"The Way of the Cross is not only a great testimony to an inner depth and maturity, but it is in fact a school for interiority and consolation. It is also a school for examination of conscience, for conversion, for inner transformation and compassion - not as sentimentality, as a mere feeling, but as a disturbring experience that knocks on the door of my heart, that obliges me to know myself and to become a better person."
Pope Benedict XVI
Friday, February 26, 2010
The Way of the Cross
Sunday, February 21, 2010
Lenten Disciplines
Elisabeth Leseur (1914), French married laywoman, currently in the process of canonization.
Wednesday, February 17, 2010
defenseless
Lord, what else do I have to offer but my selfish desire to be healed?
I can give but I don't know how to accept from you. I know that if I let go of my wants, only then you can fill my emptiness. Whenever I bring you my pain, I am for myself; therefore I am rejecting your invitation to openness. How can I empty myself to the point of not resisting you? I know I can't accept you fully until there is a space inside of me that is aching to be filled by you.
I imagine what it must be like to be as loving as you are, as others pour them self out, you are open and accommodating without condition or judgment. Sometimes I see you in them, in their desperation and pain. They suffer too, just like me. Lord, give me the grace to have a moment of compassion and love, the way you do.
So Lord, I won't beg you to free me of my troubles, but I'll pray for the grace to ask you for nothing at all. If I could approach you empty handed, my issues will become meaningless, and I can reflect your love more fully as I approach your people. Maybe then I will stop resisting you whenever I see You in their eyes.
Monday, February 8, 2010
The Seed Grows
Yet he does not give grace nor work this work in a person who has no aptitude for it. But a person lacking the capacity to receive his grace could never gain it through his own efforts either. No one at all, neither sinner nor innocent, can do so. For this grace is a gift, and it is not given for innocence nor withheld for sin. "
from The Cloud of Unknowing
written by an unknown mystic from the 14th Century
Friday, February 5, 2010
Like a River
from The Dialogue of St. Catherine of Siena