Thoughts on Easter

 Rays of Hope

Dear Lord, risen Lord, light of the world, to you be all praise and glory! This day, so full of your presence, your joy, your peace, is indeed your day.

I just returned from a walk through the dark woods. It was cool and windy, but everything spoke of you. Everything: the clouds, the trees, the wet grass, the valley with its distant lights, the sound of the wind. They all spoke of your resurrection; they all made me aware that everything is indeed good. In you all is created good, and by you all creation is renewed and brought to an even greater glory than it possessed at its beginning.

As I walked through the dark woods at the end of this day, full of intimate joy, I heard you call Mary Magdalene by her name and heard how you called from the shore of the lake to your friends to throw out their nets. I also saw you entering the closed room where your disciples were gathered in fear. I saw you appearing on the mountain and at the outskirts of the village. How intimate these events really are. They are like special favors to dear friends. They were not done to impress or overwhelm anyone, but simply to show that your love is stronger than death.

O Lord, I know now that it is in silence, in a quiet moment, in a forgotten corner that you will meet me, call me by name and speak to me a word of peace. It is in my stillest hour that you become the risen Lord to me.

Dear Lord, I am so grateful for all you have given me this past week. Stay with me in the days to come. Bless all who suffer in this world and bring peace to your people, whom you loved so much that you gave your life for them. Amen.

Henri Nouwen

Thoughts on Holy Saturday

 It’s Holy Saturday and Jesus is now in the tomb. As you look forward to Easter and His Resurrection, take a moment to reflect on what you need God to resurrect in your own life. Perhaps it’s a relationship, or your health, or career—whatever it is, ask God to raise up that aspect of your life this Easter. 

Matthew Kelly

From Silence to Celebration

Today, there is silence in heaven, for the Son of God has been put to death. Reflecting the silence of the tomb, the Church’s only liturgy today is the Easter Vigil. In this vigil Mass, the silence is broken as the Church celebrates Christ’s glorious Resurrection!

Thoughts on Good Friday

               

                      

                                            Priestly Intercession

On Good Friday, Jesus, the true High Priest, offers himself to the Father on the Cross for the salvation of sinners. Today, the Church’s liturgy uniquely emphasizes intercessory prayer, interceding as Christ did. Following Christ’s and the Church's example, spend time praying for others and their needs.

Thoughts on Palm Sunday

 The Path of Waiting

Passion is a kind of waiting - waiting for what other people are going to do. Jesus went to Jerusalem to announce the good news to the people of that city. And Jesus knew that he was going to put a choice before them: Will you be my disciple, or will you be my executioner? There is no middle ground here. Jesus went to Jerusalem to put people in a situation where they had to say "Yes" or "No". That is the great drama of Jesus' passion: he had to wait for their response. What would they do? Betray him or follow him?

 

In a way, his agony is not simply the agony of approaching death. It is also the agony of being out of control and of having to wait. It is the agony of a God who depends on us to decide how to live out the divine presence among us. It is the agony of the God who, in a very mysterious way, allows us to decide how God will be God. Here we glimpse the mystery of God's incarnation. God became human not only to act among us but also to be the recipient of our responses.

 

. . . And that is the mystery of Jesus' love. Jesus in his passion is the one who waits for our response. Precisely in that waiting the intensity of his love and God's is revealed to us.

Henri Nouwen

Thoughts on unconditional love

 Unconditional Love

When we freely allow fear to dominate and change us, we live in misery far from our home of unconditional love.

 

Meanwhile Jesus, our example, says to the disciples and to us, "Don't be afraid. Perfect love casts out fear." He walked freely, lived freely, and carried on an intimate relationship with the One who sent him into the world. 

  

Throughout the nights or early mornings Jesus spent time communing with the One who loved him. Among his last words he tells us, "As the Father has loved me, so I also love you. . . If you keep my word, the Father and I will come to you and we will make our home in you. . . I will send you my Spirit, who will dwell with you forever, and will remind you of all I have said to you."

Jesus came to convince us that Our Maker's love is pure gift, unearned and free. We are free to relate with the Source of all life or not. A great love embraces all the love that you and I have ever known, from father, mother, spouses, brothers, sisters, children, teachers, friends, partners, or counselors.

 

Welcoming unconditional love automatically makes us more like the Unconditional Lover. Divine love lasts forever.

Henri Nouwen

More thoughts on forgiveness

 

Mercy Falls Like Rain

“As the rain and snow come down from the heavens and do not return without watering the earth and making it yield...so the word does not return to me empty, without carrying out my will and succeeding in what it was sent to do” (Isaiah 55:10–11).

Jesus made the essential requirement for the forgiveness of sin rather clear and definitive here: As you do it, it will be done to you. If you do not do it, it cannot be done to you. We are merely and forever inside of the divine flow, just like Isaiah’s “rain and snow.” Forgiveness is constant from God’s side, which should become a calm, joyous certainty on our side. Mercy received will be mercy passed on, and “will not return to me empty, until it has succeeded in what it was sent to do.”

—from the book Wondrous Encounters: Scriptures for Lent
by Richard Rohr, OFM, page 30

Thoughts on God

 

‘Who are you, God, and who am I?’

For St. Francis, this search for himself began and ended by asking the only one whose opinion mattered: Jesus. Rather than filling his head with the opinions of the world, getting bogged down by his own self-doubt, letting his successes fill up his ego, he went to God in prayer and asked the two most essential questions anyone could ask: “Who are you Lord, and who am I?” So simple and pure, and yet so powerful. In these words and the response that follows is everything that could ever matter. How we come to answer them will define everything.

In my case, these questions inevitably draw me to littleness. When I ask God, “Who are you Lord, and who am I?” the image that always returns to me is that of a child of God. My place is not off alone ruling my own kingdom, but as the beloved in the kingdom of my Father. Despite being a finite creature in the midst of an all-knowing, all-powerful, ever-present Being—an absolute nothing next to God, in every way dependent and with no reason to boast—I never feel insignificant or unwanted. I am God’s child, chosen and adopted out of love, called to love and serve in his kingdom.

—from the book Let Go: Seven Stumbling Blocks to Christian Discipleship
by Casey Cole, OFM, page 16