31/10/2021

St John's visions recorded in the Apocalypse is a continuation of Old Testament witness revealed to the prophets. They are great spiritual experiences that must have been clear to the visionaries themselves but truly difficult to explain to others. Within our time the end of time cannot be conceived by our brains. We are told about it. God is beyond our minds to grasp and so those granted mystical experiences fasten their their minds on images that reveal the greatness of their experience but do not really communicate; knowledge of God comes only from God to the soul that is ready.

John in his letter is sure that we can be sure that the Love of Father Son and Holy Spirit is with us all and that we will see God for we will be like God. That is the wonder that has been given to us for we have been created and adopted by Love.

Does our Lord mean that we have to live our lives in poverty? The riches of this modern world mean that the poor who are always with us live in more bodily comfort than the richest of Roman Emperors. "Rich", "poor" are always subjective. The Beatitudes have inspired so much of the world's social policies even in the obviously non Christian parts of the World but was our Lord founding a Human Political System?  

The Kingdom of God is not anything political but should be found in every individual Soul. The Beatitudes are for me to ponder and practise. Kings, Presidents Emperors and Popes have the same mission as do I. Know Love Serve now to be ready for the wonders God has prepared for us.

Dear Lord, today we remember the Souls of the departed that have been taken up into your Love. May their intercessions led by Mary support our efforts to live the life  outlined in your "Beatitudes".

 30/10/2021

St Paul is concerned that we all remember the Jews. Remember that they are still beloved of God in the special way revealed in the Old Testament. The emnity shown to Jesus by his own people was a necessity for the mission of the Incarnation to be completed by a real death. Jesus' death was a complete annihilation. One accompanied by the unimaginable suffering. Suffering that was accepted in God's total freedom which is eternally aware of the "before" and "after" of our time.

Jesus is our "Lord and our God" and we too set up walls of sin against his message by our own human will which also has a freedom limited only by the  non-divine capabilities of our humanity. I sit at this machine which is the work of human hands and know that my intention is to start the day with prayer. What a wonder is the machine which encircles the whole world with Man. But what a greater creation is the Earth and all that is in it!

Pride and egoism are the roots of all sin and will reap their reward. Humility that refutes arrogance is God's Will for us; we must constantly battle to accept this for there are places at the wedding banquet that have been prepared for us Jew and battling Christians alike.

Dear Lord help me to not just say the right words but to find their true meaning in the way that I live my life always in the loving presence of Father Son and Holy Spirit.

 29/10/2021

St Paul is writing to the congregation of converts that is in Rome. He is intense. He knows that his correspondents are mostly Jews and he feels a great unease as he meditates and ponderss upon his own message. He has seen the Risen Lord and has heard the message tasking him with responsibity and mission. The height and the depth of Paul's faith in Jesus cannot be matched and he feels a great sorrow for educated as a Pharisee his knowledge of the historyof the Chosen People is a huge foundation on which to erect the comparitively recent events in Palestine.

The Risen Lord is now the Church and Paul realises that he and all believers are the Body of Christ and that it is as partof this body that we are saved. He is so desperate that his fellow Jews accept this that he offers his own damnation in exchange for the salvation of his people. This is truly a terrible image. 

Could I accept Hell for myself? St Paul is certainly in excess here. No one reaches heaven by his own efforts. He himself teaches that it is by a free gift that we receive salvation. Faith can become Good Works; but bargaining one's soul for the sake of another is not on. The excess of St Paul here makes for good rhetoric but our Master does not need the destruction of any soul. He accepted the horrific destruction of his own body. As a human he must of been out of his mind at the pain of it but as God he knew that his sacrifice was an acceptable offering to Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Truly God is beyond all my imagination but I hope that my small efforts to know him can grow into loving service if I can keep control of my sinful nature.

Dear Lord send me help to do your will and continue to care for those of mine who ar particulry in need of help. Let all of your people feel the love you have for your chosen ones.

 28/10/2021

St Paul makes the analogy between citizenship of Rome and being part of the Body of Christ. It must be about 20 years since Jesus was known personally in human form. The Good News had spread rapidly and there were groups of believers scattered throughout the vastness of the world that was ruled from Rome. It is an amazing thing that this bizarre teaching had captured the imaginations of so many diverse people. The Jews were somewhat prepared to continue to worship one God. For them one of the great difficulties was to accept the Trinity of Father, Son and Holy Spirit which although, revealed in scripture  had to be discovered and meditated upon. The Gentiles had even more to discard before accepting the teaching of the Apostles and their disciples. They knew stories of the Gods and local temples made great demands on them. They knew of the thinking of the philosophers. Rising from the dead???

Paul's words about a  prophet in Palestine were not the Adonis story reworked. Paul had seen the Risen Lord and his testimony, inspired by the Holy Ghost, became a testimony to the true way of life ordered for us by Almighty God. We have to accept that the belief of the first Christian was supported by the Holy Spirit and that it is God's will that there should be a Church here on Earth.

Jesus in the Gospel chooses those who were to become the Apostles but not before a night of prayer. The Love of the Trinity is a complete "prayer" way beyond the imagination of man.

It is a tribute to the veracity of the Gospel narratives that the name of the traitor was not glossed out. Jesus chose Judas. Jesus chose Peter who denied him and the other Apostles too. It is only the women and John who display any fortitude during the three days of horror in Jerusalem. 

Jesus chose our Church's first leaders. We want to believe that he continues to do so. The instant communications of our modern world reveal that today there is still as much treachery to the Lord in our Bishops as there was in the original twelve.

Dear Lord help me to find guidance and support today as I still believe that you are with us. May your Mother support all mothers who find each day a struggle to cope with sickness and motherhood.

 27/10/2021

The words of St Paul provide me with what I felt yesterday. The remembered words of "prayers" inspire me to pray. To pray in my innermost being with the certain knowledge that my praying is well appoved by my saviour in the eternal Trinity. My own words, as now, may seem confused and incoherent but my soul is known, as are the hairs on my head, and accepted into heaven to join  with the Saints in everlasting prayer and holiness. This is my hope.

A striving towards holiness is always acceptable to God. Hope will not be in vain except...........Jesus warns us that the Father even in his mercy can lock the "narrow gate"against us who misuse our human freedom and there is always the possibility of seeing the joys of eternity but not receiving them. Thus we must clearly understand that our placement in humanity, in the Church or Society, is always to be questioned and meditated on for "the last will be first and the first will be last".

Dear Lord help our rich and our leaders to think carefully about where they stand in relation to You. Let me too not be overcome by my own weak words and always know that all good comes from you. 

 26/10/2021

St Paul's letter to the Romans is not of the simplest to understand. He says that we are and we are not "saved". He says that the whole of creation is waiting for its renewal that is salvation. He says that God's Creation our physical Universe was created incomplete so that it has been yearning from the beginning for the Word to fulfill its task. We are all waiting for this completion and then we will know Salvation. We are still locked into our bodies and it is only when we are complete in our human freedom that we will be saved.

Jesus too in this morning's parables counsels patience. We can care for the "mustard seed" and witness its growth; we can add yeast to flour water and salt and witness the lively dough which is the result. These processes take time. We cannot witness the actual growth of the seed or swelling of the dough. God works in our beings in the same way.The Holy Spiirt the Son and the Father is the complete Being that will take us to Salvation which is ours but not yet.

Dear Lord may I come to better understanding than the above of your Being and of your Will for me.

 25/10/2021

Jesus is challenged today by the synagogue. It is a challenge that reveals the depth of the feeling about keeping the Law that was in religious leaders of his day and can still be seen in the surving "Chosen people". Jesus had performed healing in front of all the congregation. The healing is an obvious good and power was certainly revealed in the one who performed it. But all "work" was suspended on this the seventh day. God rested and so must man.

Jesus responds by a severe condemnation of  hypocrisy. In this case it is a "hypocrisy" that flaunts its piety by public demonstrations of prayer and fasting. I am writing this as a public demonstration of my sense of relationship with God and so I too must read my own words and act in accordance with them. I must know that my sins are forgiven by this same Jesus who is  followed by some but not all of his own people. 

The Holy Spirit moves us to pray and to truly believe that we are Coheirs with Christ. St Paul continues to emphasise this staggering fact which supported the early Church and which would do the same today if we were not confounded by our own hypocrisy which blocks the opening up of our being to the power of the  Love of Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

Dear Lord help me to show your Love to all of mine who are known to you and in all things let us know that "thy will be done" is not fatalism but a true submision and recognition that only "Good" comes from you.