07/01/2024

We have all heard of God and how that to help us recover or retain the Faith in his Divine Being that is the purpose of our lives, he emptied himself and became the same material being of his creation as the pinnacle of Evolution that is mankind. Today we celebrate the anniversary of that day when God was revealed to the Nations.

The people who first saw the babe in the stable and in the temple did not know of the resurrection and could have died before the events of Jesus' life unfolded. Luke records that  they were aware that they had seen something even greater than the wonder at new life that is our reaction to any infant creature human or otherwise.

We read St Paul's letters knowing that they are written to teach the new Church how to live and pray to their unseen God. In the communities that sprang up along the major roads of the Roman Empire there were many other travellers who brought news with them. St Paul's "You have probably heard" points to the existence of these others who spread the Good News anonymously.

The Church of Peter, Popes and Pontiffs is not, in its institutionalism, the exclusive place of Christ on earth. There have always been anonymous believers of Christ who fed by the Holy Spirit become "parts of the same Mystical Body" whose head is the Risen Lord and which still has the holiness of Father, Son and Holy Spirit and the Immaculate Mary, Theotokos, as its goal in life.

It would better if we could remain within the fold of Peter but in the long history of the Institutional Church both East and West, Mammon has always prevailed over the Kingdom of Heaven. There has never been a moment in History when we can truly say that Church, Catholic, Orthodox or Protestant has not been part of the Kingdom of this World that was disowned by Jesus before Pilate at the trial which preceded the Crucifixion that lead to the Glory of the Resurrection and a place for all of us in the Father's house. Thanks be to God.

Dear Lord, I do not want to escape as did Jonah. I am not afraid to offer my being as an unworthy  sacrifice. Your Mercy is far greater than my sins but within the limits of what I am they are as deadly as the lance that pierced your heart. May the prayers of Mary and all the Saints bring down to all on Earth and in Purgatory thy grace to help us all recognise and atone for our sins. I make this prayer in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit for us the living to avoid sin and that the souls of the faithful departed become able to rest in peace. Amen

 06/01/2024

What does it mean when John asks "Who can overcome the world?"? I am alive this morning and thanks to the wonder that is man-made technology I can reach out to all the other human beings that inhabit our planet. I can access news from Greenland to Antarctica. I can "chat" about anything on social media and see the person I am "chatting to" even if he is in Australia and I am in the UK.

This is the world that has to be "overcome" in 2024. Every waking moment of our lives can be filled with the works of Man and the material world has become the only reality for many, if not most, of us.

All of this that is the material reality of today has come about by the choice of mankind to ignore the Word of God and to revel in the self-glory of its own Ego. The created "I" of the "world" ignores the IAMIAM of Eternity and, today, as never before, our times deny God to his face, even to claiming for itself egotistical choice in being a "he"or a"she".

The ways of our world, Mammon, are not God's ways. No matter how far Medical Science progresses there comes the moment for all of us when we face the reality of Eternity. We all die and our world is revealed as the temporary reality that it is. We lose everything of this world that we have ever loved and clung to.

God is not a liar and the life that is in us is the Father's, Son's and Holy Spirit's and we have to care for it in the reality of this World not only as our own souls but for all who are united with us by Christ's saving Grace so that as we die all souls can become an offering acceptable to God. We can only do this by having Christ in us; "anyone who has the Son has life, anyone who does not have the Son does not have life." Thank God for his Truth and for his Mercy!

Dear Lord, let the awe that believing your revelations brings to me stay with me throughout this day and let me share your Mercy with all the souls captivated by the joys of the World. May Mary whose life was never damaged by sin but who shared the agony that sin brought to her Son whose death on the Cross she witnessed as a sword piercing her heart, lead the Saints in Heaven in their Chorus of Praise and continue to implore thy Mercy to erase the guilt of Sin from the living and the faithful dead who are now suffering in Hope.

 05/01/2024

I always try to avoid distractions when, each day, I begin to raise my heart and mind to God. As I read the first reading for this morning's mass I realised that I have never until now really read this letter of St John. 

I have not been able throughout my life to avoid the distractions of world, flesh and devil. I have never prayed as I am now able and have often sinned in that I am, as was Cain, always ready to ally myself with the Evil one in matters both large and small and deny the whole point of human life. 

My talk and thoughts and often my prayers have been empty words "Lord, Lord" and not the  "knowing loving and serving" the Love that gave up his life for us. I have cushioned my conscience from the Holy Spirit and often been able to justify attachment to the things of this world. 

In this I am like millions of other human beings who have been able to justify to themselves their own pride and greed by forming for themselves a human conscience which agrees with their own egos.

St John preaches the direct message of the Incarnation. We can clear our  God-given ( not personally created) consciences and stand without fear in the full presence of our Maker, Saviour and Love only when "Thy will be done on Earth as it is in Heaven" becomes much more than a formula for prayer," not just talk and empty words", but is realised in our daily lives and taken with us at the end as our own personal offering to be accepted or rejected by Our Father. God have Mercy on me.

Dear Lord, I too have to thank you for the "wonder of my being" and join the whole world in crying out with joy for you make it possible for me to be able to rely on you. Your Love surrounds the world and we can join it by turning our whole beings to you our creator. May Mary who must have shared on Earth her prayers with those of St John, and now leads all the saints in praise of your Glory, never cease to plead that we sinners on Earth, and in Purgatory can atone for our sins and finally come into your presence. Amen

04/01/2024

Today the first reading helps us to hold in our minds that Jesus is begotten by God. The Babe of Bethlehem is not created out of nothing but is the Eternal Word of God emptying himself of his Divine Being to become the human Son of Mary begotten in the Overshadowing of the Holy Spirit in human time. 

Thus IAMIAM reveals that he is a Trinity that remains a oneness. This revelation of the Mystery of God's being captivated the minds of many of the first converts and many unknown, or forgotten humans for whom the Resurrection, Descent of the Holy Spirit and Ascension began a hope of Eternity based on their prayer to know more about God.

Adam and Eve, Jesus and Mary are the only humans who have been born free of sin. Jesus and Mary are the only ones to have remained sinless throughout their lifetimes. Jesus can only be born as a true human because within the Mystery of the Trinity God knows that for creation to become the mirror of Holiness that has been loved into being the true freedom of mankind must choose to return that Love. We can do that only by free choice. It is sin that prevents me from always choosing God. It is sin that keeps body mind and soul in slavery.

Our Father is greater than anything that can be thought so we can never come near him in equality of knowing. Jesus teaches us that we can fulfill his will for us and come to holiness in this Life because that is Jesus' Mission from the Father. We are not saved by our understanding of God but only by abandoning sinful pride and putting all our trust in the revelations that are finalized by the life, death and Resurrection of the true God on Earth, Begotten not Made, of one Being with the Father; the revelations that should be steadfastly guarded by the Church of Peter, the Rock, and revealed by her actions in this world.

Dear Lord, let me live this day always knowing that you are Eternal Glory, Holiness, Thought, Power, Knowledge and Humility. Out of your greatness you Love each one of us as a human father loves his children. Help me to not sleep and keep my soul ready for the coming end of my life on Earth, which may prove painful but is the only way to see you as you really are. May Mary your Mother and ours plead for all her sinful children on Earth that we make the choices that will lead us to become witnesses of Eternal Glory and may the souls of the faithful departed rest in the peace that becomes ours when, by the Mercy of Father, Son and Holy Spirit, we are cleansed of our sins.

 03/01/2023

Dear Lord, I know that you already know how I feel today. My body is weak and I know that my sins are great but your Mercy is far greater than my transgressions of your Law. Forgive not only my own sins but also those I caused in others. May Mary and all the saints pray for me to receive the grace that is the forgiveness of Father, Son and Holy Spirit brought into the world through Jesus' life, death and resurrection.

 02/01/2024

The third and fourth centuries after the Birth of Christ were filled with the Holy Spirit who manifested Father, Son and Holy Spirit through the Holy Lives and the writings of many Saints.

 God was no more present to inhabitants of the Roman Empire than he is to us today. For no man is created to choose damnation for himself. We are all created as equal souls but in bodies that are determined by God's Providence.

When there were still people alive who had witnessed the Living Resurrected Lord the wonder of the God from Palestine was communicated to the Pagans by the devotion and sincerity of the first Christians who were filled with the Holy Spirit.

But even then there were those who wished to put themselves first and taught different versions of the events that became our standard Gospels. St John knew that even among the twelve there were those for whom it was difficult to believe that the Jesus whom they had left to die on the cross had resurrected not as a wraith or phantom but in the same living body that they had known and walked with in Palestine. "Blessed are those who have not seen and yet believe".

Jesus words are still alive in the heart of the Mystical Body of Christ recognised by St Paul. There has never been a moment in History when the meaning of God's words and deeds have not been contemplated and encouraged by the Holy Spirit. St John warns us of those who mislead, but does not dwell on them.

We are  believers or otherwise not because of "Theoloogy" but because of the witnesses of the real-time events in Palestine 2000 years ago and the recorded teaching of Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Son is begotten of the Father working through the Spirit of them both "thrice blessed three in one ".

Dear Lord let me always remain open to the Holy Spirit. Save me from the horror of selfishness and unbelief. I can be no more than I am so let my poor self be taken into the care of Mary along with all the human beings that you adopted with John in your final agony. Let holiness become the characteristic of all Christians who accept Jesus for what he is and may our souls live lives of quiet hopefulness as we prepare for the call to Glory that is closer than I think. Amen

 01/01/2024

This morning's readings repeat for us the facts on which we are to build holy lives. 

We have to accept that we are alive and that we are one of millions of other human lives that have begun in exactly the same way as ours and are still living. We know that there are other people born before us, but now dead, whom we can remember and that there are millions more whom we can know about from the remains of their work and history of their lives.

Human  lives are limited. Death comes to all of us. Our bodies really are dust. No matter how full we fill our barns somebody other than us will reap the material reward of our labours. This is the first fact that we have to accept.

In the History of human life that is the Bible another Life that is not confined by the limits of  the time and space within which we live out our three score and ten, is revealed to us. IAMIAM is the never ending  pure being, the creator and lover who made all and loves all. He it is who creates us as  image and likeness of his own being by adding our souls to our physical bodies. We cannot retain the Evergreater within our minds but we need to know that He has perfect eternal knowledge of all of his creatures. In our case he knows both our physical bodies and our souls. 

In the Old Testament God spoke through his Prophets but 2000 years ago Our God the Eternal had emptied himself of his Divinity/Godness  to reduce and confine himself to the development cycle of all human animals and nine months after his Incarnation ( begotten not made) was delivered of his chosen Mother into the poverty of the stable at Bethlehem. Mary is "The Mother of God" and all of humanity has been adopted by "Our Father who art in Heaven". 

This is the second fact that we need to build the foundations of the righteousness that will bring peace to our souls in this world and to the eternal, Love, Glory and Happiness that is the instant when we shall see Father, Son and Holy Spirit as he really is. That moment can never change for we see God as he really is ALL IN ALL and this Perfection can never be bettered nor lost.

Dear Lord, help me to avoid all temptations that take away my awareness of your love for all mankind. Help me to not confine my prayers to my own benefit but let me share all your gifts with my family and other men, women and children, the starving, the dying and all victims of war and  shameful clergy. May your Mother's prayers be shared and bring sinners back to the awareness of your eternal being and thus not refuse the gift that is the wonder of our lives. Amen.