom I do have is in your image and likeness. Strengthen Lord my weaknesses and let your Mother Mary and all the Saints pray with me that I may refuse the multitude of Sin that fills our world to the extent of controlling every second of time that should be devoted to you.

 22/07/2023

Today's mass readings commemorate St Mary Magdalen. We know her name as she is one of the three Maries who stayed with St John at the foot of the cross where hung the lifeless corpse of Jesus. She was overcome by her grief and only aware of the vast emptiness that had filled her being in the presence of the bloody and disfigured  body of her dead Master.

All the disciples had suffered along with their Rabbi. We too suffer like a "dry and weary land without water" when we become separated from our Saviour who was tortured throughout the horror of  Good Friday until the unimaginable pain that called out "Eli, Eli lama sabachthani", a greater desolation than any human being could ever experience.

For the people who saw, spoke and ate with the Risen Lord there is always mystery in this unique experience. They see him, do not recognise him and then really do recognise all in the same moment. The disciples remembrances of the Resurrection are in no way redacted to present the spectacular Apocalyptic Visions of an Ezekiel or a Daniel. They are authentic in the minimalism of  the awe they portray.

The witnesses see a reality that is beyond human belief. Their brains at first refuse the data presented by their eyes but this data is simultaneously converted by the eyes of Faith to be the supreme event of human history. They can only worship. Today's witness, Mary Magdalen calls out "Rabbuni" as her being is responds to the Glory that is the Lord.

This "Glory" is still with us today. God's resurrected reality is the Blessed Sacrament. 

This is why Peter's Church has got never to ignore its own failings and pray to be filled with holy priests who really do join Jesus in the confecting of the Blessed Sacrament. We all have to fill our beings with Love and drive out Devil, World and Flesh but without Sacraments that are doubtlessly authentic we are hindered rather than helped by descendants of those who not only witnessed the Risen Lord but were also commissioned by him and entrusted with the confecting and care of the Sacrament.of His Love.

Dear Lord, I know that at this moment I am sincerely "lifting my mind and heart to you". I also know that, in a moment of temptation, this faithful love can disappear from my being as it has done in the past. It is up to me to curb whatever human pride I have as I re-read my prayers and to trust the "eyes of Faith"to keep me focused on knowing, loving and serving. May Mary your Mother who stood with today's Mary suffering along with you as you "bled-out" on the cross continue to pray with her and all the saints that as the lance pierces your heart, the blood and water of forgiveness and Mercy pour out over the dry and weary land that is today the greater part of your Church. Save us dear Lord!

God has had no beginning and will have no end. The Universe that we live in was created literally before time began. For our God everything is the infinity of now. All matter has no freedom but in its Being is contained by the material limits set by our God. Science is the attempt to understand physical matter. 

Science is man's attempt to understand God's rules for matter. Man is God's creation to share in the Glories that he knows are Good. The Scriptures record God's reaching out to the World and man's failures to accept and reciprocate that Love. We can blame God for letting Evil into the Garden, but this Creation, this Universe, this Being is only Good. Evil the "serpent" is Adam's excuse for his personal disobedience. Every "no" we say to God creates more of the same evil. 

God could have programmed us as he has programmed all animals to be what they are with no choice in the matter. Dogs always are perfect dogs. Thank God for the perfection of their being The material that is our bodies is programmed but the "image and likeness", our souls, share in God's total Power. We are not programmed to fulfill a role in preordained providence. We have our "freedom" to imitate God's Love in a world that we fill with evil by the "nos" our freedom flings into the face of God. Christ is God's completion of this Creation. He presents God's merciful forgiveness to each of us. 

We have to accept this Love for what it is and remember constantly that the Son of Man is not only the "Master of the Sabbath" but also that he is our support in every second of World Time. Why would anyone choose to refuse the Love of so great a Saviour.? Let our answers only be "Yes" to God and thus cooperate to remove evil from this World.

Dear God, you know that I have nothing to sacrifice except myself. Help me to live in your Mercy and let me search "for every word that comes from your mouth". How can I atone for all the "nos" I have uttered to you? I cannot be afraid as you are all Loving. May the prayers of Mary who, fed and cared for you the Creator of life in your Incarnation, continue to reach your pierced heart and let  floods of Mercy drown out the wickedness produced by the disobedience of all the world.

 20/07/2023

Today Moses receives the beginning of the revelation of IAMIAM. God tells us all that he is. He tells us that he is Being. He is no abstract idea. He is not the "idea" of God. I am a limited consciousness who knows that I am one of billions of others. I am nobody's idea and neither is God. I eat and drink because I have a body. God loves and creates because he is total being and being is Good. 

That's what he does and we are the results and agents of his being. We are created to be Good in his image and likeness. We cannot change God but our limited freedom and surprising abilities can challenge him and we, God's children, stamp our feet in arrogance and childish rage to show to the vastness of God  of what our specks of being are capable.

In the real world created by God, we are only really capable of worship and returning love to the Other our creator and the Others those with whom we share place and time.The combined intelligences of humans has produced knowledge and technical abilities that are able to manipulate matter to the extent that the cloning of a human body is happening somewhere in the world right now.The actions of the human brain have been copied into artificial intelligences that are already interacting with human beings.

It is forcibly claimed that, our bodies are our own possessions and to be used as we wish. It is really a wonderful thing to be human. "Look at us God", we shout, we can cure the sick, we can make the lame walk, we can prevent the birth of the unwanted. Who needs anything from you? Look at our cities! Look of the control we have over our environment!  Look how we are not obliged to you for anything. Don't we know better than you what sex we are? Look at our charities that care for the less fortunate than ourselves. Who needs you?  Those of us who try to be the children of heaven are scoffed at and despised. We are considered to be weaklings and hypocrites who are a danger to the rest of humanity.

It is the pride of humanity that has always misused the gift of life.We wallow in a swamp of materialism and forget that our true life is our soul. However, no matter how much we fill our consciousness with this world, we all will have to face the reality that our loving Father, Son and Holy Spirit has prepared for us as we breathe our last breath.

Dear Lord, let me calm down in the face of earthly conflicts that take up my consciousness and waste my time. Let me strive only to accept your providential care and let my life be in knowing loving and serving, never forgetful that you not only know me but also have experienced directly the dilemmas of human freedom and the pain of death. May my prayers and the prayers of Mary and all the Saints bring forgiveness to us the sinful on Earth and the Holy Souls in purgatory. Amen!

 19/07/2023

Today's Psalm becomes words to match the awe which we all feel but cannot quite express when we sincerely follow the first commandment; when we grasp in our inmost selves that everything we know and is is a reality that is created for us by Our Father. It is the only physical reality that we will know until the end of time. We know that our earthly lives will come to end and that this worldly reality will also end.

The "Word" came out of a bush to Moses the one chosen to reveal by deeds the greatness of God. From the time of Adam, mankind has continually become absorbed by ourselves and by our own deeds and those of our ancestors. We fill our beings with pride at the depths of our understanding and our time with acquiring earthly goods which we know will rot into the atoms etc that are the components of all matter .

God is a non consuming flame in a shrub.  He is IAMIAM. He fills the being of Moses and drags him back to the covenants he has made with his ancestors' ancestors. God is never changing. God revealed in the flame is God of the prophets. God is compassion and love in the psalm. He is Jesus on the Cross and he is the real Presence in the Sacrament of the Altar.

Although the providence of Father, Son and Holy Sprit had enabled human development  by the time of Moses the chosen people needed to be reminded of who they were. They had to know that they were children who would be blessed by humbly accepting that God is their Father. Since the time of Moses the whole of God's care and our response has been recorded by the witness of Prophets, Evangelists, in both Old and New Testaments.  

Jesus tells us today that we do not need to be "learned" to know him and love him. Moses stood in bare feet on the "Holy Ground". Mary of Bethany sat at his feet. Jesus washed the feet of the Apostles. We can all fulfill the First Commandment by the simple act of putting it first in our lives. "Do I accept or reject God's will for me"? Am I the child that Our Father has created me to be? 

Dear Lord on the cross you gave Mary to be our Mother in the person of St John. This is another unending truth given to us by Our Father. May we all become children of heaven and may our lives become a mirror of your compassion and love until we leave them to accept the judgement of heaven, praying always for the Mercy and forgiveness that is your free gift to all who seek it.

 18/07/2023

I am responsible for myself. I am the only one created being that knows myself from the inside. God reveals himself to the countless number of souls that fill our world and we all have to answer to his scrutiny when the time comes. 

In today's Gospel, Jesus' "hard sayings" continue  by identifying specific locations which had not given the correct affirmative response to his proclamation of the "Kingdom of God"; they will face severe judgement on the "last day". Hanging on the cross, however, he prays for his executioners "Father forgive them for they know not what they do".

Living today in the world that continues to grow but where Capernaum and the rest have become the objects of Archaeology, I know that the "Word still stands". I know that "in the beginning was the Word". I also know that the Father knows "every hair on your head" and we are created out of Love that is Father Son and Holy Spirit.

The events of this day that are happening now throughout the world, that have ever happened and will happen are the result of the free/undetermined / unprogrammed  interactions of billion of souls to themselves, to each other, the situations they have found themselves in and to God's revelation of himself. 

There is no intelligence, born or artificial, that can understand the vastness of  God's Providence but we can all know something far greater than all our world and its history, namely that it will not go hard with any one of us if we listen to God's Love as revealed to Moses and accept the forgiveness that is Jesus' life, death and resurrection.

Dear Lord, help me to continue this life never forgetting that to be in the vastness of your Glory is the sole aim of my being and that you lead me and all the souls of the world there for you are the way the truth and the life. We are not alone for you are still present with us to the end of time and Mary and all the Saints continue to help us and the Holy Souls with endless their endless prayers and petitions.

 17/07/2023

Our God is a loving father who by his care for us has enabled humanity to swell in numbers and knowledge to the extent that mere children can at a click of a mouse button access the whole record of time. The fruits of life-times of scholarly work can be accessed by speaking to our machines.

The Exodus of the descendants of Israel and his people from Egypt happened about three and half thousand years ago. The world is such a different place now but the problems faced by God's chosen people are still the same today and the solutions are also the same.

We all want to be secure to live our lives fulfilling our own needs and those of our families. In short we all want to live in peace. God takes special care of the descendants of Abraham in the Old Testament. He still does and in so doing presents us with the ever deepening problem of understanding his providence.

Jesus  in the "hard sayings" recorded in this morning's Gospel is not the loving teacher of the Sermon on the Mount, he is rather the stern task master feared in the parable of the talents. He presents us with harsh realities that have to be faced by all of us who commit ourselves to him. 

Jesus was totally crucified for us. We cannot be his followers without being totally focused on the will of  Father Son and Holy Spirit to the  extent that we are ready to abandon our own lives and what they entail in an acceptance of our crosses modelled on that of Christ's obedient Love in the Trinity. 

Dear Lord let my today be spent without sin. Let my study be fruitful. Let my prayers be united to those of Mary and the saints of heaven. Let these few words be the true prayer of my heart You who know everything know how confused I become when acting as a witness to your Providence. Help me to understand.

 16/07/2023

Today the Church asks us to think about our response to God's reaching out to us in his creation. The Old Testament contains the history of God's care for the Chosen People. The Father, Son and Holy Spirit nurture the devotion of the Jews and accept the worship they return; the worship of a whole people. Isaiah is gifted by God to speak his "Word" and the message which is the Kingdom of God is heard by all the people. Today that same manifestation of Love is revealed with the same force to all our individual souls. 

St. Paul knows that Creation is still continuing  He is inspired by an intuitive glimpse of what will become "The Big Bang Theory" of our astronomy. He teaches that God's Act of creation is not complete.We too are not complete and our freedom of mind and will is restricted by our bodies. The first step to freedom is to complete our human lives and follow the Word back to its source.

"In the beginning was the Word". Today the Incarnate Word, Jesus, sits and tells us the story of his interaction with us his people on Earth. We have heard it many times. We think that we understand its significance. All the listeners at that time would know the Truth first revealed to  Isaiah and here quoted by Jesus.

Sitting in the boat, he proclaims himself to be the object of all revelation. God does not have secrets that he does not reveal to us in Love. The Word has always been present in creation. We have not been programmed for failure. The "rich soil" is not material potential or deed but the the essential being, the Soul, of everyman controlled by his personal freedom to chose love or death as revealed in the reality of our world, the Providence of God.

Dear Lord, help me to stay true to your word and cultivate the garden that is my being. You know that trying to understanding your material universe has used up the time of many souls and that they have become so enamoured of themselves that their pride has become a rock-like carapace which has to be blasted open if they are to listen. For many of us the edge of the path has become covered in wonderful primroses which we follow wholeheartedly in the quest for bodily pleasure; for others our childhood learned  piety has been choked as we have become adults devoted to these "adult" pleasures. May Mary and all the saints pray for the inspiration of your Love to inspire our shepherds and gardeners that we the sheep and the soil become fruitful in their service to you and care for us. But most of all "forgive us our trespasses as we forgive all others" so that we can become again the " beloved little children" in the dust at your feet.

 15/07/2023

Always I have to face the fact that within myself, my selfish ego is what I really am. Without warning it  bursts out of my awareness of self control and literally screams for recognition. This is an affront to God who has already forgiven me for the sins by which I have added to the Sin which crucified Jesus and continues to overcome all my best intentions.

God speaks to each of as an individual. First of all, all of the "egos" interacting within creation have to bow down before God the Creator of us all. Joseph accepts his brothers and praises God for the good that has come out of their sin. The "good" that Joseph recognises is the fruitfulness of his family in the world in which God has brought him to power and wealth. Within this success, however, the brothers are continuing the deception that brought the "blessing" to Jacob/Israel and they repeat another false testimony.

Jesus tells each of us in our sinful egos that God is aware of everything that we have ever done. All of the seconds of our lives up to now live on in the Evergreater from whom nothing is hidden as was the hairlessness of Jacob's arms hidden from Isaac. 

He is the only one that we should "fear" in our lives for the "Good" he brings, he is Father, Son and Holy Spirit, is not confined to "generations" or any other manifestation of worldly success. We have to proclaim our faith from the rooftops to be sure of the only Eternal Good, the Love to be found in Heaven.

Dear Lord, let me not waste the time that I have before me. Help me to do your will and let me have no resentments against any other soul so that the way of your forgiveness to me is not blocked by my sinful self. May Mary who has only ever known you before anything and whose will has always been in perfect alignment with you lead the souls of heaven in the prayer that will convert all the souls living on earth away from sinful materialism and bring into the light and life of your loving revelation to us.

 14/07/2023

The people to whom Our Lord preached during his time on earth were mostly familiar with the events we read about/listen to in the the First Readings at mass and with the lyrical praise of God that is the Psalm. Their minds were prepared to receive a new message from God who had been worshipped and pondered upon for more than a thousand years previously by their ancestors.

This was a help and a hindrance to our Lord. The wishy washy among his people could be easily swayed by Jesus' person and his miracles. The fully devoted were another story. They had been meticulous followers of the Law of Moses and had devoted their whole beings to the yearly round of feasts and the worship in the Temple. 

They, who had spent years studying the Scriptures, could not possibly accept the "blasphemies" uttered by this uneducated carpenter's son from Galilee, where "Jews" dwelt among Samaritans and idolatrous pagans. Pigs were even herded there; "what good could come out of Galilee?"

Jesus knows that it will be an impossible task to reveal the Single Being IAMIAM as Father, Son and Holy Spirit to the rock solid monotheists that He, the Father and Holy Spirit had loved and guided with such providential care. The human pride at their chosen place had long since captured their beings and they are indeed still a "stiff-necked" race.

Jesus in today's Gospel prepares the Apostles for the hatred that will be stirred up by their message of Truth. It is not Jesus who brings the horror of bloody strife into families and nations. The evil is created within the individuals who do not accept the peace that Jesus offers to the whole world. Each of our souls by not saying "yes" to Father Son and Holy Spirit" has refused "peace", has brought evil into our being and it is this evil that reacts  to create the horrors of sinful life that we blame on anybody but ourselves.

Dear Lord, I know that I am responsible for my own sinfulness and humbly seek pardon. I know that your merciful forgiveness is a free gift won for us on Calvary but we have to accept punishment in this world or the next. May my soul always be open to the mercy that is won for us by the prayers of Mary and all the saints and may my opportunities to study your ways as interpreted by men on earth not be lost to sloth.

 13/07/2023

We all have to live in the world at the time we are born. We all have to accept our lives as they are provided by God. Jacob's sons had feared the late arrival, Joseph, and that his place in his father's heart would result in their loss of birthright. Rueben and the rest were not filled with delight the moment they were born at the prospects of the wealth they would inherit, but as they grew to manhood they learned to accept what they had the use of as their own and grew fearful at the potential loss.

All that we see, hear, touch, taste and smell in our World is the result of God's Providence. There is nothing that surrounds us that is intrinsically evil. The only place where there is sin is within us for our first ancestors Adam and Eve chose to disobey God. Our Father has continued in his care for us and although displeased with the sin we compound with excuses and self delusion has always been able bring good out of even the worst moments created by us his creatures.

Before Christ the record of God's dealings with his people is full of such events that illustrate that we should never believe that God has abandoned us. The evils that befell Joseph were directly caused by the jealousy of his brothers. The same evils were to be compensated for by his rise to eminence in the Court of Pharaoh and the ultimate rescuing of his family from famine.

I don't think that there are any miracles or named converts recorded from the first mission ordered by Jesus. Some of those who had been sent were undoubtedly still alive when the Gospels were written. The Gospels only name very few others than the Apostles. The blind man Bar Timaeus comes to mind and of course Lazarus Martha and Mary.

Jesus is the final totality of what God has done for us to convert our sinfulness to the perfection that God saw when he knew that "It was good". His message is clear but we are still far from the perfection that he gave to us. We have to pray for the grace to break the ties of the all encompassing material world which begins to stifle our souls very soon after Baptism.

Dear God, we follow your lead and pray" lead us not into temptation" but you know how easily evil snowballs from my petty selfishness and pride. All things are nothing, all men are no greater than the Souls which we smother in our thoughtless vanity and pride. May Mary continue to lead all the heavenly throng to save us from the human failings that they know not by deed but by their experience of life in the world which grows more and more sinful as times passes. 

 12/07/2023

Today I am struggling to find how to begin this reflection on the mass readings. But that is not important. The reason why I am doing this is what is important, not its results. I am trying to become honest in the sight of God. 

The Old Testament is witness to God's Providential care of his chosen people and I am, as usual, upset by the favouritism which God  displays to the Jews and to some individuals amongst them. I can't begin to think what this favouritism has meant to the millions of other created souls which have not received this free gift from the Father.

There is always something greater than what we read, see or experience in our present lives. For my own part, I cannot understand why I have not been obliterated for my being has always been corrupted by sin and yet I am now sitting happily reading what is coming on to the screen from my heart via my fingertips, keyboard and CPU.

These moments where I face my woefully inaccurate perception of God is my place in the Universe and God's gift 12/07/2023. I am 82 years of experience of human life and hope for nothing more in this world than a painless and dignified end to life. 

I am still able, thank God, to strive to understand all that God has revealed via his Apostles, Saints and most of all by the being, words and deeds of "my beloved Son with whom IAM well pleased." It is this ambition that enables me to type "happily" and find joy in every word that comes from the Father .

Dear Lord let me become the man that you created me to be and let our Mother and all the saints join me  in my plea for forgiveness and mercy. Let me receive the Holy Spirit and follow your guidance in these my last days on earth.

 11/07/2023

St Benedict tried to live his life in a literal adherence to the words of Jesus. He was not the first to try and he will not be the last. The abandonment of all mundane ties that are God's gift in his providence to all of us is no easy matter for they have come to us from God. It is still you, me, St Peter and all the Saints who make that decision. Very few of those individuals who make the right choice are chosen.

Jesus is not a hard taskmaster. He told us in Sunday's Gospel that his "yoke is easy and his burden is light". Peter pleads for some recognition for himself and his fellow disciples. Jesus again emphasises that he is revealing to us the Kingdom of Heaven. There is no Kingdom of God on earth. We live in God's Providence but we, each of us, have to answer that direct connection that Father, Son and Holy Spirit makes to us.

"He keeps his help for honest men, He is the shield of those whose ways are honourable". The solidarity of humanity, the Communion of Saints, the True Presence of Christ founded by Jesus on earth very soon slipped to become  the Mundane Power of the Papacy and it has degenerated further ever since. St Benedict tried to reestablish the direct contact that the Apostles had with Jesus.

His prayer filled community was not founded to do all the wonderful human things for which his Order is rightly renowned and praised. St Benedict, St Anthony, the Little Flower and all the Saints throughout their lives on earth refused to become enmeshed by their family, institutional Church, or Nation and so  are now part of the Kingdom of God that is not of this world.

Dear Lord help me to live another day without sin. Keep the ordained members of your Church free from sin so that we sinners have confidence that the Sacraments they administer are truly your Real presence on earth. May the prayers of Mary and all the saints unite to bring your Mercy to all us sinners on Earth and those Holy Souls thankfully awaiting your pardon in Purgatory.

 10/07/2023

Throughout recorded time God has captured the being of some individuals. They have become, body and soul, tied to the the Lord and have consequently received great gifts from God's providence. Such are the Old Testament patriarchs and prophets. There are some saints who also had this direct line from God and shone in this world with God's love.

Jacob saw in his dream/vision a constant traffic of angels between heaven and earth. He accepted the truth of what he had seen and named the rock on which he had rested his head, House of God, Bethel. He also named the place Gate to Heaven but there is no mention of Heaven as being the destination with God that is the purpose of our lives.

Jesus comes to fulfill the Law not to change it. He constantly stresses that his Kingdom is not of this world. The genealogies with which Mark and Luke begin their memoirs of  their lives with Jesus emphasise the continuity of God's revelation. Every human being is a descendant of the created Adam and Eve. We are all born with their sin and saved by the Will of the Father through the suffering of the eternally begotten Son whose bodily being can be traced back to, Adam. 

At a religious gathering some time ago I remember a now Archbishop saying that the Church we have got today is what God wants his Church to be. It is God's Providence that allows the whole of creation to be as it is. The Bishop was being clever along the lines of another prelate's reported "we don't do religion". 

I have never had dreams of angels. I can be as cynically "clever" as our witty and worldly prelates but I do know that Jesus was never "clever"or cynical and that he, together with Father and Holy Spirit, have trusted us to live lives of holiness and that yet again we are proved by our own sins and  the deeds of men who have been called to feed us sheep, unworthy of that trust. 

Dear Lord may my soul be undamaged by sin, my heart be turned only to you and my will focused on doing only your will.  Save thy people from unholy Clerics and let the bounteous results of Mary's, together with all the saints, prayers bring the change that is needed if your Church is to be your real presence on earth.

 09/07/2023

In trying to live the rest of my life in harmony with the teachings of Jesus and guided by the accrued wisdom that is in the readings from Scripture chosen by the Church to be part of the Liturgy, sometimes I realise how very little I know. The reading from Zechariah is obviously chosen as it can be read as an anticipation of Jesus' entry into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday.The scholars call this type of reference to Jesus found in the Old Testament a "type". But I know nothing about the times and the prophet himself.

St Paul is himself. His conversion is not a "type"; it is the real thing. He is a living person who has had the anointed King whose kingdom is not of this world, Jesus the Messiah thrust into his very being.  God's Kingdom is not part of our physical universe. Our physical bodies are programmed by our instincts. Christ has brought the Holy Spirit into our lives and now our souls are supported directly by God. It is this Spiritual Self that should direct our lives, overcoming our instincts if they lead us away from the Kingdom of Heaven. 

Jesus is also not a "type" but the real thing. Father, Son and Holy Spirit. IAMIAM. His body is not created but begotten in the same way as all other bodies except that Theotokos, Mary, was herself eternally protected from original sin. The fulness of God's Being is unknowable but for us who come to him with the weakness and trust of a toddler for his/her mother he is always Our Father who has "compassion for all of his creatures" for "he is gentle and humble in heart". 

Dear Lord may I be sustained throughout this day in Hope, Faith and Charity. May I become able to genuinely put all my trust in you. May all sinners accept the mercy which you offer to all mankind. May these prayers be added to those of Mary and all the Saints that forgiveness which never can be earned by our own efforts fall like St Therese' "roses" from heaven with the Mercy that is Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

08/07/2023

Today's reading presents us with a stark choice. Do we accept Jacob's deception of his aged father as justified in the eyes of God or is it on a par with Adam's sin, another disobedience to add to the pain of Calvary that is endured to enable sinful man to return to the arms of the Father?

A Latin phrase from the Easter Vigil that has stayed in my mind since I was an altar-boy is "felix culpa". The magnitude of the Incarnation, the Choice by God to take on flesh and become true man, begotten not made is a result of sin brought into creation by Adam and this "sin" is fortunate for us because we now have the opportunity to live our lives freed from sin by choosing to live in the grace of God, which so much greater than man's disobedience.

The first sin of Adam is from that time forward stamped on the beings of all of us. Jacob's life even with the "blessing" he stole is still lived in God's providence with the constant need to obey or disobey; to chose life or death. Isaac's "blessing" is a prayer of hope to God, it is not a "coded program" to predetermine life.

God has truly blessed us with the ability to determine objective right from wrong. Many of us, however,  have become gods to ourselves and claim as our own the right to decide on the sole basis of  personal choice. "My body my choice" is their unthinking rebuff into the face of the Crucified Christ.

The disciples of John asked Jesus about "fasting". Jesus' objective answer is that there is no need for sorrow for his disciples are with him, he is the new wineskin that is Father Son and Holy Spirit. The Mystical Body of Christ is the loving unity of all comrades in belief. Some of us are known to each other in the living world, some are known with Mary and all the Saints, but all of us, including the Holy Souls are known intimately by our loving Father who art in heaven. 

Dear Lord, let me hold fast to what is being revealed to me by my prayer. May I be steadfast in my Faith, Hope and Charity and may my prayers be joined with those of your Mother and all the Saints in Heaven. Let your Mercy flow over the Holy Souls and let me too experience total regret for sin that true awareness of your forgiveness brings.

 07/07/2023

Jesus found the world as it was 2000 years ago. He was born as one of the people who had lived with the awareness of God that had been revealed to the Patriarchs and to the Prophets; the prayerful awareness of God that was recorded in the Psalms and the other books of the Old Testament.

It was their awareness of God that prompted the Pharisees to complain about Our Lord's willingness to accept all sorts of people into his company. Jesus is God's last direct intervention into his creation. He is God's Love. He reveals that God is still with us; that sinners can repent and turn to him. He shows to the Pharisees that God is greater than their "Law". He shows them that purity in the heart is more important than the ritual purity they meticulously seek and complain about the lack thereof in others.

Jesus' words in response to the complaint about his table companions prompted me to ask myself; "who are the "virtuous" that Jesus does not need to call ? Were they the priests and regulators of the Temple, the biblical scholars who taught in the Synagogues, the clique that organised the Crucifixion?

The Sacrifice of the Temple was based on the revelation to Abraham that for a man, puny and helpless in the face of the Universe, to make an attempt to thank the unknown creator of the  wonders, in which he knew himself to be a tiny part, by a gift from his possessions was an acceptable act of worship by one "being" in response to his awareness of the "greater being" which surrounded him.

The Good Shepherd knows his sheep and his sheep know him. Jesus knows the virtuous and they know him. There have always been virtuous human beings in the World. God was pleased with all his creation at the moment created time began. 

The virtuous in the gathering in Mathew's Custom house knew and welcomed Jesus with the awe and hope his deeds had inspired. and they attributed the virtue that they could sense in his person to the presence of God. Some of these even wore phylacteries.

Dear Lord let me know you, love you and serve you this day. Let me truly repent for my sins. May Mary help me pray without self-consciousness and pride and let my penitence for past sins bear some grace for the Holy Souls among which there are some of the dead whom were known to me in their lifetimes. Let me accept all that I may meet in your Providence. In the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

 06/07/2023

I do not know the Liturgical Calendar of the Church at all well, so was surprised by today's reading from Genesis. It seems that the story of Abraham and Isaac was used not very long ago. I  commented then  that there is a trend to interpret the the recorded experiences of the Patriarchs as allegories to shape our behaviour and our beliefs. "Don't ever teach your children that God ordered Abraham to kill his own son" thundered one priest that I remember. I can't remember what he preached on Good Friday.

"God will provide the lamb" is Abraham's reply to his beloved but terrified son. On the blackest of nights the world has ever known, the true lamb, also in  a fit of terror, pleads that the horrors that are to be perpetrated upon him be taken away. He also knew then that the Providence of the Father, Abba, is the reality of living as a begotten not made "beloved Son in whom I am well pleased." and he prepares himself for what is to come with the perfect alignment of wills that is the Incarnation.

In his everyday teaching Jesus knew that there was a huge opposition in the persons of the scribes and pharisees. Our Evangelists don't give the organised religious practitioners of their times a very good press but  we must always bear it in mind that the named and unnamed characters who harried our Lord to his death on Calvary, were all human beings and it is to find a way to pardon all of our sins, theirs and ours, that Jesus suffered and died. 

All of the evil being created by man in the Middle East and in the rest of our world today is the result of all sin that was brought into the Garden by the one sin of AdamEve. "Our God provides" but it is up to us to use the gift of freedom wisely and within his boundaries. We pray "thy will be done" and then choose to be sinful rather than wise, Death rather than Life-Eternal. 

Dear Lord each of us has the soul created by you to be part of your Kingdom. Our bodies too are to be resurrected. Mary and all your saints who worship you in heaven pray continually for your grace to shower down on us all on earth and in Purgatory. May this "today" be sinless for me and let my soul be protected by the power of your grace. I pray as always in the Name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.

 05/07/2023

Everything that we know and experience in our lives, past, present and future is provided for us by God for it is He who creates each one of us. Abraham is the ancestor of two great nations, not because he deserved to be but solely because he was chosen by God to be so.

God's providence is in each one of us. Each one of us has an effect on all other being both temporal and spiritual. We are known by God and our freedom from predestined intrinsic spiritual limits separates us from all other animals and is God's gift to us. 

God reveals to each individual that He is the Evergreater Spiritual Being and that we, real persons in this real world, have first of all to know that we are created beings who must "bow down" before him and that we have to always curtail our bodily needs to ensure that what we receive of God's Bounty does not deprive other "adopted children of God".

The mass of material wealth and the awe-inspiring understanding of physical matter, the intricacies of human psychology and social and economic relationships accumulated by mankind in response to Divine Providence has pushed Father, Son and Holy Spirit off the stage of our lives when in fact he is still the much more than the central character in the drama of life on earth. Nietzsche and his followers now know that they were wrong.

Jesus purified the "demoniacs". The pigs, lemming-like, destroyed themselves. The towns-folk like our world then and now, satisfied in its bodily life, was afraid. This town of pagans "en masse" implored Jesus to go away. Sometimes it seems that that is what our Church is doing today.

Dear Lord may my thoughts and words be acceptable to you. May my sins be forgiven. May the prayers of Mary and all the saints bring grace to all men and let we sinners on earth unclutter our minds so that we accept your Truth into our lives for you are merciful and full of love that can bring each of us to the joy and peace that is beyond human understanding.

 04/07/2023

Abraham witnessed the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. God had warned him that the vices enjoyed there were a sin intolerable for him. Each of our sins is intolerable for when we do commit sin we do put our self-love before our love of God. Modern scholars are divided in their opinion as to what exactly was the sin of Sodom.

During my lifetime there has been a trend to make excuses, which then become total denials of the ten Commandments, for "sin". This trend has been so successful that there are very few of us left who accept that "pleasuring our bodies" is sinful. Not only is the use of contraceptives encouraged but they are advertised as adding to the pleasure of sex. 

This trivializing of the roles of man and woman in the creation of new bodies to become the ensouled human beings that God wants us to be has resulted in the concept of same sex marriage. It is now a civil offence to fight and to preach against this totally fruitless unnatural abomination.

Afraid of appearing "judgemental" our Bishops even welcome  the organization which by its very name shouts into the face of God its challenge to the Lord the Giver of Life, into their Cathedrals for "Masses of Mercy" and most of them will preach that the sin of Sodom was not lust but "lack of hospitality".

It was for sinners that Jesus became the Sacrament of his Life, Death and Resurrection. Each one of us has to live by supporting our bodies in this world so that we can attain never-ending life. We have no need of sexual satisfaction except that which results in the fruitfulness by which the world is populated. 

We have to live according to the Law of Moses. We have to " walk towards your Truth" on the "Path of perfection". We can do this for the God perceived to shower down fire and brimstone in his persons of Father, Son and Holy Spirit showers down Love and Mercy to preserve his faithful in the midst of a sinful world and Holy Church disturbed by the sins of Bishops and their unholy cliques.

 03/07/2023

St Thomas, whose Feast Day is celebrated today, is by tradition the bringer of the Good News to India. If this is true, then he is the first bringer of the Good News into a culture that was basically alien to the civilisations of the Mediterranean Sea. It was a culture that was although polytheistic had a core of believe that connected life on earth to supernatural being which was totally spiritual but impersonal.

Saint Thomas' encounter with the risen Lord is totally person to person. Unlike Mary Magdalen he is invited to touch. He does so and we all have it confirmed that the Resurrection is totally physical in this world but at the same time time something greater, for Christ's body is not confined by the laws of physics.

The first heresies were like St Thomas in his initial refusal  to believe the Resurrection and they chose to teach that Jesus was not only a spirit after the Crucifixion but was not even a human body on the Cross. The Incarnation should have driven such fear and denigration of our bodies out of our human consciousness but it is still there.

There is no matter, especially human flesh, that is created to be sinful. God looked on his creation and saw that it was good. We all have freedom in our beings but it is not in our bodies that freedom exists. No-one is free to be alive without breathing, eating and drinking. Jesus, true man and true God could not have nails pierce his body and a lance thrust into his side without bleeding and wounds being left there.

Some paintings of St Thomas accepting Our Lord's invitation to confirm by touching what his ears had heard and his eyes have now seen, this bodily reality that is our Saviour God can cause us to squirm away from their intense realism, but Father, Son and Holy Spirit want us to know that " the beloved Son in whom I am well pleased"is still with us and still in the flesh he begot from Mary. . 

The only way we can come to the rooms God has prepared for us is to use our freedom to become thankful and obedient in this life and be in our bodies knowing that from the day we are born they begin to decay and  that the inevitable dust and ashes we become have the potential to become like the Resurrection a glorious New Life. 

An impossible dream for mankind but, Jesus is with us so it will happen if we remain true to "Our Father" whom we have not seen but still believe.

Dear Lord I have to thank you for these moments of inspiration which I know to come from you. I am never free from sin and sometimes feel too pleased with myself but with Mary's prayers  I know that  I can face my end without fear. Lord keep me strong in my last days for without your help I know that my best intentions cannot keep me from the primrose path of bodily delights in this world. Let me become by my death the inspiration to others that I have not been in my life.

 02/07/2023

The Church begins her liturgy for today with a call for celebratory joy. It is the joy that is felt by sports fans when their team wins, by parents when we know that our children are well and happy, by the Apostles when they could hold it in their hearts that Jesus is resurrected for ever.

It is joy that we may feel as we put our faith into practice. I say "may" for sometimes our joy in Christ is held back by knowledge of our continued sinfulness and the vagaries of our reactions to Providence, "Why me O Lord?".

Jesus and the Apostles in the New Testament prepare us for all that we can ever have to face in this world where each of us is responsible for the parts we are assigned by Providence. The Shunamite woman shares her wealth, has the great joy of a promised child and, as did Job, she faces the ups and downs of her life without cursing God.

Jesus is preparing us to live our lives in the Providence of this World but without ever losing sight of our Heavenly Father and His Kingdom of Heaven.We all can find joy in our place in life and feel pride at our personal achievements but we must,all of us, be sure that we will leave all the people and things that have become "our life" behind when we receive the inevitable " promotion to Glory" , the Salvation Army's happy euphemism, for death. 

By the providence of God we have all become part of parents' and offsprings' lives and we have to honour and not drive them to resentment if our own life  is to be "alive for God in Christ Jesus". There  is, however, order to life in creation and in obedience to God's will. Each human being must never forget that God is always first before all that we can know and do. The next in rank is the other person, my neighbour whose needs must always come before my own if "I am to love him as I do myself".

This is also true for mother, father, children and all other people too. We all have this cross to bear. We are our brothers' keeper.

Dear Lord help me to live true to what I am, read, think and write. May Mary who is the only created being to have lived exactly as you will for us all to live, lead all the Saints of Heaven in praise of your Being and in supplication for the divine Mercy that is You, Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

 01/07/2023

Being alive at the time of Abraham meant so many different things in different places and for different people. Abraham  had been given that name by God  thus revealing not only Himself to Abraham but also revealing Abraham to his own personal role in History. 

From the time of Abraham mankind has been able to begin to understand what "life" is all about. Abraham's nomadic life was lived in the deserts of the Middle East which, at that time was one of the regions of the world well populated with urban life, as was China, India, South -East Asia, that had been well organised and is God's Providence for all mankind but which had been unrevealed since the time of the flood and the new beginning from Noah.

Deserts are still empty places on earth and there is a marked absence of trees. Any one who has travelled  off-road through the deserts of the Middle East is aware that any bit of shade at noon to be unoccupied by  herdsmen or other travellers is indeed a rarity. Three travellers are hospitably received by Abraham into the welcoming shade of the Oak at Mamre and God's Providence is revealed as the third beginning for Mankind's life on earth.

The History of the Jewish People is their start stop relationship with God, revelation followed by unrighteousness itself followed by renewal led by Prophets who were inspired by God. Jesus is our final prophet. He himself lived in a far different world than did Abraham but emphasised that God's Law as revealed to Moses and perfected by himself, Son of God, is the way, the truth and the life that will enable each one of us to become the person that is known by Father, Son and Holy Spirit as was Abraham under the Oak at Mamre.

Being alive in the "busyness" of modern times curtails so much of the prayerfulness that Jesus "Could you not watch one hour with me" tells us that is the "better part". I missed my morning meditation yesterday because I was taken up with a dispute about an invoice for a boiler replacement. I don't feel devastated by that but know that I could have been better employed in prayer.

Dear Lord as I grow weaker in body and mind let my soul know that your Love is always here to guide me. Welcoming your Grace into my heart and always being both aware and thankful for the gift of life lived in family love without hardship should be my main concern but often is forgotten. May Mary's prayers bring our Church back to her loving faithfulness that was with you and your disciples as they fulfilled the promises made to Abraham.