tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29250072495474021202024-02-18T21:11:48.169-08:00 David Nybakke, OFS - Spiritual Direction... a process to help clear the debris and noise of our lives as we undergo God. We hope to listen to the extraordinarily peaceful powerful meaning of Love from God who wants to speak to us.David Nybakkehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13172189118334371454noreply@blogger.comBlogger124125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2925007249547402120.post-18931550107755506202023-12-23T15:59:00.000-08:002023-12-23T15:59:04.501-08:00Distractions & Longings are the Real Noise<p><span class="css-16unbz3" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; color: #222222; font-family: Georgia, Times, "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 19px; font-weight: 700; margin-top: 12px; text-transform: uppercase;">DAILY MEDITATION with</span><a class="css-rkme08" href="https://us.magnificat.net/?utm_campaign=prayers_section&utm_source=aleteia&utm_medium=website" libraries="[object Object]" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; color: #222222; font-family: Georgia, Times, "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 19px; font-weight: 700; margin-top: 12px; text-decoration-line: none; text-decoration: none;"> Magnificat</a></p><p><br /></p><p><span style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; caret-color: rgb(191, 1, 73); color: #bf0149; font-family: Georgia, Times, "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 19px; font-weight: 700; letter-spacing: 5px; text-align: center; text-transform: uppercase;">SATURDAY, DECEMBER 23</span></p><p class="MED_MED_N0_Super_titre" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; border-bottom-color: rgb(196, 1, 75); border-bottom-style: solid; border-top-color: rgb(196, 1, 75); border-top-style: solid; border-width: 1px 0px; color: #1a1818; display: table; font-family: "Delta Pro Book", sans-serif; font-size: 18px; letter-spacing: 10px; line-height: 1.222; margin: 0px auto 11px; padding: 8px 0px; text-align: center; text-transform: uppercase;"><span class="VARIABLES_Tetiere_invisible_N350">MEDITATION</span> OF THE DAY</p><p class="MED_MED_N10_Title" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; border-width: 0px; color: #1a1818; font-family: "Delta Pro Book", sans-serif; font-size: 16px; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-position: normal; line-height: 1; margin: 18px 0px 20px; padding: 0px; text-align: center; word-break: normal;">What Zechariah Learned in Silence</p><p class="MED_MED_N20_Text" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; border-width: 0px; color: #1a1818; font-family: "Delta Pro Book", sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-position: normal; line-height: 1.2; margin: 0px 10px; padding: 0px; text-align: justify; text-indent: 9px;">The direction of oneself toward God and toward solitude in him prepares the soul for the acquisition of that peace that helps us in the most distracting, most active external work…. Man’s silence makes room for God’s word. When man is silent, God is heard. And once we listen intently to God we maintain our silence even in the midst of our speech.</p><p class="MED_MED_N20_Text" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; border-width: 0px; color: #1a1818; font-family: "Delta Pro Book", sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-position: normal; line-height: 1.2; margin: 0px 10px; padding: 0px; text-align: justify; text-indent: 9px;">“Everything around man makes far less noise than man himself. The echo that magnifies external things in our soul—this is the real uproar.” This is a penetrating truth. We often do an injustice to the external world in blaming it for forcing us into distraction and noise. The longings of our soul, the disorder of our ideas and our thoughts, the diversity of our aims: it is these things that make the tumult inside us. Only our inner spiritual attitude can seal the entrance through which all these stray scraps tumble into our soul. If it is possible to open this door, it is also possible to close it. <span class="Delta_Book_Italic_N50" style="font-style: italic;">A voice crying in the wilderness </span>has to announce to the soul<span class="Delta_Book_Italic_N50" style="font-style: italic;">, make straight the way of the Lord</span>. In order to practice quiet within oneself, it is necessary to call on the aid of the virtues: patience, which calms the torment of sadness in us; perseverance and constancy, which overcome disquiet and fickleness, the shifting of intentions, plans, and goals from one object to another. Longanimity (or long-suffering) plays its part by controlling the feverish disturbance of work; humility and disinterestedness conquer the desire we feel for attention. Through the latter, our work takes on the subtle quality of a deed maturing in secret, like a flower in the bud until the time comes for it to bloom.</p><p class="MED_MED_N20_Text" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; border-width: 0px; color: #1a1818; font-family: "Delta Pro Book", sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-position: normal; line-height: 1.2; margin: 0px 10px; padding: 0px; text-align: justify; text-indent: 9px;">The longing for renown, the proclamation of our own deeds and sometimes even only of our plans, rob us of peace and of real thoroughness in our work, for there is too much for display in them, too much that is done for applause and renown, and too much seeking for immediate payment. The spirit of quiet demands humility and disinterestedness; the spirit of calm, as the fruit of love and justice, brings with it order and concord, and drives out disputes, discord, quarrelsomeness, and division. All of these are the fruit of quiet, poured into the soul.</p><p class="MED_MED_N35_Author" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; border-width: 0px; color: #1a1818; font-family: "Delta Pro Book", sans-serif; font-size: 12px; font-style: italic; font-variant-alternates: normal; font-variant-caps: small-caps; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-position: normal; line-height: 1.353; margin: 0px 10px 8px; padding: 0px; text-align: right;">Blessed Stefan Wyszyński</p><p class="MED_MED_N45_Notice" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; border-bottom-color: rgb(196, 1, 75); border-bottom-style: solid; border-width: 0px 0px 2px; color: #1a1818; font-family: "Delta Pro Book", sans-serif; font-size: 12px; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-position: normal; line-height: 1.1; margin: 0px 10px 26px; padding: 0px 0px 6px; text-align: justify;">Blessed Stefan Wyszyński († 1981) was a Polish archbishop and cardinal who was a courageous and outspoken opponent of both Nazism and Communism. / From Sanctify Your Daily Life: How to Transform Work into a Source of Strength, Holiness, and Joy. © 2018, EWTN Publishing, Inc., Sophia Institute Press, Manchester, NH. www.sophiainstitute.com. Used with permission.</p>David Nybakkehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13172189118334371454noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2925007249547402120.post-50009456341462397982023-12-03T06:04:00.000-08:002023-12-03T06:06:10.573-08:00Saving Mr Banks – Forgiveness Scene<p style="text-align: center;"> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/GSQWqnM6XNQ" width="320" youtube-src-id="GSQWqnM6XNQ"></iframe></div><br /><span face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size: 14pt; font-weight: 700; white-space: pre-wrap;">Saving Mr Banks – Forgiveness Scene</span><p></p>PAMELA - You've come to change my mind, haven’t you? To beat me into submission.<br /><br />WALT - No, I've come because you misjudge me.<br /><br />PAMELA - How do I misjudge you?<br /><br />WALT - You look at me and you see some kind of Hollywood King Midas. You think I've built an empire and that I want to use your Mary Poppins as just another brick in my kingdom.<br /><br />PAMELA - And don't you?<br /><br />WALT - If that was all it was, would I have pursued a cranky, stubborn dame like you for twenty years? I'd've saved myself an ulcer! No, you expected me to disappoint you and so you made sure I did. You see, I think life disappoints you, Mrs Travers. I think it's done that a lot. Maybe Mary Poppins is the only person in your life who hasn't.<br /><br />PAMELA - Mary Poppins isn't real.<br /><br />WALT - Oh, no, no, no, that's not true. She's real as can be to my daughter's and to thousands of other children--adults too. She's been there as a nighttime comfort to a heck of alot of people.<br /><br />PAMELA - Well, Where is she when I need her? Hm? I open the door to Mary Poppins and who should be standing there but Walt Disney!<br /><br />WALT - Mrs Travers, I am so sorry. I hoped this would be a magical experience for you, for all of us. But I let you down-- and in doing so, I've broken a twenty year old promise to my girls. I've been wracking my brains, trying to figure out why this has been so hard for you and I--You see, I have my own Mr Banks. Mine you, he had a mustache. <br /><br />PAMELA - Ah! Not true then that Disney created man in his own image?<br /><br />WALT - But it is true that you created yourself in someone else's yes? <br /><br />She doesn't answer. <br /><br />WALT (CONT'D) - Ever been to Kansas City, Mrs Travers? Do you know Missouri at all?<br /><br />PAMELA - Can't say I do.<br /><br />WALT - It's mighty cold there in the winters. Bitter. <br /><br />WALT (CONT'D - he pours out) - My dad, Elias Disney, he owned a newspaper delivery route there. Thousand papers. Twice daily. Morning and evening edition. Elias, he was a tough businessman. A save-a-penny anywhere you can type of fella so he wouldn't employ any delivery boys, he just used me and my big brother Roy. I was eight years old. Like I said, those winters were harsh and old Elias didn't believe in new shoes until the old ones were worn right through so-- Honestly, Mrs Travers, the snow drifts would be way over my head--<br /><br />WALT (CONT'D) - We'd push through that snow like it was molasses. And the cold and the wet would be seeping through the shoes and the skin would be peeling from our faces-- and sometimes I'd find myself sunk down in the snow, waking up, cuz I must've passed out for a moment-- I dunno. Then school, too cold to figure out equations and things. And back into the snow so by the time we got home it'd be just getting dark, and every part of you would sting like crazy as it slowly came back to life in the warmth. My mother would feed us dinner and then it'd be time to go out again for the evening edition. <br /><br />Best be quick Walt, best be quick or poppa's gonna show you the buckle end again boy.<br /><br />WALT (CONT'D) - Now, I don't tell you all this to make you sad Mrs Travers, I don't. I love my life - it's a miracle. And I loved my daddy, boy I loved him. But, there rare is a day where I don't think of that little boy in the snow and old Elias with his fist and strap and I'm just so tired-- I'm tired of remembering it that way. Aren't you tired Mrs Travers? We all have our tales but don't you want to find a way to finish the story? Let it all go and have a life that isn't dictated by a past?<br /><br />It's not the children she comes to save. It's their father. It's your father--? Travers Goff.<br /><br />PAMELA - I don't know what you think you know about me Walter--<br /><br />WALT - You must've loved and admired him a lot to take his name--<br /><br />PAMELA - I--<br /><br />WALT - Mrs. Travers. It's all about him isn't it? All of this. Everything. <br /><br /> Pamela looks at her hands, they're shaking.<br /><br />WALT (CONT'D) - Forgiveness, Mrs Travers, it's what I learned from your books.<br /><br />PAMELA - I don't need to forgive my father. He was a wonderful man.<br /><br />WALT - No, you need to forgive Helen Goff. Life is a harsh sentence to lay down for yourself.<br /><br />WALT (CONT'D) - Give her to me, Mrs Travers. Trust me with your precious Mary Poppins. I won't disappoint you. I swear that every time a person goes into a movie house - from Leicester to Kansas City, they will see George Banks being saved. They will love him and his kids, they will weep for his cares, and wring their hands when he loses his job. And when he flies that kite, oh! They will rejoice, they will sing. In every movie house, all over the world, in the eyes and the hearts of my kids, and other kids and their mothers and fathers for generations to come, George Banks will be honored. George Banks will be redeemed. George Banks and all he stands for will be saved. Maybe not in life, but in imagination. Because that's what we storytellers do. We restore order with imagination. We instill hope, again and again and again. Trust me, Mrs Travers. Let me prove it to you. I give you my word.<br />David Nybakkehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13172189118334371454noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2925007249547402120.post-11159034694356365022023-10-15T08:36:00.002-07:002023-10-15T08:38:06.057-07:00Assimilate the Word <p><span style="font-family: verdana; font-size: large;">My prayer is to always remember with every breath to assimilate the Word within me.</span></p><p class="MED_MED_N10_Title" style="border-width: 0px; color: #1a1818; font-family: "Delta Pro Book", sans-serif; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: 1; margin: 18px 0px 20px; padding: 0px; text-align: center; word-break: normal;"><span style="font-size: medium;">To Hear and Observe the Word</span></p><p class="MED_MED_N20_Text" style="border-width: 0px; color: #1a1818; font-family: "Delta Pro Book", sans-serif; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: 1.2; margin: 0px 10px; padding: 0px; text-align: justify; text-indent: 9px;"><span style="font-size: medium;">On a human plane some days go better than others. And so once again we experience that in the present moment given to us it doesn’t really matter if the day is going well or not. What does matter instead is how we live our lives, and how that points to love, which alone gives value to everything. God in fact loves those who keep his Word.</span></p><p class="MED_MED_N20_Text" style="border-width: 0px; color: #1a1818; font-family: "Delta Pro Book", sans-serif; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: 1.2; margin: 0px 10px; padding: 0px; text-align: justify; text-indent: 9px;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p><p class="MED_MED_N20_Text" style="border-width: 0px; color: #1a1818; font-family: "Delta Pro Book", sans-serif; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: 1.2; margin: 0px 10px; padding: 0px; text-align: justify; text-indent: 9px;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Let us keep in mind that neither our successes nor our failures will accompany us to the next life. Were we to even give our bodies to be burned— without love it would have no meaning. Without love neither doing missionary work nor speaking with angels’ tongues, neither doing works of mercy nor giving everything to the poor has value (cf. 1 Cor 13:1-3). We can take with us to heaven only how all this was lived, that is, in accordance with God’s Word through which our love is expressed.</span></p><p class="MED_MED_N20_Text" style="border-width: 0px; color: #1a1818; font-family: "Delta Pro Book", sans-serif; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: 1.2; margin: 0px 10px; padding: 0px; text-align: justify; text-indent: 9px;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p><p class="MED_MED_N20_Text" style="border-width: 0px; color: #1a1818; font-family: "Delta Pro Book", sans-serif; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: 1.2; margin: 0px 10px; padding: 0px; text-align: justify; text-indent: 9px;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Let us start our day then with confidence, whether there be storms or sunshine. Let us remember that every day has value insofar as we have assimilated the Word within us. Christ will live in us and he will give value to the works we accomplish, whether directly or through our prayers and sufferings. In the end these are the works that will follow us into everlasting life (cf. Rv 14:13). We will realize in awe how the Word of God, the truth, makes us free regardless of external circumstances, of inner trials, and of the influence of the world around us, which attempts to diminish the fullness and beauty of God’s kingdom within us.</span></p><p class="MED_MED_N35_Author" style="border-width: 0px; color: #1a1818; font-family: "Delta Pro Book", sans-serif; font-size: 12px; font-style: italic; font-variant-caps: small-caps; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: 1.353; margin: 0px 10px 8px; padding: 0px; text-align: right;">Servant of God Chiara Lubich</p><p class="MED_MED_N45_Notice" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(196, 1, 75); border-bottom-style: solid; border-width: 0px 0px 2px; color: #1a1818; font-family: "Delta Pro Book", sans-serif; font-size: 12px; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: 1.1; margin: 0px 10px 26px; padding: 0px 0px 6px; text-align: justify;">Chiara Lubich († 2008) was the founder and president of the Focolare movement. / From Heaven on Earth: Meditations and Reflections, Jerry Hearne, Tr. © 2000, New City Press, Hyde Park, NY. www.newcitypress.com. Used with permission.</p><p class="MED_MED_N45_Notice" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(196, 1, 75); border-bottom-style: solid; border-width: 0px 0px 2px; color: #1a1818; font-family: "Delta Pro Book", sans-serif; font-size: 12px; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: 1.1; margin: 0px 10px 26px; padding: 0px 0px 6px; text-align: justify;">From The Magnificat</p>David Nybakkehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13172189118334371454noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2925007249547402120.post-21004044840307673182023-10-04T04:00:00.001-07:002023-10-04T04:02:24.563-07:00Oct 4 - Bound to the Weakest - St Francis<p><span style="font-size: medium;"> From my friend, Gerry Straub's journal:</span></p><p><b><span style="font-size: medium;">October 4, 2023</span></b></p><p><span style="font-size: medium;"><i>Bound to the Weakest</i></span></p><p><span style="font-size: medium;"><i>Today we celebrate the Feast Day of St. Francis of Assisi. The saint desired to pray continually, as</i></span></p><p><span style="font-size: medium;"><i>1 Thessalonians 5:17 recommends. Let us pray...</i></span></p><p><br /></p><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;">Blessed you are, Lord;</span></p><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;">show me what you want me to do.</span></p><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;">Lord, you have been our refuge</span></p><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;">from generation to generation.</span></p><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;">Lord, have mercy on me</span></p><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;">-- I ask as I have asked before --</span></p><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;">heal this soul that has sinned against you.</span></p><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;">Teach me to do your will,</span></p><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;">for you are my God.</span></p><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;">In you is the source of all life;</span></p><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;">in you is the light</span></p><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;">whereby we shall see light.</span></p><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;">Forever show your mercy</span></p><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;">to them that have come to know you.</span></p><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;">Amen.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: medium;"><i>(A fragment of the ancient church’s prayer, the Te Deum, </i></span><i style="font-size: large;">specially translated by Fr. A. Hamman, a Dominican friar.)</i></p><p><span style="font-size: large;">Words to Ponder</span></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5_oT2gmO5yCkqLCZVMAJzcwSN2YVbl3cO4_actCWiKbRQfDyhQtAShKIImRls3wcZrQV_spRtLiRgP8ComfWkDBlDCeqOZ8PchiJtGU5TThzak2v5V34p6JnE3-thDBCaoQR8ofILjUegkWuC7tMHb99JbjtFV5j81hpSH9GT1mkGmeISHpj2hMUDow/s459/St%20Francis%20-%20Painting%20in%20Haiti%20Art%20Museum%20(Gerry%20Straub).png" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="459" data-original-width="278" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5_oT2gmO5yCkqLCZVMAJzcwSN2YVbl3cO4_actCWiKbRQfDyhQtAShKIImRls3wcZrQV_spRtLiRgP8ComfWkDBlDCeqOZ8PchiJtGU5TThzak2v5V34p6JnE3-thDBCaoQR8ofILjUegkWuC7tMHb99JbjtFV5j81hpSH9GT1mkGmeISHpj2hMUDow/s320/St%20Francis%20-%20Painting%20in%20Haiti%20Art%20Museum%20(Gerry%20Straub).png" width="194" /></a></div><span style="font-size: large;">Because he himself assumed his full share in this labor of transformation, along with the humblest</span><span style="font-size: medium;"> </span><span style="font-size: large;">and poorest of his fellow men, [St.] Francis [of Assisi] discovered an aspect of God very different </span><span style="font-size: large;">from that current among the adherents of ecclesiastical principalities and holy wars. For him, God </span><span style="font-size: large;">ceased to be the external, dominating, and Transcendent One, the Lord in a more-or-less feudal </span><span style="font-size: large;">dress. To him, God appeared as mysteriously present in our history, bereft of all trappings of </span><span style="font-size: large;">power, bound instead to what was weakest and most despised in man’s world. Francis </span><span style="font-size: large;">rediscovered God’s humbleness, God’s humanity. Not merely as an object of devotion, but as a </span><span style="font-size: large;">new principle on which to reconstruct society. He understood that if one acknowledges the God </span><span style="font-size: large;">of the Gospel, then one can no longer be satisfied with just any form of social organization. This </span><span style="font-size: large;">acknowledgment is bound to bring about a transformation in human relationships; it involves </span><span style="font-size: large;">seeking and bringing into being true brotherhood, a brotherhood that excludes nobody. The God </span><span style="font-size: large;">of the Gospel lets himself be seen through other men, where there are no more lords and no more </span><span style="font-size: large;">subjects, where no one is kept out. The dawn of true brotherhood is the light in which God is </span><span style="font-size: large;">truly found.</span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: medium;"><i>-Eloi Leclerc, OFM,</i></span></p><p><span style="font-size: medium;"><i>Francis of Assisi: Return to the Gospel</i></span></p>David Nybakkehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13172189118334371454noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2925007249547402120.post-9522128625872604092023-09-04T09:28:00.002-07:002023-09-04T12:13:34.166-07:00 I, but no longer I: A liberation of our "I" from its isolation - Pope Benedict XVI<p style="text-align: center;"><b><span style="font-size: medium;"> <i style="background-color: white; font-family: Tahoma, Verdana, Segoe, sans-serif;">I, but no longer I</i><span face="Tahoma, Verdana, Segoe, sans-serif" style="background-color: white;">: A </span><span face="Tahoma, Verdana, Segoe, sans-serif" style="background-color: white;">liberation of our "I" from its isolation</span></span></b></p><p style="text-align: left;"><b>I can't help but think that sometimes you take words literally and then sometimes, if you are blessed, you hear and feel the heartbeat of the Word. </b></p><p style="text-align: left;"><b><span face="Tahoma, Verdana, Segoe, sans-serif" style="background-color: white;"><a href="https://www.vatican.va/content/benedict-xvi/en/homilies/2006/documents/hf_ben-xvi_hom_20060415_veglia-pasquale.html" target="_blank">Link to a homily given on April 15, 2006, Pope Benedict XVI</a> </span></b></p><p style="text-align: left;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span face="Tahoma, Verdana, Segoe, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 14.6667px;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: right;"><span face="Tahoma, Verdana, Segoe, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 14.6667px;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjiL0WOy4mX1gwheHx6AIHgTbKUb8YUGegfgIvm8ipOXIjTme3BfEUoM9yHpExq6DhqB6lkwwBpWWXy3D7t7DyS4Cz08vJKUicZb7ezo2TsbER1-GCTcIEWyBcafnKIX5UdgeQNfcghEBsXsXddg51Xc-Ser3UllGovqZN1KGvAUtrFzZ8Ro8dExIcRTg/s743/Jesus%20Heartbeat.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="524" data-original-width="743" height="226" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjiL0WOy4mX1gwheHx6AIHgTbKUb8YUGegfgIvm8ipOXIjTme3BfEUoM9yHpExq6DhqB6lkwwBpWWXy3D7t7DyS4Cz08vJKUicZb7ezo2TsbER1-GCTcIEWyBcafnKIX5UdgeQNfcghEBsXsXddg51Xc-Ser3UllGovqZN1KGvAUtrFzZ8Ro8dExIcRTg/s320/Jesus%20Heartbeat.jpg" width="320" /></a></span></div><span face="Tahoma, Verdana, Segoe, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 14.6667px;"><div><span face="Tahoma, Verdana, Segoe, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 14.6667px;"><b style="font-size: medium;">Some outtakes of this homily:</b></span></div>Jesus is not a character from the past. He lives, and he walks before us as one who is alive, he calls us to follow him, the living one, and in this way to discover for ourselves too the path of life.</span><p></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white;"><span face="Tahoma, Verdana, Segoe, sans-serif"><span style="font-size: 14.6667px;">(Like the disciples we are perplexed at the Resurrection and ask) What happened there? </span></span></span><span face="Tahoma, Verdana, Segoe, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 14.6667px;">What does it mean for us, for the whole world and for me personally? Above all: what happened? Jesus is no longer in the tomb. He is in a totally new life. But how could this happen? What forces were in operation? The crucial point is that this man Jesus was not alone, he was not an "I" closed in upon itself. He was one single reality with the living God, so closely united with him as to form one person with him. He found himself, so to speak, in an embrace with him who is life itself, an embrace not just on the emotional level, but one which included and permeated his being. His own life was not just his own...</span></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span face="Tahoma, Verdana, Segoe, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 14.6667px;">The Resurrection was like an explosion of light, an explosion of love which dissolved the hitherto indissoluble compenetration of "dying and becoming". It ushered in a new dimension of being, a new dimension of life in which, in a transformed way, matter too was integrated and through which a new world emerges.</span></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span face="Tahoma, Verdana, Segoe, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 14.6667px;">The Resurrection is not a thing of the past, the Resurrection has reached us and seized us. We grasp hold of it, we grasp hold of the risen Lord, and we know that he holds us firmly even when our hands grow weak. We grasp hold of his hand, and thus we also hold on to one another’s hands, and we become one single subject, not just one thing. </span><i style="background-color: white; font-family: Tahoma, Verdana, Segoe, sans-serif; font-size: 14.6667px;">I, but no longer I</i><span face="Tahoma, Verdana, Segoe, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 14.6667px;">: this is the formula of Christian life rooted in Baptism, the formula of the Resurrection within time. </span><i style="background-color: white; font-family: Tahoma, Verdana, Segoe, sans-serif; font-size: 14.6667px;">I, but no longer I</i><span face="Tahoma, Verdana, Segoe, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 14.6667px;">: if we live in this way, we transform the world.</span></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span face="Tahoma, Verdana, Segoe, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 14.6667px;">Life comes to us from being loved by him who is Life; it comes to us from living-with and loving-with him. </span><i style="background-color: white; font-family: Tahoma, Verdana, Segoe, sans-serif; font-size: 14.6667px;">I, but no longer I</i><span face="Tahoma, Verdana, Segoe, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 14.6667px;">: this is the way of the Cross, the way that "crosses over" a life simply closed in on the I, thereby opening up the road towards true and lasting joy.</span></p>David Nybakkehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13172189118334371454noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2925007249547402120.post-82392709462001635182023-02-26T18:12:00.001-08:002023-02-26T18:12:32.835-08:00Contact - I Had an Experience...I Wish i Could Share It<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/opZ1E1bF3Ds" width="320" youtube-src-id="opZ1E1bF3Ds"></iframe></div><br /> <span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">ELLIE</span><p></p><span id="docs-internal-guid-4141c46d-7fff-7117-aa37-55645d757375"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I had... an experience. I can't</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">prove it. I can't even explain it.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">All I can tell you is that</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">everything I know as a human being,</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">everything I am -- tells me that it</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">was real.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The room grows quiet.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">ELLIE</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> (softly)</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I was given something wonderful.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Something that changed me. A vision</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">of the universe that made it</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">overwhelmingly clear just how tiny</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">and insignificant -- and at the same</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">time how rare and precious we all</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">are. A vision... that tells us we</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">belong to something greater than</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">ourselves... that we're not -- that</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">none of us -- is alone.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">JOSS</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Moved beyond words.</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">ELLIE</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Softly:</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">ELLIE</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I wish I could share it. I wish</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">everyone, if only for a moment --</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">could feel that sense of awe, and</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">humility... and hope. That</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Courier New"; font-size: 11.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">continues to be my wish.</span></p><br /></span>David Nybakkehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13172189118334371454noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2925007249547402120.post-35545319350116869212022-12-14T18:15:00.000-08:002022-12-14T18:15:00.630-08:00 THE SOUL THAT SUFFERS WITH LONGING TO SEE GOD - St John of the Cross<p> <span style="background-color: white; color: #111111; font-family: adobe-text-pro, sans-serif; font-size: 18px;">Saint John of the Cross (1542–1591)</span></p><p style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #111111; font-family: adobe-text-pro, sans-serif; font-size: 18px; margin: 0px 0px 10px;">I live yet do not live in me,<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />am waiting as my life goes by,<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />and die because I do not die.</p><p style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #111111; font-family: adobe-text-pro, sans-serif; font-size: 18px; margin: 0px 0px 10px;">No longer do I live in me,<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />and without God I cannot live;<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />to him or me I cannot give<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />my self, so what can living be?<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />A thousand deaths my agony<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />waiting as my life goes by,<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />dying because I do not die.</p><p style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #111111; font-family: adobe-text-pro, sans-serif; font-size: 18px; margin: 0px 0px 10px;">This life I live alone I view<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />as robbery of life, and so<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />it is a constant death — with no<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />way out until I live with you.<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />God, hear me, what I say is true:<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />I do not want this life of mine,<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />and die because I do not die.</p><p style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #111111; font-family: adobe-text-pro, sans-serif; font-size: 18px; margin: 0px 0px 10px;">Being so removed from you I say<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />what kind of life can I have here<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />but death so ugly and severe<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />and worse than any form of pain?<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />I pity me — and yet my fate<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />is that I must keep up this lie,<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />and die because I do not die.</p><p style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #111111; font-family: adobe-text-pro, sans-serif; font-size: 18px; margin: 0px 0px 10px;">The fish taken out of the sea<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />is not without a consolation:<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />his dying is of brief duration<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />and ultimately brings relief.<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />Yet what convulsive death can be<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />as bad as my pathetic life?<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />The more I live the more I die.</p><p style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #111111; font-family: adobe-text-pro, sans-serif; font-size: 18px; margin: 0px 0px 10px;">When I begin to feel relief<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />on seeing you in the sacrament,<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />I sink in deeper discontent,<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />deprived of your sweet company.<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />Now everything compels my grief:<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />I want — yet can’t — see you nearby,<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />and die because I do not die.</p><p style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #111111; font-family: adobe-text-pro, sans-serif; font-size: 18px; margin: 0px 0px 10px;">Although I find my pleasure, Sir,<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />in hope of someday seeing you,<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />I see that I can lose you too,<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />which makes my pain doubly severe,<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />and so I live in darkest fear,<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />and hope, wait as life goes by,<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />dying because I do not die.</p><p style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #111111; font-family: adobe-text-pro, sans-serif; font-size: 18px; margin: 0px 0px 10px;">Deliver me from death, my God,<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />and give me life; now you have wound<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />a rope about me; harshly bound<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />I ask you to release the cord.<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />See how I die to see you, Lord,<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />and I am shattered where I lie,<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />dying because I do not die.</p><p style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #111111; font-family: adobe-text-pro, sans-serif; font-size: 18px; margin: 0px 0px 10px;">My death will trigger tears in me,<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />and I shall mourn my life: a day<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />annihilated by the way<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />I fail and sin relentlessly.<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />O Father God, when will it be<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />that I can say without a lie:<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />I live because I do not die?</p><p style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #111111; font-family: adobe-text-pro, sans-serif; font-size: 18px; margin: 0px 0px 10px;">St. John of the Cross<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />translated by Willis Barnstone<br style="box-sizing: border-box;" />found in “Poems of St. John of the Cross”</p>David Nybakkehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13172189118334371454noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2925007249547402120.post-13884909279170851122022-12-03T14:05:00.001-08:002022-12-03T14:08:36.060-08:00Élisabeth Leseur - Meditation on Suffering<span style="font-size: medium;">I know that if I didn't begin each day with the daily meditations from <i><a href="https://us.magnificat.net/" target="_blank">The Magnificat</a></i> I would be banging around like the pinball in the song Pinball Wizard by The Who.</span><p><span style="font-size: medium;">This year, with my trials and tribulations, the theme of suffering has brought me some solace. I just want to share a few quotes from Élisabeth Leseur.</span><br /><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjsPGrMg1lbhWZz9OVghEYA-Znk4i0XArddY8iDZotloiN4HdI8oFt9uiWNLdkO1Nqo2cvPB2ixX0xohEOA8axaYQzOi4Ys1tPgUXiRrZ8loYl5tR0-JXoofmfYdehVLAeuCUYwK9HnWXJIuP6jK1fqs3T5rFFT8yujYtlfm8mhGpcy_gJQn7xwShg/s528/Elisabeth%20Leseur.jpg" style="clear: left; display: inline; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="528" data-original-width="450" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjsPGrMg1lbhWZz9OVghEYA-Znk4i0XArddY8iDZotloiN4HdI8oFt9uiWNLdkO1Nqo2cvPB2ixX0xohEOA8axaYQzOi4Ys1tPgUXiRrZ8loYl5tR0-JXoofmfYdehVLAeuCUYwK9HnWXJIuP6jK1fqs3T5rFFT8yujYtlfm8mhGpcy_gJQn7xwShg/s320/Elisabeth%20Leseur.jpg" width="273" /></a><i><span style="font-size: medium;">“Let it be done for you according to your faith”<o:p></o:p></span></i></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: medium;">God, I offer you my spiritual aridity and deprivations. I
offer you the interior sadness, the injuries, the disappointments of my heart,
so much anxiety for the spiritual well-being and the health of those precious
to me, and all the many sufferings of life. I offer you darkness of spirit,
weakness of will, interior sorrow, and burdens. I offer you my physical
distress, this illness that has sadly limited my external life, the discomforts
and exhaustion that my troubles bring right now. I bind these things into a
sheaf, Lord, and come humbly with the shepherds to lay it in the manger.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size: medium;">Little Child, all love, all purity, all tenderness, give me
purity of heart, tenderness, and charity. Accept my afflictions and use them
for the good of others and for your glory. May your blessed hands help me to
carry [my burdens], and may your love and the union of our hearts relieve my
isolation. May it end one day, when, by your grace, you will convert and make
holy those dear persons whom I beg you to make Christians and apostles, O Jesus
Christ, my Lord and my God.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="font-size: medium;">A few more quotes from Servant of God Elisabeth Leseur:<o:p></o:p></span></i></p><p><span style="background-color: white; color: #121212;"><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;">“Look around oneself for proud sufferers in need,” Élisabeth counseled, “find them, and give them the alms of our heart, of our time, and of our tender respect.”</span></span></p><p><span style="background-color: white; color: #121212; font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;">“Suffering is the highest form of action, the highest expression of the wonderful Communion of Saints, and that in suffering one is sure not to make mistakes (as in action, sometimes) — sure to be useful to others and to the great causes that one longs to serve.”</span></p><p><span style="background-color: white; color: #121212; font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">And here is an entry from her diary dated, May 3, 1904, which is typical of her experience of sorrow: </span></p><p><span style="background-color: white; color: #121212; font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"></span></p><blockquote><span style="background-color: white; color: #121212; font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;">"Has my life known any unhappier time than this?…And yet through all these trials and in spite of the lack of interior joy, there is a deep place that all these waves of sorrow cannot touch….[T]here I can feel how completely one with God I am, and I regain strength and serenity in the heart of Christ. My God, give health and happiness to those I love and give us all true light and charity."</span></blockquote><p></p><p><span style="background-color: white; color: #121212; font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;">Sometimes the best place to be is in silence and </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #121212; font-family: Montserrat, serif; font-size: large;">Élisabeth sums it up this way:</span></p><p><span style="background-color: white; color: #121212; font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;"></span></p><blockquote><p><span style="background-color: white; color: #121212; font-family: inherit; font-size: medium;">“Silence is sometimes an act of energy, and smiling, too.”</span></p></blockquote><p><span style="font-size: medium;"><i>Dear Lord, please kindle in my heart the indelible mark of suffering shared by all in the Communion of Saints and help me find union with Your Heart full of tenderness and charity.</i></span></p>David Nybakkehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13172189118334371454noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2925007249547402120.post-72923795912015701582021-09-14T10:09:00.010-07:002022-12-31T11:16:04.098-08:00Peace and Truth - The Peace that Convicts Us of Our Lies<div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiGVihOP9xTpxq3PiZXCvSRx6YW4DOuEwh0QidPKJS4WbJdlP_ZROSdonfb8il0Bfrypb-0-v7bjbqAbR3rCMU7b9xTcftwEGFdIb4ODCdxpQdZkY8lco18M8u58RvMc2N2BjFy6topIAw/s600/The-Raising-Of-The-Cross-1894-Crucifixion-Good-Friday-600x334-Feature-I.jpeg" style="display: block; padding: 1em 0px; text-align: center;"><img alt="" border="0" data-original-height="334" data-original-width="600" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiGVihOP9xTpxq3PiZXCvSRx6YW4DOuEwh0QidPKJS4WbJdlP_ZROSdonfb8il0Bfrypb-0-v7bjbqAbR3rCMU7b9xTcftwEGFdIb4ODCdxpQdZkY8lco18M8u58RvMc2N2BjFy6topIAw/s600/The-Raising-Of-The-Cross-1894-Crucifixion-Good-Friday-600x334-Feature-I.jpeg" width="600" /></a></div>
The one symbol most often identified with Jesus and his Church is the cross. Today we celebrate The Exaltation of the Holy Cross. The cross is a sign of suffering, a sign of human cruelty at its worst. But by Christ’s love shown in the Paschal Mystery, it has become the sign of triumph and victory, the sign of God, who is love itself. Pope Benedict XVI wrote: <div><blockquote>In one respect the cross does have a terrible aspect that we ought not to remove... To see that the purest of men, who was more than a man, was executed in such a grisly way can make us frightened of ourselves. But we also need to be frightened of ourselves and out of our self-complacency. Here, I think, Luther was right when he said that man must first be frightened of himself so that he can then find the right way.
However, the cross doesn't stop at being a horror... because the one who looks down on us from the cross is not a failure, a desperate man, not one of the horrible victims of humanity. For this crucified man says something different from Spartacus and his failed adherents, because, after all, what looks down at us from the cross is a goodness that enables a new beginning in the midst of life's horror.<span style="font-size: x-small;"> (<i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/Salt-Earth-Millennium-Interview-Seewald/dp/0898706408/ref=sr_1_6?qid=1672513767&refinements=p_27%3APeter+Seewald&s=books&sr=1-6&text=Peter+Seewald" target="_blank">Salt of the Earth: The Church at the End of the Millennium</a></i>)</span></blockquote></div><div> As my friend, Gil Bailie surmises that if you or I were on the cross, looking down at our persecutors, we would have seen ravenous wolves. Jesus looks down and see lost sheep. In this difference of looks we have either the apparent peace we grasp at by expelling our enemies versus the look of Real Truth and Goodness revealed through the grace of His Peace.
Pope Benedict XVI continues:
<blockquote>Peace convicts us of our lies. It brings us out of our comfortable indifference into the struggle and pain of the truth. And it is only thus that true peace can come into being, in place of the apparent peace, beneath which lie the hidden hypocrisy and all kinds of conflict. Truth is worth pain and even conflict. I may not just accept a lie in order to have quiet. For it is not the first duty of a citizen, or of a Christian, to seek quiet; but rather it is that standing fast by what is noble and great, which is what Christ has given us and which can reach as far as suffering, as far as a struggle that ends in martyrdom - and exactly in that way of peace. Christ embodies the great and undiluted loving-kindness of God. He comes to help us bear the load. He does not do this simply by taking away from us the pain of being human; that remains heavy enough. But we are no longer carrying it on our own; he is carrying it with us. Christ has nothing to do with comfort, with banality, yet we find in him that inner calm that comes from knowing that we are being supported by an ultimate kindness and an ultimate security. We see that the entire structure of the message of Jesus is full of tension; it is an enormous challenge. Its nature is such that it always has to do with the Cross. Anyone who is not ready to get burned, who is not at least willing for it to happen, will not come near. But we can always be sure that it is there that we will meet true loving-kindness, which helps us, which accepts us - and which does not merely mean well toward us, but which will in fact ensure that all things go well with us. <span style="font-size: small;">Quote from: </span><i style="font-size: small;"><a href="https://www.amazon.com/God-World-Conversation-Peter-Seewald/dp/0898708680" target="_blank">God and the World: A Conversation With Peter Seewald</a></i> </blockquote></div>David Nybakkehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13172189118334371454noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2925007249547402120.post-53286796234772906102021-07-04T13:28:00.006-07:002021-07-04T13:32:32.506-07:00Founding Fathers' Vision for Independence Day<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiu0Ioh38nUPn73FKkacF8sqAPBbI9v_oKH-LlhbGAHclhpYsnWYXDwU1txteqpjiaWkKu3iqoGwvth7pbCuiO_SiulduFukrCM_I6NEkPX3UwhGJ4jSWJ8o_MBR2nubwqhG26tgVK82Dg/s230/GodBlessAmerica.jpg" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="230" data-original-width="220" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiu0Ioh38nUPn73FKkacF8sqAPBbI9v_oKH-LlhbGAHclhpYsnWYXDwU1txteqpjiaWkKu3iqoGwvth7pbCuiO_SiulduFukrCM_I6NEkPX3UwhGJ4jSWJ8o_MBR2nubwqhG26tgVK82Dg/s0/GodBlessAmerica.jpg" /></a></div>The following Independence Day meditation is from The Magnificat by Anne Husted Burleigh, author and scholar on John Adams.<p>"In God’s plan of history—that mysterious drama that unites God’s providential care with our freedom –there are particular moments that reveal with glittering clarity that God is in charge. For Americans, Independence Day marks the anniversary of such a moment.</p><p>"Nearly two and a half centuries ago, on July 4, 1776, members of the Continental Congress approved Jefferson’s magnificent Declaration of Independence, proclaiming “these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.”</p><p>"For the first time a nation sprang forth, not simply from the bond of people living together in a place for years, but rather from an idea, the principle of the truth of the human person as sacred and unrepeatable. The Declaration acknowledged our origin as beings made by God, with rights God himself gave us. It is God’s law—his plan—that declares unequivocally that in our creation by the divine hand rests our equal liberty and the rights inherent in us a God’s creatures. Our liberty arises not from us, but from the one who made us.</p><p></p>"Independence Day Honors not our own artificial schemes of liberty and quality but the founding principle of natural law that alone protects who we are: each one of us chosen, loved, and created as free beings by God our Father. No other authority will do: nothing other than divine truth provides proper grounding for ordered liberty. On God’s authority, then, the American founders in 1776, “with a firm reliance on the Protection of divine providence,” ventured forth in the great experiment, mutually pledging “to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our Sacred Honor.” <p></p><p style="text-align: right;">By Anne Husted Burleigh</p><p>Anne is a long-time writer, among whose books is a biography of one of the American founders, John Adams. She and her husband live in Cincinnati near their children and grandchildren.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhdOGUq2Jgs8kmlvK8eLesN8BvQiw8BavMc3FrBTxD1VV8f1KsRVhCxj6JfEEI9yo9ARq6j7ZvOaKcxTSHHqPWadOW2l3EbKEa3ILsOn4PA8rGDfQ-SZTAWWywhiSfETj267z7Ow1WsndM/s1600/johnadams4thjuly.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1600" height="432" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhdOGUq2Jgs8kmlvK8eLesN8BvQiw8BavMc3FrBTxD1VV8f1KsRVhCxj6JfEEI9yo9ARq6j7ZvOaKcxTSHHqPWadOW2l3EbKEa3ILsOn4PA8rGDfQ-SZTAWWywhiSfETj267z7Ow1WsndM/w640-h432/johnadams4thjuly.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p></p><br /><p><br /></p>David Nybakkehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13172189118334371454noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2925007249547402120.post-58207551665880251262021-06-25T12:37:00.016-07:002021-06-25T12:45:41.334-07:00Bishop Barron - How to Discern God's Will for My Life<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgXFDcPAh_CNJfVdlBDkfexzVkWs-abBnPsQQABxyFOXpprDJmhjdJACutNkk7WSLmhxfa5dBABPINn2Sw0Eq8xz6-nX8Nx6LjndNt-2P_kPFHNE4R2M9dF2hbvqWTDtnirsyVo9KHyfYY/s475/How+to+Discern+WoF.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="475" data-original-width="317" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgXFDcPAh_CNJfVdlBDkfexzVkWs-abBnPsQQABxyFOXpprDJmhjdJACutNkk7WSLmhxfa5dBABPINn2Sw0Eq8xz6-nX8Nx6LjndNt-2P_kPFHNE4R2M9dF2hbvqWTDtnirsyVo9KHyfYY/w268-h400/How+to+Discern+WoF.jpg" width="268" /></a></div><span style="font-size: medium;">A great resource from Bishop Robert Barron and the folks at Word on Fire. </span><div><a href="https://www.wordonfire.org/wof-site/media/wof-ebook-how-to-discern-gods-will-for-your-life.pdf" style="font-family: verdana;" target="_blank">HOW TO DISCERN GOD'S WILL FOR MY LIFE</a></div><div><p></p><p> <span style="font-size: medium;"> "As a priest, and now a bishop, I hear often from many
people searching for God’s direction in their lives. They
wonder, what does God want me to do with my life? How
can I be faithful to God in my day to day decisions? How
can I hear God and be sensitive to his promptings?
We all ask these questions. They are a normal part of the
Christian life. That’s why Brandon Vogt and I recently
devoted a whole episode of our podcast, “The Word on
Fire Show,” to exploring these questions.
Below you’ll find an edited transcript of the show so you
can read it slowly, at your own pace, and reflect on how
God is leading you in your life.
In the end, all discernment boils down to one ultimate
goal: finding the path of greatest love. Let’s seek that path
together."</span></p><p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span>Listen to Bishop Barron discuss the context of the book </span><a href="https://www.wordonfireshow.com/episode19/" target="_blank"><b>HERE!</b></a></span></p></div>David Nybakkehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13172189118334371454noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2925007249547402120.post-83974289289503819082021-04-25T06:19:00.001-07:002021-04-25T06:19:13.156-07:00What Does it Mean to Believe IN?<p> <span style="font-size: medium;">A wonderful meditation from The Magnificat.</span></p><p class="MED_MED_N10_Title" style="border-width: 0px; color: #1a1818; font-family: "Delta Pro Book", sans-serif; font-size: 16px; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: 1; margin: 18px 0px 20px; padding: 0px; text-align: center; word-break: normal;"><b>From “Believing That” to “Believing In”</b></p><p class="MED_MED_N20_Text" style="border-width: 0px; color: #1a1818; font-family: "Delta Pro Book", sans-serif; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: 1.2; margin: 0px 10px; padding: 0px; text-align: justify; text-indent: 9px;">In the Gospel of John, the personal nature of the act of faith is stressed by the very use of the verb “to believe.” In the Gospel, we encounter the expression “to believe,” which means to lend credence to or hold to be true. For instance, to believe Scripture (Jn 2:22), or Moses, or Christ (Jn 5:46). We also encounter the expression “to believe that,” meaning to be convinced that, or just to believe. For instance, to believe that Jesus is the Holy One of God, that he is the Christ, that the Father has sent him.</p><p class="MED_MED_N20_Text" style="border-width: 0px; color: #1a1818; font-family: "Delta Pro Book", sans-serif; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: 1.2; margin: 0px 10px; padding: 0px; text-align: justify; text-indent: 9px;"><br /></p><p class="MED_MED_N20_Text" style="border-width: 0px; color: #1a1818; font-family: "Delta Pro Book", sans-serif; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: 1.2; margin: 0px 10px; padding: 0px; text-align: justify; text-indent: 9px;">But alongside these well-known usages, there is one unknown to profane language yet most dear to the Evangelist, and that is the expression “to believe in,” as in the sentence: <span class="Delta_Book_Italic_N50" style="font-style: italic;">Let not your hearts be troubled. Believe in God, believe also in me</span> (Jn 14:1). <b><i>Believe here means: have faith in, entrust yourself to the person you believe in, build your own life on that person. </i></b>It indicates a total and unconditional trust that is to replace all human insecurity. A trust in consequence of which the heart can never again be troubled by anything. Jesus asks the same kind of trust for himself that God asked of his people in the Old Testament.</p><p class="MED_MED_N20_Text" style="border-width: 0px; color: #1a1818; font-family: "Delta Pro Book", sans-serif; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: 1.2; margin: 0px 10px; padding: 0px; text-align: justify; text-indent: 9px;"><br /></p><p class="MED_MED_N20_Text" style="border-width: 0px; color: #1a1818; font-family: "Delta Pro Book", sans-serif; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: 1.2; margin: 0px 10px; padding: 0px; text-align: justify; text-indent: 9px;">Believing in the Son of God is something different and more than believing that Jesus is the Son of God…. As regards the former, there are all sorts of degrees and you would never finish progressing through them. In other words, you can always trust more in Christ, by surrendering yourself to him more and more and losing yourself in him, until faith in the Son of God becomes the whole reason for your life. Like Paul, who could say: <span class="Delta_Book_Italic_N50" style="font-style: italic;">The life I now live in the flesh, I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me </span>(Gal 2:20).</p><p class="MED_MED_N35_Author" style="border-width: 0px; color: #1a1818; font-family: "Delta Pro Book", sans-serif; font-size: 12px; font-style: italic; font-variant-caps: small-caps; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: 1.353; margin: 0px 10px 8px; padding: 0px; text-align: right;">Cardinal Raniero Cantalamessa, o.f.m. cap.</p><p class="MED_MED_N45_Notice" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(196, 1, 75); border-bottom-style: solid; border-width: 0px 0px 2px; color: #1a1818; font-family: "Delta Pro Book", sans-serif; font-size: 12px; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: 1.1; margin: 0px 10px 26px; padding: 0px 0px 6px; text-align: justify;">Cardinal Cantalamessa is a Capuchin Franciscan friar and the preacher to the papal household. [From Jesus Christ: The Holy One of God, Alan Neame, Tr. © 1991, St. Paul Publications, Slough, UK. All rights reserved.]</p>David Nybakkehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13172189118334371454noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2925007249547402120.post-3157148190585834172021-04-19T09:50:00.001-07:002021-04-19T09:50:31.292-07:00The Vast Expanse Between the Good Life and the Holy Life - A Reflection by Father Donald Haggerty<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiGvw-FMzVoefhMzHsPuK7Y1JEk4QVQsLvZMlp9_qLPg51Tbm7kPE8hD7YVFmQ6PmDtZvNSOqOEwqoW3keQeX5WyvUzCkjhtAs_-k-Ml45vkrWP9291oDBbC9CoUoePkiz70ufvt_krXAo/s2100/EducationContemplativeLifeB.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="670" data-original-width="2100" height="204" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiGvw-FMzVoefhMzHsPuK7Y1JEk4QVQsLvZMlp9_qLPg51Tbm7kPE8hD7YVFmQ6PmDtZvNSOqOEwqoW3keQeX5WyvUzCkjhtAs_-k-Ml45vkrWP9291oDBbC9CoUoePkiz70ufvt_krXAo/w640-h204/EducationContemplativeLifeB.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p style="background-color: white; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #444444; font-family: Alegreya, serif; font-size: 16px; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant-east-asian: inherit; font-variant-numeric: inherit; line-height: 1.5; margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">The vast separation between the good life and the holy life is always far more than we realize. The difference is not evident simply in the exterior activity of life. The generous accomplishments of a good person may outshine the limited works of the holy person. What distinguishes the holy person is the interior quality of a soul seeking God, and this is often not seen so visibly. The good life will always be observable to some degree, but whether or not a life is truly holy can easily be concealed in its essential truth. The most important acts of a holy life take place in secret, within quiet depths of the soul. And these most important acts are the offerings it makes for others. There is no great love of God unless a soul is great in offering itself for others. And this begins in the intensity of its prayer, where God alone sees.<span style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: 700; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><br style="box-sizing: border-box;" /></span></p><p style="background-color: white; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #444444; font-family: Alegreya, serif; font-size: 16px; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant-east-asian: inherit; font-variant-numeric: inherit; line-height: 1.5; margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">The word holiness ought not to be tossed about too lightly, as though the reality were easily reached. There is a danger that an overworked and casual evocation of holiness as the goal of life reduces the immense challenge of giving all to God to a manageable habit of steady, low-cost generosities. Dorothy Day kept on her bedside table a striking phrase of Dostoevsky that conveys, by contrast, the starker reality of a true offering: <em style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">“Love in action is a harsh and dreadful thing compared to love in dreams.” </em>It is precisely the harsh and dreadful nature of sacrificial love that makes such love and the offering that accompanies it most fruitful for the salvation of souls.</p><p style="background-color: white; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #444444; font-family: Alegreya, serif; font-size: 16px; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant-east-asian: inherit; font-variant-numeric: inherit; line-height: 1.5; margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">A task in prayer that must be repeated with regularity: <em style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">to search for the deeper solitary region of the heart where a single word spoken in silence has more impact on our soul than hours of replete eloquence taking place at the shallows of life.</em></p><p style="background-color: white; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #444444; font-family: Alegreya, serif; font-size: 16px; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant-east-asian: inherit; font-variant-numeric: inherit; line-height: 1.5; margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"> <span style="text-align: center;">~ A Reflection by Father Donald Haggerty, ‘The Contemplative Hunger’</span></p><p style="background-color: white; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #444444; font-family: Alegreya, serif; font-size: 16px; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant-east-asian: inherit; font-variant-numeric: inherit; line-height: 1.5; margin: 0px 0px 1.5em; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="text-align: center;">Check out Fr Haggerty at Ignatius Press <a href="https://www.ignatius.com/cw_contributorinfo.aspx?ContribID=35&Name=Fr.+Donald+Haggerty" target="_blank">HERE</a>.</span></p>David Nybakkehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13172189118334371454noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2925007249547402120.post-70382142135095565552021-03-17T11:29:00.002-07:002021-04-05T13:35:42.988-07:00Prayer Draws You Into New Life - Into Christ<p><span style="font-family: verdana; font-size: medium;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: verdana; font-size: medium;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVCS6MY_wnSN-Xx_5VA1-dE-K2paKi40AlZD7bTL04Vl_UolS9Zxj_QXbL-qp7PMNnXh2OGKs2yjeXPoZpZmpKFzlNhL4IhWH00lqtgm9KNL4bs4PAcdmsaOtTzpUapiiJ5eSvdSW4RYw/s988/morning-and-new-beginnings-prayers.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="214" data-original-width="988" height="138" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVCS6MY_wnSN-Xx_5VA1-dE-K2paKi40AlZD7bTL04Vl_UolS9Zxj_QXbL-qp7PMNnXh2OGKs2yjeXPoZpZmpKFzlNhL4IhWH00lqtgm9KNL4bs4PAcdmsaOtTzpUapiiJ5eSvdSW4RYw/w640-h138/morning-and-new-beginnings-prayers.jpg" width="640" /></a></span></div><span style="font-family: verdana; font-size: medium;"><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><b><span style="background-color: white; border: 0px; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant-east-asian: inherit; font-variant-numeric: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Colossians 3:4 - </span><span style="background-color: #fdfeff; border: 0px; color: #001320; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant-east-asian: inherit; font-variant-numeric: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">When Christ, who is your life, appears...</span></b></div></span><p></p><p><span style="font-family: verdana; font-size: medium;"><span style="background-color: white; border: 0px; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant-east-asian: inherit; font-variant-numeric: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Prayer is to forge us into the likeness of the beloved, and thus it is bringing Christ to life in the believer. This is the mystery of prayer - bringing Christ to life in us, thus bringing Christ’s image of His Father to life in us. This is the Christian idea of centering, as a key ingredient for prayer, which means a focus on Christ to where it draws your whole being into Christ. </span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: verdana; font-size: medium;"><span style="background-color: white; border: 0px; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant-east-asian: inherit; font-variant-numeric: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Colossians 3:4 - <b><i><span style="color: red;">“</span></i></b></span><span style="background-color: #fdfeff; border: 0px; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant-east-asian: inherit; font-variant-numeric: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><b><i><span style="color: red;">When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.”</span></i></b></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: verdana; font-size: medium;"><span style="background-color: #fdfeff; border: 0px; color: #001320; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant-east-asian: inherit; font-variant-numeric: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">At some point in my life prayer became, not so much talking to, or reflecting on, meditating, contemplating for achieving union, to or with God..., yes all these things and more are part of prayer, but prayer became, Imitatio Christi - the imitation of Christ - a place within</span><span style="background-color: white; border: 0px; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant-east-asian: inherit; font-variant-numeric: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"> where my "I" in the here and now is continually being formed and reformed by God. </span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: verdana; font-size: medium;"><span style="background-color: white; border: 0px; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant-east-asian: inherit; font-variant-numeric: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: verdana; font-size: medium;"><span style="font-family: verdana; font-size: medium;"></span></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: verdana; font-size: medium;"><span style="font-family: verdana; font-size: medium;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjbmhOX93Lw-qMVJBI1sH1z51P50Uz9pc3MBUy1NH6c5PJGo1MAPs_sr3P3VOkHfy3lbxQA-6xom0IlUbVjw9OTXBoEqkeKJht7zuYCBcCBg3cE1tNqDyv91rMMwqNCzMD-I-80FjkaYIQ/s373/Sr+Ruth+Burrows.jpg" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="373" data-original-width="290" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjbmhOX93Lw-qMVJBI1sH1z51P50Uz9pc3MBUy1NH6c5PJGo1MAPs_sr3P3VOkHfy3lbxQA-6xom0IlUbVjw9OTXBoEqkeKJht7zuYCBcCBg3cE1tNqDyv91rMMwqNCzMD-I-80FjkaYIQ/w156-h200/Sr+Ruth+Burrows.jpg" width="156" /></a></span></span></div><p></p><span style="font-family: verdana; font-size: medium;">Here is beautiful gift on prayer from Sr Ruth Burrows:</span><p></p><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><p style="text-align: left;"><i style="color: #1a1818; font-family: Arial; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-size: large;">"Prayer is not just one function in life, not even the most important function; it is life itself. We are truly alive, truly human, only when our whole life is prayer."</span><span style="font-size: medium;"> </span></i></p></blockquote><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="color: #1a1818; font-family: Arial; font-size: 9pt; font-style: italic; white-space: pre-wrap;">Sister Ruth is a Carmelite nun at Quidenham in Norfolk, England. She is the author of a number of bestselling books. </span></p></blockquote>David Nybakkehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13172189118334371454noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2925007249547402120.post-71450307481625922882021-03-05T15:40:00.003-08:002021-03-05T19:38:28.238-08:00Interdividual - We Are A Colony of Others<div class="separator"><span id="docs-internal-guid-5cd85b0a-7fff-ebbf-29a1-21e931d7cb26" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"></p><p> <span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana; font-size: x-large; white-space: pre-wrap;"><b><i>I</i></b></span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: medium; white-space: pre-wrap;">nterdividual rather than individual best describes human beings and the word points to a term that we may be more familiar with, interconnectedness. </span></p><p></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-size: medium;"></span></span></p><div style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><img height="256" src="https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/VgzzbT1NK9y-zaX_K4bN83bkFYlRhAI50ngdhx1TXETSfZL69u7_3QTwqN80GNevEqsxh0vqG8ARhLwUaR_q9aSN4AqQqelhPgKRH_6Ob2EXViIWjLJ_U8A0-rpJjtJL0niCZqk" style="margin-left: 0px; margin-top: 0px;" width="320" /></span></span></div><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Let’s use the aspen tree for a glimpse into this idea of being interdividual. The leaves of an aspen have an unusual ability to twist and bend to protect the trees from severe winds. Their twisting motion helps the tree to dissipate the energy more uniformly throughout the forest canopy - to reduce the stress on the tree. Additionally, the quaking movement is thought to aid in the tree’s growth, because the constant movement increases the intake of air by the leaves. Lastly, moving the leaves increases the ability for sunlight to shine on the lower leaves, thereby improving the rate of photosynthesis for the trees (that is trees - plural)</span></span><p></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.47273; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; padding: 0pt 0pt 15pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; font-family: Arial; font-size: medium; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">But wait, perhaps we should say TREE (interdividaul).</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.47273; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; padding: 0pt 0pt 15pt;"><span style="background-color: transparent; font-family: Arial; font-size: medium; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Aspens are unique in that a forest of trees can be actually one tree. Aspens grow in large colonies derived from a single seedling and spread the roots to create new trees. The new saplings may appear as far as 30-40 meters from the parent tree, yet they are a part of the same system. The individual trees may live 40-150 years above the ground but the roots can live for thousands of years. There is one colony in Utah that is believed to be over 80,000 years old! Aspen colonies can even survive forest fires because their roots are so well protected.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.47273; margin-bottom: 15pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="border: none; clear: left; display: inline-block; float: left; height: 239px; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; overflow: hidden; width: 320px;"><img height="239" src="https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/PI3gAOlCXKwjyZx-aYJNR2n9SnJ7VSfEG7N6cAzX15Gj9ZnvSafdD83uRywBDIvKXpJOSaqE7DG0bboQy1fwpM99icJkkq4gzhZqQq7V4K_8u25Z9LCwNwQNApzlxhtkmp_QTUw" style="margin-left: 0px; margin-top: 0px;" width="320" /></span><span style="background-color: transparent; font-family: Arial; font-size: medium; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">And because the colony is actually one system, they are quite generous to what could appear to be ”another tree”. If a tree on one side of the forest is thirsty, the trees will work in unison to pass water through the root system to the ailing tree from one that is in an area where water is more abundant. If another needs nutrients or minerals, again it will be passed through the root system from one </span><span style="font-size: medium;"><span style="background-color: transparent; font-family: Arial; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; text-align: center; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">tree </span><span style="background-color: transparent; font-family: Arial; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; text-align: center; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">to the one in need. </span></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.47273; margin-bottom: 15pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: medium; white-space: pre-wrap;">One of the most famous of quaking aspens' vast underground root systems is a network called Pando (Latin for "I spread", and also known as the Trembling Giant). It is estimated to cover about 107 acres, weighs about 6,600 tons and dates back 80,000 years - making it a contender to be one of the Earth's oldest and heaviest organisms. Trees within the root system grow and die, but these are replaced with fresh growth. The entire colonial organism, which is said to be derived from a single male plant, contains about 47,000 stems.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Interdividual is a term coined by René Girard and it means, in general that we desire according to the desire of the other and which is often referred to as “mimetic”. There has always been some other who precedes us and </span><span style="font-family: Arial; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">which surrounds us, and which moves us to desire, to want and to act. We may acknowledge this when we see it illustrated in the way the entertainment industry creates celebrities, or the advertising profession manages to make particular objects or brands desirable. Just observing yourself in the mob of consumers on Black Friday. </span></span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 11pt; margin-right: 11pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="border: none; display: inline-block; height: 237px; overflow: hidden; width: 320px;"><img height="237" src="https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/rAhM04f7I5422eoy2pWUmRMPhTqh1aMQkK25cT_cnywtHyQCZSzN0Oyjoelkk62qAtBqOHSWS8t3W_3dHxchGNau95zfbf-L7ngLWBjcT1nolDFrFTQrGyX-y-S75h3px-_zooM" style="margin-left: 0px; margin-top: 0px;" width="320" /></span></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: medium; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">What becomes challenging for us is the claim that in fact it is not some of our desires that are highly mimetic, but the whole way in which we humans are structured by desire.</span></p><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: medium; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Girard has pointed out, much like the interconnectedness of the Aspen tree, that humans are those animals in which even basic biological instincts (which of course exist, and are not the same thing as desire) are ever-bond to the other. In fact, our capacity to receive and deal with our instincts is derived from a hugely developed capacity for imitation which sets our species apart from our nearest primate relatives.</span></p><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: medium; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">As a result, gestures, language and memory are not only things which “we” learn, as though there were an “I” that was doing the learning. Rather it is the case that, through this body being imitatively drawn into the life of all those before us, gesture, language and memory form an “I” that is in fact one of the indications of the "social" other. Thus being highly malleable, it is not the “I” that has desires, it is desire that forms and sustains the “I”. The “I” is something like a snapshot, in time, of all the many relationships which preexist it and which it is a mirror image.</span></p><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 11pt; margin-left: 11pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="border: none; clear: left; display: inline-block; float: left; height: 200px; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; overflow: hidden; width: 177px;"><img height="200" src="https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/TMbi2sZTU6tftTxrlDV8oCx-JVMR9xtKznLoRvpxRVN7s8sYNDsSggwEDmeXWiUknJpJpeunYKzEBTCWqlKeioNcvz_Q4RiHXEmQ6Z23Ss45G6fhiXAcp98dFSSNeYX3ZrLJjqk" style="margin-left: 0px; margin-top: 0px;" width="177" /></span><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: medium; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The image laid out here, of the person mimetic, is always reaching outward and inevitably getting caught in entanglements - physically, psychologically and every which way. As we twist and turn in our attempts to free ourselves from another, these very movements become highly contagious for others who often enjoin the swirling of estrangement until escalating into violence. The issue for restoring community is how do we break the spiraling cycle of violent contagion - bringing calm after the chaos? Instead of trying to break free from the other, thinking that is the way to become free, how do we, like the aspen tree, become part of the support system?</span></p><span style="font-size: medium;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Not wanting to leave a post dangling, check out this link to an audio presentation </span><a href="https://www.cbc.ca/radio/ideas/the-scapegoat-the-ideas-of-ren%C3%A9-girard-part-1-1.3474195" style="text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank"><span style="color: #1155cc; font-family: Arial; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-weight: 700; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-skip-ink: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The Scapegoat: René Girard's Anthropology of Violence and Religion</span></a><span style="font-family: Arial; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-weight: 700; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">.</span><span style="font-family: Arial; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span></span></span></div>David Nybakkehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13172189118334371454noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2925007249547402120.post-69720007101839355852021-03-03T12:39:00.002-08:002021-03-03T12:39:49.300-08:00The Contemplative Journey to the Place Hidden in the Heart of God - Fr Donald Haggerty<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjZQFnfZjT7_K5wNLpWj5YgpfJgZmmUW8e0Ku8uaSRtz0USy86iRXxbjAFZIHzY9YOSOsSZhqEU1SJNJHutZPMIZdXHCBoYIMJzsnZahgEMDpxCSxiG1ue-aJ0VyDpxjayZJaGzWB6KQjc/s994/Meeting+Place+for+Prayer.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="452" data-original-width="994" height="293" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjZQFnfZjT7_K5wNLpWj5YgpfJgZmmUW8e0Ku8uaSRtz0USy86iRXxbjAFZIHzY9YOSOsSZhqEU1SJNJHutZPMIZdXHCBoYIMJzsnZahgEMDpxCSxiG1ue-aJ0VyDpxjayZJaGzWB6KQjc/w640-h293/Meeting+Place+for+Prayer.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><b><span style="font-size: large;">The Contemplative Journey</span></b></div></div><p></p><p class="MED_MED_N20_Text" style="border-width: 0px; color: #1a1818; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: 1.2; margin: 0px 10px; padding: 0px; text-align: left; text-indent: 9px;"><span style="font-family: arial; font-size: medium;"><i>“When I did not seek him with self-love, he gave himself to me without being sought” (Jacques Maritain).</i> A place hidden in the heart of God awaits contemplatives as they renounce any desire for status or privilege with God and leave that ambition smoldering in ashes. This renunciation has a significant consequence in the inner realms of silent prayer. The effect is to hide the soul more easily from itself. We lose interest in self and have no need to gain anything for ourselves in prayer. Without a desire to seek anything for self or to advance in some manner in our own estimation, a poverty takes hold in us and becomes, as it were, an ordinary place for prayer…. We learn then more often to discard at the doorstep of prayer all traces of desire for an acquisition of any kind in prayer. All desire to possess something for ourselves fades and disappears. The desire for gratification and favor from God becomes unnecessary, cast away as unimportant, no longer pursued.</span></p><p class="MED_MED_N20_Text" style="border-width: 0px; color: #1a1818; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: 1.2; margin: 0px 10px; padding: 0px; text-align: left; text-indent: 9px;"><span style="font-family: arial; font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><p class="MED_MED_N20_Text" style="border-width: 0px; color: #1a1818; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: 1.2; margin: 0px 10px; padding: 0px; text-align: left; text-indent: 9px;"><span style="font-family: arial; font-size: medium;">The internal poverty may in time offer us a different treasure. There is now a new attraction within our soul. We are beginning to know the drawing power of the divine presence in the poor emptiness of prayer. We do not perceive his presence in any experience we can carry away as a memory from prayer. It is confirmed more in the desires we take with us from silent prayer to intercede for others in spiritual need. It may be that the truest sign of favor from God is a hidden union with his divine thirst for souls. And this union we can indeed sense more and more every day.</span></p><p class="MED_MED_N35_Author" style="border-width: 0px; color: #1a1818; font-family: "Delta Pro Book", sans-serif; font-size: 12px; font-style: italic; font-variant-caps: small-caps; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: 1.353; margin: 0px 10px 8px; padding: 0px; text-align: right;">Father Donald Haggerty</p><p class="MED_MED_N45_Notice" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(196, 1, 75); border-bottom-style: solid; border-width: 0px 0px 2px; color: #1a1818; font-family: "Delta Pro Book", sans-serif; font-size: 12px; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; line-height: 1.1; margin: 0px 10px 26px; padding: 0px 0px 6px; text-align: justify;">From the Magnificat. Father Haggerty, a priest of the Archdiocese of New York, is currently serving at Saint Patrick’s Cathedral in New York City. / From Contemplative Enigmas: Insights and Aid on the Path to Deeper Prayer. © 2020, Ignatius Press, San Francisco, CA. www.ignatius.com. Used with permission.</p></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: medium;">In Fr Haggerty's book, <u><i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1621643433/ref=ox_sc_act_title_2?smid=ATVPDKIKX0DER&psc=1" target="_blank">Contemplative Enigmas</a></i></u> he writes just prior to the reflection above:</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: right;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh1x-L3Kmtp0hQgK7fubHIrUTbnfwPraNeM1FHhNOVzuemND7oxgy156ONWDPTG7gp8MGRMNY8t_Nck6fN6UcvgA8ssZ27pPIMFVclld_LkfUk_KNVjVlI3r8GWqpawESCkaaHEt321Gqk/s1000/Contemplative+Enigmas.jpg" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1000" data-original-width="655" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh1x-L3Kmtp0hQgK7fubHIrUTbnfwPraNeM1FHhNOVzuemND7oxgy156ONWDPTG7gp8MGRMNY8t_Nck6fN6UcvgA8ssZ27pPIMFVclld_LkfUk_KNVjVlI3r8GWqpawESCkaaHEt321Gqk/s320/Contemplative+Enigmas.jpg" /></a></div><span style="background-color: white; font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">Precisely</span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: inherit; font-size: large;"> when </span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">God seems most hidden</span><wbr style="background-color: white; font-size: large;"></wbr><span style="background-color: white; font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">, </span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">our attention</span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: inherit; font-size: large;"> is </span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">often thrown back painfully upon ourselves</span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">. In one sense, this tendency must be ruthlessly opposed. </span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: inherit; font-size: large;"> In another sense, it must be </span><span style="background-color: white; font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">treated gently, by a calm turning in the direction of Our Lord... with the conviction that he is always in our company. Despite every false thought of his </span><span>absence</span><span style="font-family: inherit;">, he is close to us, waiting always for our heart's next expression of longing, whether in word or in silence.</span></span></div></div>David Nybakkehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13172189118334371454noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2925007249547402120.post-16235040528045914592021-02-12T10:44:00.001-08:002021-02-12T10:44:30.025-08:00"Ephphatha" - "Be opened<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFl9DVtkh6UJoEOTds8KaGQRKkh_LCVRV90s7tNO90wSQFaBrAUyg3rrclKbbUA_7bNlTaDY9dErzOGas58Gf5b3cJK_VF1vLO_tl4QG0OxW2QoDSv7Cjs4-u0AEPaEObRdypkrQyRnAU/s602/be+opened+1.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="600" data-original-width="602" height="658" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFl9DVtkh6UJoEOTds8KaGQRKkh_LCVRV90s7tNO90wSQFaBrAUyg3rrclKbbUA_7bNlTaDY9dErzOGas58Gf5b3cJK_VF1vLO_tl4QG0OxW2QoDSv7Cjs4-u0AEPaEObRdypkrQyRnAU/w660-h658/be+opened+1.jpg" width="660" /></a></div><br /><i><b><span style="font-size: x-large;">Ephphatha - </span></b></i><i><b><span style="font-size: x-large;">Be opened</span></b></i><div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant-east-asian: inherit; font-variant-numeric: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="border: 0px; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="font-family: verdana; font-size: medium;">I am providing the readings of today Feb 12, 2021 below. The first reading is important because it opens us up to the reflection and then the question: We are going to be opening ourselves up to someone, so just who are you listening to today? The reflection follows the readings.</span></span></div><div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant-east-asian: inherit; font-variant-numeric: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="border: 0px; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="font-family: verdana; font-size: medium;"><br /></span></span></div><div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; font-family: Calibri, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif, serif, EmojiFont; font-size: 12pt; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant-east-asian: inherit; font-variant-numeric: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span color="inherit" style="font-family: inherit; font-size: 22px; font-style: inherit; font-variant-caps: inherit; font-variant-ligatures: inherit;">Reading I </span><a data-auth="NotApplicable" href="https://bible.usccb.org/bible/genesis/3?1" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="border: 0px; font: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: none; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">Gn 3:1-8</a></div><div style="background-color: white; border: 0px; font-family: Calibri, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif, serif, EmojiFont; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant-east-asian: inherit; font-variant-numeric: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><p style="color: #363936; font-family: Roboto, sans-serif, serif, EmojiFont; font-size: 20px; letter-spacing: 0.3px; line-height: 30px; margin: 0px 0px 10px; outline: none;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.3px;">Now the serpent was the most cunning of all the animals </span><span style="letter-spacing: 0.3px;">that the LORD God had made.</span></p><p style="color: #363936; font-family: Roboto, sans-serif, serif, EmojiFont; font-size: 20px; letter-spacing: 0.3px; line-height: 30px; margin: 0px 0px 10px; outline: none;">The serpent asked the woman, “Did God really tell you not to eat from any of the trees in the garden?”<br />The woman answered the serpent: <span style="letter-spacing: 0.3px;">“We may eat of the fruit of the trees in the garden; </span><span style="letter-spacing: 0.3px;">it is only about the fruit of the tree </span><span style="letter-spacing: 0.3px;">in the middle of the garden that God said, </span><span style="letter-spacing: 0.3px;">‘You shall not eat it or even touch it, lest you die.’”</span></p><p style="color: #363936; font-family: Roboto, sans-serif, serif, EmojiFont; font-size: 20px; letter-spacing: 0.3px; line-height: 30px; margin: 0px 0px 10px; outline: none;">But the serpent said to the woman: “You certainly will not die! No, God knows well that the moment you eat of it your eyes will be opened and you will be like gods who know what is good and what is evil.” <span style="letter-spacing: 0.3px;">The woman saw that the tree was good for food, </span><span style="letter-spacing: 0.3px;">pleasing to the eyes, and desirable for gaining wisdom. </span><span style="letter-spacing: 0.3px;">So she took some of its fruit and ate it;</span></p><p style="color: #363936; font-family: Roboto, sans-serif, serif, EmojiFont; font-size: 20px; letter-spacing: 0.3px; line-height: 30px; margin: 0px 0px 10px; outline: none;">and she also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it. Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized that they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and made loincloths for themselves.</p><p style="color: #363936; font-family: Roboto, sans-serif, serif, EmojiFont; font-size: 20px; letter-spacing: 0.3px; line-height: 30px; margin: 0px 0px 10px; outline: none;">When they heard the sound of the LORD God moving about in the garden at the breezy time of the day, the man and his wife hid themselves from the LORD God among the trees of the garden.</p><div class="x_content-header" style="border-bottom-color: rgb(208, 208, 208); border-bottom-style: solid; border-image: initial; border-left-color: initial; border-left-style: initial; border-right-color: initial; border-right-style: initial; border-top-color: initial; border-top-style: initial; border-width: 0px 0px 1px; color: inherit; display: flex; font-family: inherit; font-size: 12pt; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px 0px 17px; outline: none; padding: 0px 0px 5px; vertical-align: baseline;"><h3 class="x_name" style="font-size: 22px; font-weight: 500; line-height: 1.3; margin: 0px; outline: none;"><br /></h3></div><div class="x_content-body" style="border: 0px; color: inherit; font-family: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: none; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><p style="font-weight: inherit; letter-spacing: 0.3px; margin: 0px 0px 10px; outline: none;"><span style="font-size: large;">Gospel</span></p><p style="font-weight: inherit; letter-spacing: 0.3px; margin: 0px 0px 10px; outline: none;"><a data-auth="NotApplicable" href="https://bible.usccb.org/bible/mark/7?31" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="border: 0px; font: inherit; letter-spacing: normal; margin: 0px; outline: none; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;" target="_blank">Mk 7:31-37</a></p><p style="font-weight: inherit; letter-spacing: 0.3px; margin: 0px 0px 10px; outline: none;"><span style="font-size: large;">Jesus left the district of Tyre and went by way of Sidon to the Sea of Galilee, into the district of the Decapolis. And people brought to him a deaf man who had a speech impediment and begged him to lay his hand on him. </span></p><p style="font-weight: inherit; letter-spacing: 0.3px; margin: 0px 0px 10px; outline: none;"><span style="font-size: large;">He took him off by himself away from the crowd. He put his finger into the man’s ears and, spitting, touched his tongue; then he looked up to heaven and groaned, and said to him,<br /><br /></span></p><p style="letter-spacing: 0.3px; margin: 0px 0px 10px; outline: none;"><span style="font-size: large;"><b>“<em style="margin: 0px; outline: none;">Ephphatha</em>!” (that is, “Be opened!”)</b><br /><br /></span></p><p style="font-weight: inherit; letter-spacing: 0.3px; margin: 0px 0px 10px; outline: none;"><span style="font-size: large;">And immediately the man’s ears were opened, his speech impediment was removed, and he spoke plainly. <br />He ordered them not to tell anyone. But the more he ordered them not to, the more they proclaimed it. They were exceedingly astonished and they said, “He has done all things well. <br />He makes the deaf hear and the mute speak.”</span></p><p style="font-weight: inherit; letter-spacing: 0.3px; margin: 0px 0px 10px; outline: none;"><span style="font-size: large;">______________________________________________________</span></p><p style="letter-spacing: 0.3px; margin: 0px 0px 10px; outline: none;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, serif, EmojiFont; letter-spacing: normal;"><a href="http://www.vatican.va/content/benedict-xvi/en/homilies/2006/documents/hf_ben-xvi_hom_20060910_neue-messe-munich.html" target="_blank"><b><span style="font-size: large;">Pope Benedict XVI reflection</span></b></a></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="font-weight: inherit; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: black; font-family: Verdana, serif, EmojiFont; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: 400; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="font-size: medium;">“There is not only a physical deafness which largely cuts people off from social life; there is also a "hardness of hearing" where God is concerned, and this is something from which we particularly suffer in our own time. Put simply, we are no longer able to hear God - there are too many different frequencies filling our ears. What is said about God strikes us as pre-scientific, no longer suited to our age. Along with this hardness of hearing or outright deafness where God is concerned, we naturally lose our ability to speak with him and to him. And so we end up losing a decisive capacity for perception. We risk losing our inner senses. This weakening of our capacity for perception drastically and dangerously curtails the range of our relationship with reality in general. The horizon of our life is disturbingly foreshortened...</span></span></p><p dir="ltr" style="font-weight: inherit; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><span style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: black; font-family: Verdana, serif, EmojiFont; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: 400; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">“The Gospel tells us that Jesus put his fingers in the ears of the deaf-mute, touched the sick man's tongue with spittle and said "</span><span style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: black; font-family: Verdana, serif, EmojiFont; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: italic; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: 400; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Ephphatha</span><span style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: black; font-family: Verdana, serif, EmojiFont; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: 400; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">" - "Be opened". The Evangelist has preserved for us the original Aramaic word which Jesus spoke, and thus he brings us back to that very moment. What happened then was unique, but it does not belong to a distant past: Jesus continues to do the same thing anew, even today. At our Baptism he touched each of us and said "</span><span style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: black; font-family: Verdana, serif, EmojiFont; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: italic; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: 400; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Ephphatha</span><span style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: black; font-family: Verdana, serif, EmojiFont; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: 400; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">"</span><span style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: black; font-family: Verdana, serif, EmojiFont; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: italic; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: 400; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"> </span><span style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: black; font-family: Verdana, serif, EmojiFont; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: 400; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">- "Be opened" -, thus enabling us to hear God's voice and to be able to talk to him...</span></span></p><p style="font-weight: inherit; letter-spacing: 0.3px; margin: 0px 0px 10px; outline: none;"><b style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: white; color: black; font-family: Calibri, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif, serif, EmojiFont; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: start; text-decoration-color: initial; text-decoration-style: initial; text-decoration-thickness: initial; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></b></p><p dir="ltr" style="font-weight: inherit; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><span style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: black; font-family: Verdana, serif, EmojiFont; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: 400; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">“The Gospel invites us to realize that we have a "deficit" in our capacity for perception - initially, we do not notice this deficiency as such, since everything else seems so urgent and logical; since everything seems to proceed normally, even when we no longer have eyes and ears for God and we live without him. But<span> </span></span><span style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: black; font-family: Verdana, serif, EmojiFont; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: italic; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: 700; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">is it true that everything goes on as usual</span><span style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: black; font-family: Verdana, serif, EmojiFont; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: 400; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"> when God no longer is a part of our lives and our world?</span></span></p><p style="font-weight: inherit; letter-spacing: 0.3px; margin: 0px 0px 10px; outline: none;"><b style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: white; color: black; font-family: Calibri, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif, serif, EmojiFont; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: start; text-decoration-color: initial; text-decoration-style: initial; text-decoration-thickness: initial; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><br /></span></b></p><p dir="ltr" style="font-weight: inherit; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><span style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: black; font-family: Verdana, serif, EmojiFont; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: 400; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">“As we gather here, let us here ask the Lord with all our hearts to speak anew his "</span><span style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: black; font-family: Verdana, serif, EmojiFont; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: italic; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: 400; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Ephphatha</span><span style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: black; font-family: Verdana, serif, EmojiFont; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: 400; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">", to heal our hardness of hearing for God's presence, activity and word, and to give us sight and hearing. Let us ask his help in rediscovering prayer, to which he invites us in the liturgy and whose essential formula he has taught us in the Our Father.” -<span> </span></span><span style="background-color: white; border: 0px; color: #663300; font-family: Verdana, serif, EmojiFont; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: 400; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">HIS HOLINESS BENEDICT XVI </span></span></p></div></div>David Nybakkehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13172189118334371454noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2925007249547402120.post-83852935330903285292021-02-10T10:27:00.001-08:002021-02-10T10:28:05.364-08:00Trying to Understand the Human Person Better<blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0 0 0 40px; padding: 0px;"><p style="text-align: left;"> <span style="background-color: white; color: #0f1111; font-family: Arial; font-size: 21pt; text-indent: 36pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">In the Beginning…' Pope Benedict XVI</span></p></blockquote><span id="docs-internal-guid-115cf69e-7fff-0e23-4ffc-54200e1dcaac"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #3a3a3a; font-family: Georgia; font-size: 12.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">In a Lenten sermon given in 1981 in the cathedral of Munich, Germany, “Cardinal” Joseph Ratzinger said the following:</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.8; margin-bottom: 15pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="border: none; clear: left; display: inline-block; float: left; height: 403px; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; overflow: hidden; width: 267px;"><img height="403" src="https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/rvX1JHFGR342fDsWsr_w6sNoa-cV9Vbbdmw2tkwy9xwM7BB5zhjX5J9pp_NG70t_q_9otnCN0Q0qpcCUK0gNTRedTHmOYU5iJzB-iZRUsqFgXhzk0zFlldRqAz6M-x7Bu8YqIuk" style="margin-left: 0px; margin-top: 0px;" width="267" /></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #3a3a3a; font-family: Georgia; font-size: 12.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">“In the Genesis story that we are considering, still a further characteristic of sin is described. Sin is not spoken of in general as an abstract possibility but as a deed, as the sin of a particular person, Adam, who stands at the origin of humankind and with whom the history of sin begins. The account tells us that sin begets sin, and that therefore all the sins of history are interlinked. Theology refers to this state of affairs by the certainly misleading and imprecise term ‘original sin.’ What does this mean? Nothing seems to us today to be stranger or, indeed, more absurd than to insist upon original sin, since, according to our way of thinking, guilt can only be something very personal, and since God does not run a concentration camp, in which one’s relative are imprisoned, because he is a liberating God of love, who calls each one by name. What does original sin mean, then, when we interpret it correctly?</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.8; margin-bottom: 15pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #3a3a3a; font-family: Georgia; font-size: 12.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">“Finding an answer to this requires nothing less than trying to understand the human person better. It must once again be stressed that no human being is closed in upon himself or herself and that no one can live of/or for himself or herself alone. We receive our life not only at the moment of birth but every day from without–from others who are not ourselves but who nonetheless somehow pertain to us. Human beings have their selves not only in themselves but also outside of themselves: they live in those whom they love and in those who love them and to whom they are ‘present.’ <i>Human beings are relational, and they possess their lives–themselves–only by way of relationship. I alone am not myself, but only in and with you am I myself.</i> To be truly a human being means to be related in love, to be of and for. But sin means the damaging or the destruction of relationality. Sin is a rejection of relationality because it wants to make the human being a god. Sin is loss of relationship, disturbance of relationship, and therefore it is not restricted to the individual. When I destroy a relationship, then this event–sin–touches the other person involved in the relationship. Consequently sin is always an offense that touches others, that alters the world and damages it. To the extent that this is true, when the network of human relationships is damaged from the very beginning, then every human being enters into a world that is marked by relational damage. At the very moment that a person begins human existence, which is a good, he or she is confronted by a sin-damaged world. Each of us enters into a situation in which relationality has been hurt. Consequently each person is, from the very start, damaged in relationships and does not engage in them as he or she ought. Sin pursues the human being, and he or she capitulates to it.”</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.8; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #3a3a3a; font-family: Georgia; font-size: 12.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">(Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger, </span><a href="https://www.amazon.com/Beginning-Catholic-Understanding-Ressourcement-Retrieval/dp/0802841066" style="text-decoration-line: none;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #1155cc; font-family: Georgia; font-size: 12.5pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-skip-ink: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">‘In the Beginning…’: A Catholic Understanding of the Story of Creation and the Fall</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1155cc; font-family: Georgia; font-size: 12.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-skip-ink: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">,</span></a><span style="background-color: white; color: #3a3a3a; font-family: Georgia; font-size: 12.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> trans. Boniface Ramsey, OP [Eerdmans, 1995], pp. 71-73)</span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #3a3a3a; font-family: Georgia; font-size: 12.5pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Also see:</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><a href="http://www.vatican.va/content/benedict-xvi/en/audiences/2013/documents/hf_ben-xvi_aud_20130206.html" style="text-decoration-line: none;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #1155cc; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-skip-ink: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">BENEDICT XVI</span></a><span style="background-color: white; color: #663300; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span><a href="http://www.vatican.va/content/benedict-xvi/en/audiences/2013/documents/hf_ben-xvi_aud_20130206.html" style="text-decoration-line: none;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #1155cc; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-weight: 700; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-skip-ink: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">GENERAL AUDIENCE</span></a><span style="background-color: white; color: #663300; font-size: 12pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-weight: 700; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span><a href="http://www.vatican.va/content/benedict-xvi/en/audiences/2013/documents/hf_ben-xvi_aud_20130206.html" style="text-decoration-line: none;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #1155cc; font-size: 11pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-skip-ink: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Paul VI Audience Hall</span></a><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 11pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span><a href="http://www.vatican.va/content/benedict-xvi/en/audiences/2013/documents/hf_ben-xvi_aud_20130206.html" style="text-decoration-line: none;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #1155cc; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 11pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-skip-ink: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Wednesday, 6 February</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1155cc; font-size: 11pt; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; text-decoration-line: underline; text-decoration-skip-ink: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> 2013</span></a></p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; padding: 11pt 0pt;"><span style="color: #3a3a3a; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Actually, in opposing their Creator people go against themselves, deny their origin and consequently their truth; and evil, with its painful chain of sorrow and death, enters the world. Moreover, all that God had created was good, indeed, very good, but after man had opted freely for falsehood rather than truth, evil entered the world.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="background-color: white; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 11pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="color: #3a3a3a; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I would like to highlight a final teaching in the accounts of the Creation; sin begets sin and all the sins of history are interconnected. This aspect impels us to speak of what is called “original sin”. What is the meaning of this reality that is not easy to understand? I would just like to suggest a few points. First of all we must consider that no human being is closed in on himself, no one can live solely for himself and by himself; we receive life from the other and not only at the moment of our birth but every day. Being human is a relationship: I am myself only in the “you” and through the “you”, in the relationship of love with the “you” of God and the “you” of others. Well, sin is the distortion or destruction of the relationship with God, this is its essence: it ruins the relationship with God, the fundamental relationship, by putting ourselves in God’s place.</span></p><div><span style="color: #3a3a3a; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></div></span>David Nybakkehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13172189118334371454noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2925007249547402120.post-12781856222175345002021-01-20T10:50:00.001-08:002021-01-20T10:57:21.657-08:00Opportunity to be Patient<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/9_mRgK9FTno" width="320" youtube-src-id="9_mRgK9FTno"></iframe></div><br /><span style="font-size: medium;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: Arial; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Enjoy this video clip from the movie, </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: Arial; font-style: italic; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Evan Almighty,</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: Arial; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> where the waiter, Al Mighty, played by Morgan Freeman, explains prayer as, 'God providing opportunities'. What are we going to do with the opportunities in our life?</span></span><div><br /><p></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: .5in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.5in; mso-list: l12 level1 lfo1; tab-stops: list .5in; text-indent: -0.25in; vertical-align: baseline;"><!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="color: black; font-family: Symbol; font-size: 10pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Symbol; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: Symbol;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">·<span style="font: 7pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]--><b><span face=""Verdana",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">Joan:</span></b><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><span face=""Verdana",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"> Excuse me. Can I get a refill please?</span><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span></span><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p role="presentation" style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: .5in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.5in; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: .5in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.5in; mso-list: l8 level1 lfo2; tab-stops: list .5in; text-indent: -0.25in; vertical-align: baseline;"><!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="color: black; font-family: Symbol; font-size: 10pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Symbol; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: Symbol;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">·<span style="font: 7pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]--><b><span face=""Verdana",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">God:</span></b><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><span face=""Verdana",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"> Coming right up. </span></span><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p role="presentation" style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: .5in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.5in; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: .5in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.5in; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo3; tab-stops: list .5in; text-indent: -0.25in; vertical-align: baseline;"><!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="color: black; font-family: Symbol; font-size: 10pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Symbol; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: Symbol;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">·<span style="font: 7pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]--><b><span face=""Verdana",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">Joan:</span></b><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><span face=""Verdana",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"> Thank you. </span></span><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p role="presentation" style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: .5in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.5in; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: .5in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.5in; mso-list: l10 level1 lfo4; tab-stops: list .5in; text-indent: -0.25in; vertical-align: baseline;"><!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="color: black; font-family: Symbol; font-size: 10pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Symbol; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: Symbol;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">·<span style="font: 7pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]--><b><span face=""Verdana",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">God:</span></b><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><span face=""Verdana",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"> Excuse me. Are you alright? </span></span><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p role="presentation" style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: .5in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.5in; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: .5in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.5in; mso-list: l7 level1 lfo5; tab-stops: list .5in; text-indent: -0.25in; vertical-align: baseline;"><!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="color: black; font-family: Symbol; font-size: 10pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Symbol; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: Symbol;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">·<span style="font: 7pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]--><b><span face=""Verdana",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">Joan:</span></b><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><span face=""Verdana",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"> Yeah. </span><i><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">(God looks at her unconvinced.)</span></i><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"> No. It’s a long story. </span></span><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p role="presentation" style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: .5in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.5in; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: .5in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.5in; mso-list: l6 level1 lfo6; tab-stops: list .5in; text-indent: -0.25in; vertical-align: baseline;"><!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="color: black; font-family: Symbol; font-size: 10pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Symbol; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: Symbol;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">·<span style="font: 7pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]--><b><span face=""Verdana",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">God:</span></b><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><span face=""Verdana",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"> Well, I like stories. I’m considered a bit of a storyteller myself. </span></span><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p role="presentation" style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: .5in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.5in; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: .5in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.5in; mso-list: l1 level1 lfo7; tab-stops: list .5in; text-indent: -0.25in; vertical-align: baseline;"><!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="color: black; font-family: Symbol; font-size: 10pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Symbol; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: Symbol;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">·<span style="font: 7pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]--><b><span face=""Verdana",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">Joan:</span></b><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><span face=""Verdana",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"> My husband… Have you heard of New York’s Noah? </span></span><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p role="presentation" style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: .5in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.5in; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: .5in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.5in; mso-list: l3 level1 lfo8; tab-stops: list .5in; text-indent: -0.25in; vertical-align: baseline;"><!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="color: black; font-family: Symbol; font-size: 10pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Symbol; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: Symbol;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">·<span style="font: 7pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]--><b><span face=""Verdana",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">God:</span></b><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><span face=""Verdana",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"> <i></i></span><i><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">(Chuckling)</span></i><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"> The guy who’s building the ark. </span></span><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p role="presentation" style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: .5in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.5in; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: .5in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.5in; mso-list: l2 level1 lfo9; tab-stops: list .5in; text-indent: -0.25in; vertical-align: baseline;"><!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="color: black; font-family: Symbol; font-size: 10pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Symbol; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: Symbol;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">·<span style="font: 7pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]--><b><span face=""Verdana",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">Joan:</span></b><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><span face=""Verdana",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"> That’s him. </span></span><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p role="presentation" style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: .5in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.5in; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: .5in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.5in; mso-list: l11 level1 lfo10; tab-stops: list .5in; text-indent: -0.25in; vertical-align: baseline;"><!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="color: black; font-family: Symbol; font-size: 10pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Symbol; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: Symbol;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">·<span style="font: 7pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]--><b><span face=""Verdana",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">God:</span></b><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><span face=""Verdana",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"> I love that story, Noah and the Ark. You know, a lot of people miss the point of that story. They think it’s about God’s wrath and anger. They love it when God gets angry. </span></span><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p role="presentation" style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: .5in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.5in; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: .5in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.5in; mso-list: l13 level1 lfo11; tab-stops: list .5in; text-indent: -0.25in; vertical-align: baseline;"><!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="color: black; font-family: Symbol; font-size: 10pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Symbol; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: Symbol;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">·<span style="font: 7pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]--><b><span face=""Verdana",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">Joan:</span></b><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><span face=""Verdana",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"> What is the story about, then? The ark? </span></span><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p role="presentation" style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: .5in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.5in; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: .5in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.5in; mso-list: l4 level1 lfo12; tab-stops: list .5in; text-indent: -0.25in; vertical-align: baseline;"><!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="color: black; font-family: Symbol; font-size: 10pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Symbol; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: Symbol;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">·<span style="font: 7pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]--><b><span face=""Verdana",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">God:</span></b><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><span face=""Verdana",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"> Well, I think it’s a love story about believing in each other. You know, the animals showed up in pairs. They stood by each other, side by side, just like Noah and his family. Everybody entered the ark side by side. </span></span><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p role="presentation" style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: .5in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.5in; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></span></p>
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</span></span></span><!--[endif]--><b><span face=""Verdana",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">Joan:</span></b><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><span face=""Verdana",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"> But my husband says God told him to do it. What do you do with that? </span></span><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p role="presentation" style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: .5in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.5in; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: .5in; margin-right: 0in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0in 0in 0.5in; mso-list: l5 level1 lfo14; tab-stops: list .5in; text-indent: -0.25in; vertical-align: baseline;"><!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="color: black; font-family: Symbol; font-size: 10pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Symbol; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: Symbol;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">·<span style="font: 7pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]--><b><span face=""Verdana",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;">God:</span></b><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><span face=""Verdana",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial;"> Sounds like an opportunity. Let me ask you something. If someone prays for patience, do you think God gives them patience? Or does he give them the opportunity to be patient? If they pray for courage, does God give them courage, or does he give them opportunities to be courageous? If someone prayed for their family to be closer, you think God zaps them with warm, fuzzy feelings? Or does he give them opportunities to love each other? Well, I got to run, a lot of people to serve. Enjoy. </span></span><span face=""Arial",sans-serif" style="color: black; font-size: 11pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p><br /><p></p></div>David Nybakkehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13172189118334371454noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2925007249547402120.post-58424764867166627352021-01-15T11:53:00.007-08:002021-01-15T11:57:19.172-08:00Neighours (1952) - A Film by Norman McLaren<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/4YAYGi8rQag" width="320" youtube-src-id="4YAYGi8rQag"></iframe></div><div><br /></div><span style="font-size: medium;">Erik Buys writes in his blog, Mimetic Margins:</span><p></p><p style="background-color: white; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #474747; font-family: Lora, serif; font-size: 18px; margin: 0px 0px 2em; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-align: justify; vertical-align: baseline; word-break: normal;">In 1952, Scottish-born Canadian film director and animator Norman McLaren (1914-1987) released his hugely acclaimed short film <em style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Neighbours</em>. It won both a Canadian Film Award and an Academy Award, and has been designated as a ‘masterwork’ by the Audio-Visual Preservation Trust of Canada. Moreover, in 2009, the film was added to UNESCO’s Memory of the World Programme. <em style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Neighbours</em> is a revolutionary piece of art, both in content and in style. McLaren is a master in using the so-called pixilation, an animation technique which treats live actors as stop-motion objects. As for the content, <em style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Neighbours</em> can be considered an anti-war statement. </p><p style="background-color: white; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #474747; font-family: Lora, serif; font-size: 18px; margin: 0px 0px 2em; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-align: justify; vertical-align: baseline; word-break: normal;">Asked about the inspiration for his film, McLaren answered: <em style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">“</em><em style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">I was inspired to make </em><em style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Neighbours </em><em style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; font-family: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">by a stay of almost a year in the People’s Republic of China. Although I only saw the beginnings of Mao’s revolution, my faith in human nature was reinvigorated by it. Then I came back to Quebec and the Korean War began. My sympathies were divided at that time. I felt myself to be as close to the Chinese people as I felt proud of my status as a Canadian. I decided to make a really strong film about anti-militarism and against war.”</em></p><p style="background-color: white; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #474747; font-family: Lora, serif; font-size: 18px; margin: 0px 0px 2em; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-align: justify; vertical-align: baseline; word-break: normal;">The film clearly demonstrates the mimetic origin of rivalry and its escalation into violence. Two neighbours, living together peacefully and enjoying shared interests, become each other’s rivals once they both lay claim on a flower. The film plainly depicts they not only pay attention to this object, but also that they increasingly keep an eye on each other until, finally, the attention for the object completely disappears. As they imitate each other’s claims and try to manifest themselves over against one another, the object is even destroyed during the process.</p><p style="background-color: white; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #474747; font-family: Lora, serif; font-size: 18px; margin: 0px 0px 2em; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; text-align: justify; vertical-align: baseline; word-break: normal;"><em style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">Neighbours</em> not only ironically reveals that one’s desire for <em style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">prestige</em>, pride and power is actually based on <em style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">nothing</em> (but an imitation of another’s desire), but it also shows the tragic and horrifying, shocking outcome of escalated mimetic rivalry. The former friends are tricked into becoming each other’s <em style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">monstrous doubles</em>. The Latin word <em style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">praestigia</em> means <em style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">deception </em>or <em style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">illusion</em> and it indeed points to the misleading nature of mimetic desire.</p>David Nybakkehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13172189118334371454noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2925007249547402120.post-71366681172542008762020-12-29T13:10:00.000-08:002020-12-29T13:10:59.668-08:00We Were Created to be Listeners<p><br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiEAFc-6YzITVnlEtVizzsEsk-W1MqGB4UrA1WIV3LMUcylPQCvxHwm_6inJ7OxldXm77f7I6GI8cIAVq3juka_3_qbqtJ3BP53vRxYADQDPPh1FWHiiccFYDvH3p6aew_z6HYEsXZ2vzA/s648/Listening-to-each-other.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="303" data-original-width="648" height="188" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiEAFc-6YzITVnlEtVizzsEsk-W1MqGB4UrA1WIV3LMUcylPQCvxHwm_6inJ7OxldXm77f7I6GI8cIAVq3juka_3_qbqtJ3BP53vRxYADQDPPh1FWHiiccFYDvH3p6aew_z6HYEsXZ2vzA/w400-h188/Listening-to-each-other.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="meta" style="background-color: white; color: #525151; font-family: Verdana, Geneva, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 13.92px; margin: 0px 0px 10px; padding: 0px;"><br /></div><div class="content clearfix" style="background-color: white; color: #525151; font-family: Verdana, Geneva, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><p style="margin: 1em 0px; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-size: medium;">To "listen" another's soul into a condition of disclosure and discovery may be almost the greatest service that any human being ever performs for another. But in this scrutiny of the business of listening, is that all that has emerged? Is it blasphemous to suggest that over the shoulder of the human listener, there is never absent the silent presence of the Eternal Listener, the living God? For in penetrating to what is involved in listening, do we not disclose the thinness of the filament that separates person listening openly to one another, and that of God intently listening to each soul?</span></p><div class="field field-type-text field-field-quotation-bi-line" style="font-style: italic; margin: 0px 0px 15px; padding: 0px;"><div class="field-items" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><div class="field-item odd" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-size: medium;">~ from GLEANINGS by Douglas V. Steere</span></div></div></div></div>David Nybakkehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13172189118334371454noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2925007249547402120.post-82116499746593148332020-07-11T07:00:00.000-07:002020-07-11T07:15:35.933-07:00There is Only One Sadness - Not to Live in God's Desire for Life AbundantlyNo more sadness...<br />
For me life seems to present more meaning as I have been processing through the death of my mom. She passed away almost 2 months ago and I continue to find more joy in living fully knowing of God's Eternal Life to come.<br />
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From the Magnificat Meditation of the Day </div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhkHiptNWRkexdqEUMEdmJHig5U3sSf4WlJPfyy-utBvIKo_eZo7t9Yp1XTmBL8PZs_vmPXLCRaqVn3qTNPnz_8KAKVUUCQWZvNdVRFfVQKneGbmJ54l46GnCPf6i3A4gBHJIAcyHrLg48/s1600/jacques-raissa-maritain.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="325" data-original-width="400" height="260" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhkHiptNWRkexdqEUMEdmJHig5U3sSf4WlJPfyy-utBvIKo_eZo7t9Yp1XTmBL8PZs_vmPXLCRaqVn3qTNPnz_8KAKVUUCQWZvNdVRFfVQKneGbmJ54l46GnCPf6i3A4gBHJIAcyHrLg48/s320/jacques-raissa-maritain.jpg" width="320" /></a>Faced with death, shall I be afraid? Ought I to be afraid? It seems to me, no. Well or ill, I have done what I could to keep on the track of my destiny. My eternal future is in the hands of God, I abandon myself to my heavenly Father. I shall go to Christ, that will be deliverance. I have a peaceful feeling about it. The Lord knows what I have suffered. If ever I felt the “comfort” of the spiritual life, that feeling has long ago left me. A spiritual destiny is a light bridge thrown across the abyss, or the peak of a rock rising above the ocean. If the bridge and the rock are proof against all hazards, the soul does not know it. She has a view of the world that makes her dizzy, whether it displays itself to her in its beauty or its madness. Because she is <span class="Delta_Book_Italic_N50" style="font-style: italic;">separated </span>but not yet <span class="Delta_Book_Italic_N50" style="font-style: italic;">withdrawn</span> from the world. The beauty, the intelligible consistence, the nobility, the justice of the divine world from which she receives life are essentially objects of faith. She lives by secret motions. The object of her love is veiled….</div>
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The divine Scriptures awaken in my soul the desire to see God; the desire to depart for eternal life. It is a desire which springs from the joy of the soul—and not from the sadness of temporal life. I love this daily life too and I love my beloved Jacques and [my sister] Véra and I love our friends, and all beauty: but perhaps God is beginning to call my soul and to train it to the hope of eternal life. At these moments of living faith and joy, the fear of God frightens me less. Sweet Jesus, have pity on me.</div>
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Raïssa Maritain</div>
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Raïssa Maritain († 1960) was born in Russia. She was a convert to Catholicism and the wife of philosopher Jacques Maritain. [From Raïssa’s Journal, presented by Jacques Maritain. © 1974, Magi Books, Inc., Albany, NY. All rights reserved.]</div>
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">I found solace in these remarks and, when searching for more information on Raissa and Jacques Maritain, I stumbled onto </span><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; text-align: center; white-space: pre-wrap;">Rabbi Mark Kinzer / Congregation Zera Avraham, as he describes with beautiful detail the impact of one, on the way to becoming a saint, and how his life made an indelible imprint on the lives of Raissa and Jacques Maritain</span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"> </span><a href="https://www.czaa2.org/post/2014/09/27/there-is-only-one-sadness" style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif;">HERE</a>.<span style="background-color: white; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"> (</span><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; text-align: center; white-space: pre-wrap;">An excerpt from his remarks.)</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #292f33;">Jacques and Raissa were not your typical students. They thought and felt deeply about everything. They realized what this worldview implied about life: in the final analysis, all was meaningless. Truth, goodness, beauty were illusions. There was nothing worth living for – and so they were considering leaving life itself behind, and doing it together on their own terms. </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #292f33;"> </span><span style="background-color: white; color: red;"><i><b>Then</b> they read a book that changed everything. It was a novel by a devout Christian by the name of Leon Bloy. The final line of the novel took their breath away, and became a motto for their future life together: “There is only one sadness – <span style="background-position: 0px 0px; border: 0px; box-sizing: inherit; font-family: inherit; font-size: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-weight: 700; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">not to be a saint.</span></i></span> </blockquote>
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<span style="font-family: times, "times new roman", serif;">Imagine living life fully and unreservedly, fulling the purpose we were created for and knowing the treasure is Eternal Life in God.</span></blockquote>
David Nybakkehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13172189118334371454noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2925007249547402120.post-43890138709714338292020-06-12T05:45:00.003-07:002022-12-31T11:56:07.534-08:00The Real Presence Requires the Sacrament and the Church<h1 style="background: rgb(247, 247, 247); color: #660803; font-family: "Trebuchet MS", Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 26px; line-height: 24px; margin: 0px; padding: 10px 0px 5px; text-transform: uppercase;">
ENCOUNTERING CHRIST IN THE EUCHARIST</h1><div><br /></div>
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We need the living Christ, whom we can know only through our encounter with him. But encounter presumes actual presence—the Real Presence, which, in turn, requires the Sacrament and the Church that alone is authorized to give us the Sacrament, the Church that Christ himself willed into existence and continues to support. The Eucharist, at each new celebration, must be recognized anew as the core of our Christian life. But we cannot celebrate the Eucharist adequately if we are content to reduce it to a ritual of—more or less—a half-hour’s duration. To receive Christ means to worship him. We welcome him properly and worthily at the solemn moment of receiving him only when we worship him and in worshiping him learn to know him, come to understand his nature, and follow him. We need to learn once more how to rest peacefully in his gentle presence in our churches, where the Eucharist is likewise always present because Christ intercedes for us before the Father, because he always awaits us and speaks to us. We must learn again how to draw inwardly close to him, for it is only thus that we become worthy of the Eucharist. We cannot prepare ourselves to receive the Eucharist simply by thinking about how it should be done. We can prepare for it only when we try to comprehend the depths of its demands on us, of its greatness; when we do not reduce it to our level, but let ourselves be raised to its exalted level; when we become aware of the accumulated sound of the prayers offered during all the centuries in which generations of men have advanced and are still advancing toward Christ. It is petty and undiscerning to criticize such prayers because we do not understand them; it is an expression of a genuinely “critical” sentiment (of which, be it noted, self-criticism is also a form) when we begin to recognize their greatness and, opening ourselves to that greatness, let ourselves be deepened and purified by it.</div>
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From: Joseph Ratzinger, Roman homilies, October 12, 1982<br /></div>
David Nybakkehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13172189118334371454noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2925007249547402120.post-51014054380766708812020-05-15T06:06:00.000-07:002020-05-15T06:07:30.677-07:00True LifeTrue Life is experienced and reflected by living a life as a calling, breaking free from our hardness of hearts and 'old tapes' to remaining in His Love which is how our hearts were opened. The following meditation taken from The Magnificat by Father Maurice Zundel does a wonderful job of opening our eyes to this marvelous feature of being a member of this new creation in Christ.<br />
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Jesus wants to reintroduce us to the dialogue of love by breaking the seal of the stone of our hearts so that divine life may spring again and be communicated to us by his holy humanity as the fruit of his immolation. Thus Jesus redirects our life according to the Heart of God. By revealing love to us, by opening for us this unlimited credit, Jesus solicits our generosity to make us enter into the very movement of his being, to associate us with this wonderful detachment, to root our lives in divine poverty, to heal us of ourselves, finally to communicate to us all that he is.</div>
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To say that Jesus wants to communicate to us all that he is, is to say, since every grace is a mission, that the grace of the Incarnation given to his humanity does not concern it alone. It concerns all of humanity. All men are called to see, through Christ, their self in God by forming with him one sole body, one sole person. That means that the Incarnation, of the head that is Jesus, must be extended to us who are the members. Finally, Christian life, of which Christ is the center, according to the admirable words of Saint Paul to the Philippians: “For, to me, living is Christ,” this Christian life prolongs the Incarnation of Jesus, the head, in the members of Christ.</div>
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That entails admirable consequences made tangible to us by these great words of Saint Paul: You are the body of Christ, you are members of Jesus Christ, you are the temple of the Holy Spirit. What a marvel! We are here in a church built of stone, before a tabernacle made of marble, and we approach this place with awe. We observe silence. We tiptoe our way ahead to the altar, we open ourselves to the radiance of this silence which is made different by the sacred presence of the Host…. He is there for us, to consecrate us, to transform us into a living host, so that we may truly be the sanctuary of the divinity.</div>
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Father Maurice Zundel</div>
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Father Zundel († 1975) was a Swiss theologian, poet, philosopher, liturgist, and author. [From Wonder and Poverty, Florestine Audette, <span class="Petites_CAP_N10" style="font-variant-caps: small-caps; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal;">r.j.m</span>., Tr. © 1993, Éditions Médiaspaul, Sherbrooke, QC. Used with permission.]</div>
David Nybakkehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13172189118334371454noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2925007249547402120.post-5156489382620333672020-01-19T06:11:00.000-08:002020-01-19T06:11:28.501-08:00This quote from the book, <a href="https://www.amazon.com/God-World-Conversation-Peter-Seewald/dp/0898708680">"God and the World"</a> provides us with a the image of our being and our relatedness to one another.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh1m0Vx4bZ8sYRQyMgQQco3OAPDRh03gE33_uy6IeLPxq5hjkLBUJVoLdwicOrdL0TlT8xCUDHG6SKxjhnbyhhjzcPXYJDQahW6E9hbgvD_I2EqtVJEi5iM03HrMX5wqGIUOaa3zn5l_-4/s1600/god+and+the+world.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; display: inline !important; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="300" data-original-width="191" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh1m0Vx4bZ8sYRQyMgQQco3OAPDRh03gE33_uy6IeLPxq5hjkLBUJVoLdwicOrdL0TlT8xCUDHG6SKxjhnbyhhjzcPXYJDQahW6E9hbgvD_I2EqtVJEi5iM03HrMX5wqGIUOaa3zn5l_-4/s1600/god+and+the+world.jpg" /></a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> Faith is not a magic formula. But it does give us the key to learning for ourselves. So that we can get answers and find out for ourselves who we are. It is always the case that a person first recognizes himself in others and through others. No one can arrive at knowledge of himself just by looking within himself and trying to build up his personality from what he finds there.<br /><br />Man as a being is so constructed for relationships that he grows in relation to others. So that his own meaning, his tasks in life, his advancement in life, and his potential are unlocked in his meetings with others.<br /><br />From the starting point of this basic structure of human existence we can understand faith and our meeting with Jesus. Faith is not just a system of knowledge, things we are told; at the heart of it is a meeting with Jesus<br /><br />This meeting with Jesus, among all those other meetings we have need of, is the truly decisive one. All our other meetings leave the ultimate goal unclear, where we are coming from, where we are going. At our meeting with him the fundamental light dawns, by which I can understand God, man, the world, mission, and meaning - and by which all other meetings fall into place. </span><br /><br /><em>Benedictus</em><br />Pope Benedict XVIDavid Nybakkehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13172189118334371454noreply@blogger.com0