14/02/2023

There is never any doubt about the teaching Jesus revealed to his first disciples in Palestine. His message was first to the Jews but the pagans too heard his words and were intrigued and even in awe. We are not given the details of his daily life and sometimes there seem to be contradictions in Gospel accounts. Jesus is reported to have said to those he first cured to tell no-one about the miracle they had received. This would have been a pretty tall order for the manacled maniac from whom Legion was expelled and for the blind who were filled with the joy of sight.

Today, however, Jesus instructs some of his disciples to act as did John the Baptist "to go out and prepare the way for the Lord" he is starting a public awareness campaign. His instructions are clear. Prepare nothing for this first mission. Your brief is to announce that the Lord is close to us; the Kingdom of God is at hand and show this by the poverty of your persons Hold onto nothing but obey and trust. Walk without footwear. Let your feet feel the dust and pebbles between your toes.

These instructions are very far from me in time and completely "odd"for my cultural consciousness. Imagine some scruff coming to the door shoeless, or uninvited into your garden and greeting you with "Peace"and if "peace" is not returned the visitor turns on his heel and goes to do the same at the next house. We call it "cold-calling" today and put notices on our doors to deter the unwelcomed strangers .

I don't think that we had a debriefing in the Gospels about the results brought back or met with on arriving at the towns so prepared. The message to be announced by the 72, however, is for all times. There is never any change in the Love of Father, Son and Holy Spirit. The pagans who heard St Paul and Barnabas, however, have an immediate joyful reaction to the clarity of "I have made a light of you for the nations". This isn't too surprising as the  Apostles were radiant with the certainty of the Resurrection; the way, the truth and the life; God with us. The only light that will never dim.

Dear Lord you know that these thoughts that I have put into words have been found in my heart and I am happy to read them even though I know how unreliable I can be. You never deceive. I have to drop my self concern and strive to follow you today. May the prayers of Mary and all who are with you in Paradise come to my aid now and may the Holy Souls continue to wait in hope that they can truly atone for their sins and thus welcome your Mercy into their hearts.

 13/02/2023

Dear Lord, I can only appeal to you with a sigh that comes straight from the depths of my heart. Jesus was overcome by the persistence of the Pharisees who still wanted a sign even though they were witnessing the incarnation and he sighed a sigh that I can still hear. I am still like them persistent, but for me it is in my non understanding of the Evil which I know is ever present in my being. 

It seems from Genesis that Adam and Eve were not alone in the world which was teeming with animal life and you too were always with them witnessing the crime of Cain, you marked him so that others would not harm him. I have to ask you why you did not stop the crime.

I do know that my own sins are the result of my own freedom choosing evil. I choose to succumb to temptation, to the self-centredness that  accepts every temptation as my right to have. But poor Cain and poor Abel! Cain did not have the the guidance of the prophets, the history of the Chosen People. He did not have Mary and the Incarnation. He did not have the teachings of Jesus, the Crucifixion and the Resurrection. Poor Cain was there alone in the Universe, totally aware of  and absorbed in his own being and he began to hate his own companion and victim.

Dear Lord, whence did that evil come? I do not want to know evil. I want to know Father Son and Holy Spirit and with the Grace freely won for all of us on Calvary come into your presence which is only Love but now I am weeping for the weight of responsibility carried by that first family in Eden which results in the unimaginable pain of the Cross witnessed by your and our Mother Mary. May she and all the saints pray for the grace refused by all sinners on Earth and awaited in the suffering of Purgatory to be freshly bestowed upon all creation.

 12/02/2023

Mankind has always been in the care of God. We are still the same humanity as were our first parents but have by our labour and ingenuity changed the face of the Earth. Some say that we have not changed it for the better. They are probably right, but God has revealed that the Earth is ours to live in and use. He has further revealed that our only important task for us living in this world is to know, love and serve. We have to remember that what has gone wrong in the past has been the result of the first disobedience. We are not programmed by our instincts but, although we have the same instincts as animals we have the freedom of will to control them. God does not create any of us to sin.

The reading from Ecclesiasticus rightly reminds us that we have been given the tools with which to control our environment but without Wisdom they are nothing. Each moment of our lives gives us the opportunity to do right or to do wrong. Wisdom begins with "the fear of God",  we have to worship in awe for we exist and God has made himself known to us. The Psalmist is sure that to follow  the commands of God in every detail will bring us to happiness. 

Jesus, however, warns us that obeying the will of Father, Son and Holy Spirit is not just a matter of precision in our private or public daily liturgy. Again he warns that the fiddliness of the professional religious class, the scribes and the Pharisees, the priests, has taken the place of the Holy Spirit in Temple worship. 

Jesus, the Lamb of God is in the world to be the ultimate animal sacrifice of mankind to God. He is pure Love, total obedience to the will of the Father and as such our Lord and our God. He has fulfilled the Law. In him we have the exemplar of perfection to be followed every moment of our lives. To honour the will of the Father we have to bring the Holy Spirit into our lives by following the Son to Calvary.

Scrupulous washings and phylacteries were not wrong in themselves but had become distractions that had turned religion into a matter of appearances rather than the raising of individual minds and hearts to God, to keep the joy of the "Law" in their hearts.

Dear Lord let me hear the words of Jesus and keep them in my heart to protect me from all temptations. May Mary lead all the Saints in the true worship that we can only strive for on Earth. May all we sinners open our hearts to you so that we can become all that you made us to be and may your Mercy pardon all the Holy Souls who are now truly aware of their sinfulness but secure in their hopes.

 11/02/2023

I have to read the Genesis account of the disobedience of Adam and Eve aware of the way I too can sin but also find excuses for myself. God is telling us by this Holy Spirit inspired text that we have to fight for our lives on Earth. I am sorely tempted to view the story as nonsense and am loth to try to wrangle my way round the simplicity of the black and white, good or evil. Why does God want us to go through life when in his own perfection he has no need of anything that I could give?

We have to accept, however, what we know as the only reality of which we are part. Myself and the millions of other things and animals are in this place in this time, in this life. The whole thing is difficult enough to make sense of without the further result of the being that is "thought" which cannot be turned into the particles of Quantum theory but which is present wherever there is a human being.

When I accept that "I am" and with Descartes become "thought" my questions just multiply for we are more than "thought"; I have a body that needs feeding, clothing and is programmed to reproduce. I can  accept by an act of faith/will, that the Bible texts of thousands of years ago reveal that we are not the be all and end all of this Universe. The whole wonder of the star-filled night sky, the beauty and power of oceans, the variety of life both the Leviathan and the almost invisible viruses are the creations of the Love of Father Son and Holy Spirit and I am one individual atom of mankind created to do the will of the Father by responding obediently to his revelation of himself and thus can accept his grace  to join him in the never ending perfection that is his will for all of us.

Atomic particles spin around but, although we cannot see them they are still material being. I am a hybrid being of physical matter, here we can find sub-atomic particles, and soul that is the image and likeness of our Creator. It is my soul that has to accept the grace to know, love and do the will of our Father who art in heaven. I have to respect my body for it too is God's creation but never forget that it is dust composed of sub-atomic particles which will return whence it came.

Dear Lord let me retain your grace to continue to use my freedom to chose to do your will for me by resisting the temptations that surround me. You know that the "serpent", the devil, Satan is a powerful and insidious enemy of your Love. May Mary whose "Yes" to you opened the way back to you for all humanity continue to support all sinners both on Earth and in purgatory and plead for comfort for our brothers and sisters suffering in the places known to so many of the earliest Christians who are now in Heaven.

 10/02/2023

 Being aware that I exist, knowing that I am alive is fraught with problems. Being made aware that God has created me brings more problems. All mankind has faced the same problems. The root of all evil is not money; it is itself. 

Nobody has answered the question that is prompted by our knowing that bad things happen in the world. In my lifetime millions have been slaughtered in disasters both man-made and natural. Many children have been born weak and disfigured. There are people whose bodies are not quite definitely  male or female.

We all ask why it should be that today many are suffering atrocious living conditions following the deaths of thousands of victims of the earthquakes in Anatolia and this is only one location where the goodness of God is not apparent.

I can be happy in my less than perfect being  by turning to the  revelations that begin in the Old Testament but I have only faced the evil from which I  need to be delivered in my own self. I do not know the pain and suffering cold, hunger and thirst that is the objective evil known by many this morning.

Jesus did not ignore this question which has been asked by millions of us poor mortal souls. We are all sinners, except for Jesus and Mary, and the 18 killed by the collapsing tower at Siloam were no greater sinners than the  disciples who questioned him about it.The chain of historical human decisions and pride that resulted in the collapsing buildings in places where the Church first grew to be "Christian"  is known only to Father, Son and Holy Spirit and we must put our trust only in God for our true being is in our souls.We must not????

Dear Lord you know how difficult it is to witness the evils of this world. The disciples saw your body on the cross as the end of all their hopes. In fact it was an event that was needed for the links of  our chains of sin going back to the Garden to be broken and for the Resurrection to bring the surety of faith into our hearts. May Mary who although created without sin held its results and defeat in her arms on Calvary plead  the the grace to turn us all away from sin in this world and obtain forgiveness as do the Holy Souls in Purgatory. 

 09/02/2023

God our Father Creator loves us with the Love that is the being of Father, Son and Holy Spirit. He loves us  into our human being in the creation that first was known by Adam and Eve. His Love for us is also respect for the being he created for us to become naturally. We are "little less than gods" in that we have human freedom which makes us superior to the other worldly beings whose instincts, their programming from which it is impossible to break free, control their limited lifespans. Since the fall, our bodies  also have preprogrammed  limits on length of life but our souls are absolutely free within the limits of Love. That is why Adam could name the animals in unison with God, welcome Eve and then misuse the freedom God has given to us.

Each day I relive the first day of mankind. I come out of non-consciousness into the world. Unlike Adam my mind is filled with memories of both experiences and of events. I know that I have to pray and then face my daily tasks. Today the tasks were an instant mess as I began with interacting with a remote voice on my computer. I was trying to report a fault with my boiler. When I began to talk to a human he too might as well have been a computer for he was keeping to a script that made no allowances for the interlocutor.

I am strictly warned by Jesus not to be angry, to be self-controlled at all times. I am not made happy by the performance I put on this morning. What really makes me feel bad is that the grace I receive from God was not all present in my deeds.

 Jesus was not denigrating the pagan woman. She, at least  didn't react with the anger evidenced by me this morning. In all humility she used her freedom and put it to our Lord that we are all human and that  scraps left-over from any meal need never be wasted . She did that of course not knowing the greatness of God whom she was addressing; she was just responding in hope to the Nazarene whose reputation for power and authority had preceded him from Galilee.

Dear Lord, I thank you for the Love which enables me to pray each day and for the grace which you have bestowed on all of us. May the prayers of Mary and all the saints be heard for the ones suffering in Syria and Turkey, places where your Church first grew to be called "Christian" and for us all on Earth and the Holy Souls paying for their worldly sins in Purgatory.

 08/02/2023

Jesus is our saviour. He it is who drags me out of my sinful self and reveals the wonder that is Father Son and Holy Spirit. There is nothing in the unholiness of heart, the sins of which he warns us in Mark's Gospel that I have not known to some degree and of which, at this moment, I regret entirely. God isn't fooled and reminds me that although at "this moment" I abhor sin I must not fool myself for I know by experience that sin can be stronger than my prayer.

Adam and Eve have everything a human could wish for. They have life, a beautiful environment, no hardships and a Creator who reveals that he has only Love and respect for mankind, the summit of his  creation, asking but one thing in return. We immediately refuse wanting something ever greater and now our lives are limited in time and full of conflicts within ourselves and with our neighbours.

"Happy fault of Adam that gave us such a great redeemer" I first heard "Felix Culpa" in the pre 1955 liturgy of Holy Saturday which took place in the early morning and it struck a chord then and still does. Our God wants only Good for us but he gave us a choice to accept his Love or refuse it. Freedom is the greatest of Life's gifts and the most dangerous for in the fullness of time in which I live self-centered disobedience with all its pomps and works has come to dominate our world in the same way it did the first humans in the Garden.

Dear Lord "I thank you for the wonder of my being", I thank you for so "great a redeemer" and I beg that we use your grace to root out the weeds of lust, pride and avarice that are strangling your body on Earth, our Church. May we open our hearts to receive your grace as did the Marys  and John at the foot of the cross when they received your bloodstained corpse and may our prayers joined with theirs be as fruitful as was the garden before the fall.