22/02/23

The Holy Spirit speaking through the prophet Joel assures us that God is always ready to accept the penitence of the sinner. If the whole community turns back to the Lord, if the whole of Israel shows it repentance for sins by fasting to take control of their worldly bodies, then the Lord's compassion will again bring his Mercy upon them. God has a covenant with the Jews, a community of the People of God.

The Psalm is the repentance of an individual for  having committed a grave sin. Adultery, fornication any perverse sexual activity has lost most of its significance in this age of same-sex so called marriages, co-habitations and multiple divorces but, for David his sin was a grotesque attack on the holiness of the Lord. David knew that by sinning he had cast filth into the face of his benefactor who had shown him only kindness and love. This psalm is a truly human sign of the penitence I need to emulate this Lent.

St Paul  tells us that every day is the the favourable time to ask for Mercy, for God is always ready to hear our repentance for sin. As a Jew he is aware of Community, the People of God and  preaches as part of a new community, the Body of Christ on Earth. Jesus also first preached to the Jews. He preached to the total community, but suffered, died and became the Resurrection not for the sake of any special community or institution but for the sake of each created soul.

Jesus does not tell us to abandon the way to Sacramental Grace he founded on Peter but to be aware that in our "secret place", the core of our beings there we can find our loving Father, Son and Holy Spirit who knows everything and in the totality of his grace pours out forgiveness on each one of us.

Dear Lord, this Lent may my intentions not be broken into the decorative paving slabs that lead to Hell. Let me use your grace to humbly accept your Mercy and know in my heart the enormity of your Sacrifice on Calvary. You know that I am thankful for the ease of my life. May the prayers of Mary and all the Saints of Heaven bring relief for those suffering agonies on this Earth and may their suffering be received by you as reparation for their unknown sins. 

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 21/02/2023

St Peter Damian's was a voice pleading for the condemnation of the cesspit Church of his day. The moral corruption of clergy, the power of prelates and the forsaking of the Cross had produced more than two centuries of failure for the Church that had been founded to channel the Grace gained for us by the humility of our God.

There is no-one who can read today's readings without recalling Jesus' condemnation of the Pharisees. "Do as they say but not as they do". The passage from Ecclesiasticus comforts us with the steadfastness that the love of God brings to us. The psalmist has no doubts that if I truly trust in the Lord then I will live and be secure, confident that he will never desert me. The Psalms are all lovely and especially this one. They were the prayer book of Jesus and their words are recollections of the joy of knowing Father, Son and Holy Spirit which sometimes happens when we escape ourselves and for a moment, a fleeting second truly know our place in Creation.

Even the first group of disciples, walking in the company of Jesus himself, was already disputing about rank. Human quarrels have continued since those first days to mar the love that has to radiate from Christ's Body on Earth. 

Reading the history of the Popes in St Peter Damian's time it is hard to believe that such an organisation has been able to continue. The Holy Spirit cannot be in the vast wealth that cripples the grace of the Father won for it by the humility of the Son, he is not in the stupidity of  hedonism that dominates the lives of false bishops and priests, but the people of the Church still stumble along. 

It must be in the "little children" who cling devotedly to "Our Father" and to Mary, our Mother that there is the Faith and Holy Spirit that Jesus will find at the end of time. It is true that there is "no salvation outside the Church" but the true Church is found only in the hearts of men and not in their possessions and organisational structures.

Dear Lord today is a  day of resolution as we begin tomorrow to prepare for the Three Days that have saved mankind. Let my will become firmly fixed on your Will for all mankind and may the prayers of Mary and all Saints be heard and look favourably on your servant Flo whose funeral is today. May her soul and the souls of all the faithful departed rest in peace. Amen  

 20/02/2023

I missed the Transfiguration on Saturday. Today Jesus and the disciples have come down from Mount Tabor and yet again there are crowds around them; some wanting to hear the words of Jesus; some wanting healing and some just wanting to be there. It must be the humanity of Jesus that snaps at the persistence of the crowds. "How much longer must I be with you" is not an irritated response from Father Son and Holy Spirit, the Creator of our Universe and of all that is in it. Jesus is also truly man.

The wisdom praised in the first reading is not the same as human intelligence. If it were our world would be a far different place than it is today. The wisdom praised is more like the Faith the lack of which Jesus bemoans. It is not the brainpower that starting with the Ancient Greeks has become more and more powerful until today I am able to access the entire History of the World and the mysteries of matter at the click of my mouse.

Knowledge is a deceptive good; like gold it can be amassed and like gold in our world, it does not perish. Wisdom is what helps us  to face "the wonder of  being", to know that we have been created, to know that we are not "the gods" that our achievements seem to make us and most of all to know that there is an Evergreater Being who has created us to know love and serve for our Creator, who gives us wisdom to use our freedom to do his will, is Love.

Dear Lord you know what I need to do to make holy preparation for your great feast. Help me to face my sinfulness and with honesty strive for the holiness that is your will for me. Let me have the wisdom to truly avoid the occasions of sin and this Lent pour your grace into my heart and into the hearts of all your poorly shepherded souls on Earth. May Mary and all the Saints eternally present in your Love continue in their supplications for all sinners on Earth and for the Holy Souls in Purgatory.

 19/02/2023

I missed yesterday. This morning, Leviticus presents us with a summary of the Ten brought down from Mt Sinai by Moses. Dear Lord if your first choice had listened to your Word they would not ever have hardened their hearts as they did on  numerous occasions  while in the process of growing into the nation and people that still, today, are the witness of your Covenant with them.

Paul does not speak of a nation or a people. He avoids the egocentric nationalism of the Pharisees and their descendants. He tells each one of his congregation and also the millions of people that have lived are living and will live after them that Father, Son and Holy Spirit, three persons one God, loves, knows and supports each one of us in the freedom he has created for us. The Ever-greater person lets us chose to become a home fit for holiness that is our target as we worship.

Jesus returns to the roots of the Commandments. God does not approve anything we do that harms another person. The inner being of the Trinity is only Love. We have been given responsibility for our Earth. The deaths in the Earthquake in Turkey/Syria are not sought by God. The greed of the rich who built the tower blocks is no greater than the greed of the Vatican or of the "rich young man" who went sorrowfully away. The sun does shine on us all. The Material Universe is what it is. It is not programmed to make judgements about the morality of nations or individuals.

It is not Church structure that brings us to God but persons in the Church can reach a God-given perfection. It is my personal holiness that can make the Church the Holy of Holies; the dwelling-place on Earth for the Mercy bestowed by the suffering Christ; a dwelling place fitting, as much as it can be in human eyes,  for my Lord and my God.

Dear Lord let me learn to recognise your gifts to me, let me too be of humble of heart so that the pride that rises like the yeast in dough that is proving as I write this, does not continue to smother the grace you have encouraged me to seek out. May Mary's prayers help young people to withstand the lure of glamour and bodily satisfaction and may the sincerity of atonement in Purgatory come closer to the Mercy that guarantees a place in Heaven.

 17/02/2023

Our forefathers had huge problems to face as they left behind the hunting and gathering that was their fate after Eden. They did meet other humans and could not understand their speech. There is the presence of the Holy Spirit in all of the Bible and the tower of Babel could be a record of the People of God's first encounter with Ziggurat structures in Mesopotamia built by people whose language they did not understand. Human emotions are again attributed to God and he is portrayed as being in fear of what he has created.

Jesus, God's complete revelation of his triune Being to the people of Earth, tells us that we must never let our material successes, our own Towers of Babe, blind us to the fact that our life on Earth is not the be all and end all of our existence. Young and poor, old and rich we all have to die and it is at that final moment we will all know the reason for our worldly being.

The "some will not taste death until they see the Kingdom of God come with power" needs to be pondered with faith in our hearts as there is not an easy explanation. Jesus' other mysterious sayings all came to be understood in the light of events; e.g. "This is my body" the words of consecration uttered before the crucifixion. Peter asked about John "What about this man" and was answered by the brusque rebuke "What is it to you"?

 So many things about God are unknowable as everything that we do know about Father, Son and Holy Spirit is revealed to each of as the person we are meant to be when we turn to God, in emptiness of self, hoping to be one of the "Happy to be people, the Lord has chosen as his own".

Dear Lord you know that I feel touched by your grace and happy to be alive this morning. May I live today as I should without being sidetracked by knowledge of the failings in response to your love that are my sins and those of your Church. May Mary to whom the unborn Incarnation infancy, and youth of your Son were entrusted, continue with all the Saints to pray for all hearts to be opened to your Grace and for your Mercy to accept the spiritual atonement that is Purgatory.

 16/02/2023

There is a well known and often used saying in the North of England, "There's nowt as queer as folks" and in these times we can vary it a little to say "There's nowt as queer as "woke" folk". God's sign for his covenant with Noah has been stolen to be the badge of the enemies of both Mankind and God. Their pride is their sin and their  diversity is the unity they have with Satan. 

They are also plain daft as reproductive organs define male and female even in the animal kingdom. Those who have had the misfortune to be born indefinite must be treated with respect but the patronising seekers of uniformity are a voluble minority who need to go the way of the child molesters who, a few years ago began to seek a lowering of  the age of consent.

Jesus knew Satan as the opposition to Father, Son and Holy Spirit that all, except himself and his mother, experience in our beings. Jesus heard the words of Peter and treated them as if they came directly from the "Tempter" he had rebuffed face-to-face in the aloneness of the desert.

Peter became the foundation on which Jesus began the human structure which with the guidance by the Holy Spirit was to maintain his presence on Earth. After 2000 years, we know this as the RC Church. Poor Peter! What a responsibility to have been put onto one man. 

Of course, Peter was not alone and he had not only Mary and the Apostles to support him but many enthusiastic men and women joined the witnesses of the Resurrected Christ in full belief in the Holy Spirit and expectation of the Second Coming. St Paul in particular knew that the resurrected Jesus Christ had not left us alone as he had been in the desert and then in that hiatus between his death and Resurrection.

"Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesars and unto God the things that are God's". Jesus knew that the assaults by  Satan would begin as soon as he returned to the Father and continue to the end of time.

 Today,in the North of England, there is being played out yet another drama involving the Church structure and the wish to placate Caesar. An Archbishop of the Church, having been ordered by the Vatican to investigate nefarious conduct by a Bishop and also the events that lead to the suicide of a Cathedral Dean has avoided his duty by passing it to a lay person who had been given the title Chief Operating Officer of a different Diocese. What has this purely worldly administrative role got to do with Our Lord and his redemption of mankind, the saving of souls?

Popes, Archbishops priests in fact all members of the clergy and dedicated orders are absolutely nothing if they are not the "things of God" in that they form the visible form of Christ's Mystical Body. Almost immediately, however,  the acceptance as a necessity for there to be a human organisation originally to take care of "widows and orphans"but which was soon overcome by the same power of Mammon  that had corrupted the much vilified Judas, there began the conflict between holiness and worldliness in which today's English Hierarchy have faithlessly thrown in the towel. Westminster and Birmingham at the IICSA and Liverpool today.

Let them admit that there are many failures among the clergy who have damaged children and others. Let them admit that it is an added sin to pretend that this is not true. Let them admit that Church property is theft from the poor. Let them admit that over the centuries their predecessors in both West and East have always failed to make the right choice between God and Caesar. 

Europe's great Cathedrals and Monasteries are proof of this.

Dear Lord you are Creator and Saviour of Mankind. I know that I am responsible for my own life and I, although still upset by the failings of richer and powerful, am still aware that I fail in total response to the truth I read in your Gospels and writings of holy men. Please stir up the faith of those comfortable prelates who cosy up to the Caesar/ worldly society of our times and cannot  defy Satan by preaching only truth without regard for their own status and wealth. May Mary and all the saints continue to pray that thy people on Earth are not mislead by miscreant clergy and that reactions to others' misdeeds does not become the dominant force in my life. I know that I am always in need of Mercy and hope to share the same with my generation of Holy Souls in purgatory.

 15/02/23

The people who first began to fill the region we now know as the Middle East were close to God and were guided by him. They did not have the wealth of sources that we have when it comes to explaining the natural events which they experienced. They were self-centred and  interpreted their worldly experiences through their own awareness of them. 

They were, however, given a consciousness of God and their interpretation of spiritual awareness projected onto God their own humanity, their acceptance or rejection of other humans, love or hate, strength and power. Thus the first part of the story recorded on the scrolls has God as a super-human, walking with Adam in the garden. 

The Old Testament contains the record of God's self-revelation and of man's response. God has a total awareness of everything that has happened, is now and of all the possibilities that could be or will happen, for in this world each individual is known to him. Each individual is good and is loved into being. But each individual is also free now and thus there is an incalculable number of possible futures and pasts that might have been, known only to God. 

The Father, Son and Holy Spirit has through the Incarnation, teaching life, death and Resurrection completed the education of Mankind. God has made known, Hiself, the Trinity that is His being and the Love that limits our Freedom. He has founded his Church and promised to be with her to the end of time.

What are we doing in response?

Dear Lord, may I be open to receive the Grace that you lavish upon mankind and by prayer seek to do your will in everything that I am. May Mary the only sinless human being since Adam and Eve before the fall continue to plead for sinful humanity that we might reverse our sins by growing in our love for you. May the Holy Souls who now totally aware only of you and of their sins receive the grace that previously they rejected.