15/07/2024

God has never left us alone to oversee his creation. He has always guided humans who have come to realise that the meaning in their lives is not the result of the achievements of mankind.

In the Old Testament, Job is mankind accepting that we all live in the providence that is not decided by God but arises out of the interrelatedness of decisions for good or evil made by each one of us. 

Isaiah is inspired by God to give warning to us all that what is required from us is to know, love and serve him and no matter how brilliant the achievements of ourselves or our forefathers we are all individuals who must make a personal response to "Our Father".

Jesus speaks to us "man to man". He does this always but sometimes he hits us hard with  pure truth. Today we hear one of these "hard sayings" which we struggle to understand. 

The sword, family discord and universal strife is hardly the stuff of the blessings received on the mount earlier in Matthew's Gospel.

The Church founded on St Peter has always been guided by some great individuals whose relationship with God has been so brilliant that all have recognised their holiness. Today we celebrate the holiness of St Bonaventura who revealed to mankind his devotion to the Lord in his teaching and writings.

When I read of the holy lives of saints I always try to find out the state of the Institutional Church during their lifetimes. St Bonaventura as did St Thomas Aquinas and Roger Bacon served in an "unholy church of this world" ruled by Popes who were devoted to politics and Mammon.

In my lifetime millions of souls have been lost by the Church, a worldly institution that is the not nearly perfect product of not  practising what was declared by its founder in open court to the representative of Mammon . "My kingdom is not of this world".

We all admire, or are envious of, those intellects which are greater than our own. Father, Son and Holy Spirit, however, has no need of "Theology", our God is "All-Knowing". The Good Shepherd, however, seeks out all sinners that he might save us all from our sin and reminds us that no matter our place in the hierarchy of this world  we have to return to him as naked, helpless infants to be judged by the deeds of our lives.

Dear Lord, help me this day to live without sin. Let my being be open to the words of Scripture and the promptings of your Holy Spirit, one God with Father, and Son. Help me to never forget that you know me for what I am even in the vastness of your creation. Jesus and Mary are present with you in the glorified bodily humanity that you have prepared for us all, Help your creation avoid any further sinfulness by becoming open to the Holy Spirit and may your "second coming" bring us all into the "glorious freedom" prophesised by St Paul. Open all hearts to receive the pardon shared by all sinners here and in Purgatory. May that "final coming" be soon. Maranatha! Come Lord Jesus Come!

 14/07/2024

Dear Lord, You know how yesterday I failed through my own stupidity to perform one worldly task which has since that moment dominated my thoughts and will not go away even though my will is turned to You. Help me to  understand the revelation that is in the scriptures selected by the Church for reading at the masses celebrated throughout the world today.

I am created in Your image and likeness. I too cannot disown my own self. So, as usual, I am the basically selfish being for whom Jesus accepted his Eternal Mission "to take away the sins of the world".

You know us all and in my case you know the secret depths of my own self-conceit that is the source of all the sins I have ever committed. 

Hosea has been called to reveal your Truth to your people Israel. St Paul is formed by IAMIAM, the result of  the revelations of all the prophets, although, you had to confront him in person for him to know your eternal purpose and mission selected for him.

Jesus is your total self-revelation, the perfect guidance for how to live in human time. He is Your self-utterance Incarnate in the material of this world becoming the perfect human deed to counteract the sin of Adam that disfigured the perfection of creation.

Today we are chosen to be in the world but to remain focussed on the mission given to the Apostles that we all have to preach, repentance, not solely by prayer but also by public deeds. Since the time you shared our humanity the world has grown ever more entrenched in Mammon and we have become more and more captured by pride in our own ingenious creations.

Each one of us is known by Father, Son and Holy Spirit. We are each "sealed with the Holy Spirit of the Promise, the pledge of our inheritance which brings freedom for those God has taken for his own, to make his glory known."

The achievements of mankind are wonderful but of no use whatsoever as we think of the helplessness of nothing into which we all flounder without belief in the the Resurrection of our Saviour, Jesus Christ.

Dear Lord you know how I have been troubled as I struggled to reflect on your Word today. Today you know my worldly problem is a lost MS password. Jesus spoke in many parables. The loss of one sheep by someone we don't know has helped millions of us understand the depth of the Father's Love. In today's world being locked out of "MS Windows" shakes many of us to the core. Comparing this event to losing the Grace won for all mankind by Jesus has helped me in this morning's reflection to understand that there is nothing trivial about Grace and that sincerity of heart opens our Souls to the finding of the Seal of the Holy Spirit. Let us shout out with joy when we do!. May my prayers join those of Mary and all the Saints that we sinners on Earth and in Purgatory accept the gift that will keep us within the embrace of Father, Son and Holy Spirit for ever more. Amen! May my worldly problem also be solved today. I cannot put our God to the test. Thy will be done.

 13/07/2024

Our God to whom I raise my heart and mind each day is totally without limits; which means that Father, Son and Holy Spirit is far greater than the words with which I worship him. I have within me bits of all the ideas about God received or created by men over the last 3 or 4 thousands of years. It is not my words that determine my place in the all encompassing Love that is Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

Isaiah's vision of God who rules the Cosmos is described in words that really do, if we let them out of the confines of our minds, take us into the presence of the Lord and we can together with Isiah be filled with breath-taking fear together with the joy that being known by God brings to each one of us.

It is not my words that determine my place in the all encompassing Love that is Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

Jesus tells us today that though Satan, the lure of materialism and Mammon, has great power in this World we need not be fearful that we inevitabley succumb. The protection of the Love that knows everything is always with us. If we call on the Lord and bear witness to him we have accepted to join the Mission that Isaiah chose voluntarily and Jesus will become our witness in heaven.

It is not my words that determine my place in the all encompassing Love that is Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

Dear Lord, you know that I am hoping that these words with which I pray to start each day become my declaration of Faith, Hope and Charity, my confession of belief in all that you have revealed to me.  May Mary, together with all Saints within the heaven of your presence continue to support the prayer of this world which humbly seeks forgiveness for our sins and succour for the repentance of Purgatory. I make my prayer in the name of Father, Son and Holy Spirit and implore your mercy to become St Theresa's shower of roses onto me and all my loved ones.

 12/07/2024

The first steps that I make towards God are inspired by faith and reinforced by my choice. I must have no fear that I am despised by worldly standards. This is fear is the self pride which I know is stupid,especially for the wretch that I truly am.

 Jesus tells his disciples that they have to have no fear that their words will not be adequate for the mission he is entrusting to them. The Holy Spirit will shape their thoughts and they will never be at a loss for words to do justice to their task. We can still take heart from these words of the Lord.

"Do not worry about how to speak or what to say; what you are to say will be given to you when the time comes; for it is not you who will be speaking; the spirit of your Father will be speaking in you."

All of the Bible is a record of this inspiration received throughout History. We are all surrounded  in the love and mercy that is Father, Son and Holy Spirit. We have to recognise that all that we are, the all that we know comes from the creative Love of the Trinity. 

The earthly mission of each one of us is to acknowledge that we have to know, pray with sincere faith in the Father , love, accept with joyful thanks the incarnate Resurrection, and serve, do what ever is revealed to our consciences by the Holy Spirit working through the Father and Son.

Throughout the 2000 years since Jesus spoke  these words 

"I tell you solemnly that you will not have gone the round of the towns of Israel before the Son of Man comes" 

Millions of us must have been disappointed and millions have used Jesus' as yet unfulfilled promise to return to justify their own sinful lives and mock the faithful.

We have to be prompted by "faith" to reach out for God during our lifetimes and as we draw to the close  we can be sure that we will have to answer to Jesus for the being that we have made of ourselves. 

The "Word" that I have made of myself has to answer to the Word of God.

Dear God, let me not loose touch with the Love that is your being. Let me become sincere in my faith and let these words reflect the reciprocated love that inspires me each morning. One day I know that I will see you as you really are and then let me just "be" with you. May I never loose sight of Mary and all the Saints who together can bring your mercy to all us sinners on earth and in Purgatory. Help me to know your ways and let me atone for the sins of my lifetime which can be washed away by your bountiful mercy and my sincere penitence.

 I make these thoughts and prayers to and through Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Lord have mercy.

 11/07/2024

For those of us who have been rattled in our faith by the sinfulness that for over two millennia has been covered up by the  Institutionalizing of the Church founded on St Peter, Monastic Communities are still an existing enigma. Many of them are unable truthfully to resist the challenge that their own rules present to their chosen way of life. 

How can the ecclesial virtues be practised by communities that are giving their members a life style that is anything but poverty-stricken? And yet their communal life punctuated by disciplined prayer is an example for us all to follow.

St Benedict is one of the last Romans but is not one of the first hermits. As a Roman he was aware of the austerity that was a hallmark of the original Republic which had become an Empire and destroyed its own integrity by the vice of luxurious living. 

As a hermit he had wished to be left alone to get on with the prayer and meditation which he knew would help to bring him to the the life free of this worldliness that Father, Son and Holy Spirit has created for each one of us.

The representatives of the Institutional Church resented the contrast  that the holiness of Benedict's life presented to their own and there were two attempts by priests and monks to poison him. The corruption that is the Sin of this world was already rampant in the worldly institution that has still never fully realized that Jesus truly meant his proclamation before Pilate, "My Kingdom is not of this world".

St Benedict has been entitled "Patron of Europe" by the elites who rule that continent. I expect that if it were possible to ask him, the hermit of Subiaco would reject all the worldly values that are espoused by "Brussels", today. 

He would also be deeply hurt by the monks on planes, in airports and in prisons who have all vowed to abandon all earthly ties and stay in one place to pray, pray and pray again. He knows that God is not to be trifled with and that monastic communities have a responsibility to become centres of a holiness that we can trust; an example that it would be good to follow.

Dear Lord, help me to live today without sin. Let me continue in my studies. May I become less resentful of other peoples' lives and focus only on taming sinfulness that is potentially with me at every moment of my own life. May Mary and all the saints pray for the "Roman testudo" of worldliness  that we have erected over our beings and communities, to be broken and let us all become helpless as children needing only your love to care for us. Amen

 10/07/2024

It is very difficult for those living in today's overpowering world to raise our hearts and minds to God, "to know, love and serve" with integrity. 

My own life has been lived constantly aware that I am a long way from the "holiness" that is the will of Father, Son and Holy Spirit. But I have always been able to avoid the unwavering commitment to the Father that is the way to perfection shown to the world by Mary and her son Jesus.

Mary is created as the perfect woman totally without sin. Jesus is the eternal Word who in perfect oneness with the Father and Holy Spirit is able to enter into created time as the perfect human bodily antithesis to the sin of Adam. 

I say that "I have been able to avoid" holiness because although I search my soul and confess that I am "sinful" my personal sincerity, my integrity is always called into question as I again turn my back on God and choose to disobey the Loving Kindness that is Our Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

There has always been with me ever since I can remember a longing for holiness and simultaneously an awareness that the total commitment has to be just that and not the "bring me chastity but not now" attitude that has been the story of my life. 

I can see the never ending salvation that is God's gift to us all, but I still cling to the things that are present to me in the here and now even though I know that they are as corruptible as my body and become unusable by me at the moment of my death.

In this morning's Gospel Jesus commissions his first missions that are all entrusted to Jews solely for Jews. My hope and faith is in the Almighty. His total integrity neither deserts any of his faithful followers nor  does he thrust any sinner beyond the scope of his mercy. He chooses both Peter and Judas as missionaries. Both are unable to hide their sins but as are we all, still able to choose to accept the mercy that  is created in the mystery of the events in the garden and on the hill of Calvary.

The message of the first missionaries is to continue the preaching of Jesus, word and deed.

         "The kingdom of heaven is close at hand". Fear not, for God is never far away!

Dear Lord , you know that I am afraid that by choosing you I have set a task that is beyond my ability. I know that saving myself from the power of sin is, indeed, beyond me but there is nothing that is beyond you so "I place all my trust in thee", eternal Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Save me from all my sins  and let my soul be united in prayer with Mary and all the saints that as we praise and worship your Glory our prayers will bring your perfect merciful judgement to us the living sinners and to the Holy Souls secure in their penitential amends in Purgatory.

 09/07/2024

Hosea continues to condemn the creation of idols. Mankind in all corners of the earth has at sometime  chosen to answer the inner voice that calls for an explanation of  the amazing thing that is our consciousness of "being". We all know that we are and that we are not alone; but we are all the unique one that is "I".

I cannot remember or imagine what it was for me to be an infant, a totally helpless but conscious being. It is out of remembrance of the care given to us by our mothers that the primitive female idols the "Great Mother" came to be. 

After more than 80 years of self-awareness, I know that I am more than what I think, see, hear, touch and taste. The psalmist warns us that if we make idols we will become like them senseless and inanimate. If we continue to give up our autonomy to our technical creations that is what will happen to us.

We are not dolls, the playthings of heaven but are formed in the image and likeness of the creator who spoke to the Jews through his prophets. We are not his puppets controlled by his strings. We are intelligent beings who have been given personal control of our consciousness. We are trusted by Father, Son and Holy Spirit to live in this world with hearts full of loving obedience to our unseen God and with goodwill towards all men.

We are not expected to do this by our own efforts but we can be sure of our salvation if we choose to disown Mammon and all worldly idols. God chose to be in human time and incarnate he suffered the unimaginable agony that is the sin brought into the world by our continuing disobedience.

Dear Lord, help me to pray. Help me to see my thoughts always in your light of revelation. Help the Institutional Churches to break with Mammon and subservience to sinful social policy which denies your created man and woman and praises the slogans of "Gay Pride" and the untruth "My body, my life". Help the "iams" who shout these to realise how tiny they are even though they are astonished by their own knowledge and cleverness. May Mary our heavenly mother lead all the saints in praise of the perfection of your being and implore your grace to purify all souls on earth and in Purgatory. I make this prayer in what I hope is sincerity of heart. Save me from the snares of Satan and his innumerable allies in this world.