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Medjugorje
Message: September 25, 2015 Dear children! Also today I am praying to the Holy Spirit to
fill your hearts with a strong faith. Prayer and faith will fill your heart with
love and joy and you will be a sign for those who are far from God. Little
children, encourage each other to prayer with the heart, so that prayer may
fulfill your life; and each day, you, little children, will be, above all,
witnesses of serving God in adoration and of your neighbor in need. I am with
you and intercede for all of you. Thank you for having responded to my call. |
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Published by the Marian Center of
San Antonio / A Catholic Evangelization Ministry This month’s message gives us
several important insights. First, Our Lady says that she
prays to the Holy Spirit. If Mary, now Queen of Heaven
and Earth, still prays
to the Holy Spirit—shouldn’t we? Yet how
often do we invoke the Holy Spirit and ask for this Divine Presence within
and around us? Our Lady says, “I
am praying to the Holy Spirit to fill your hearts with a strong faith.” She who was “overshadowed by the Most High”
and thus conceived—by the Third Person of the Blessed Trinity—“the Word
made flesh” in the mystery of the Incarnation, knows better
than anyone the magnificent, transformative power of the Holy Spirit at work in a human life. She understands to
what a great extent we, too, could become “God-bearers” in this world if
we would give our “fiat” (as she did to the Angel Gabriel), and open
fully to the inner presence and power
of the Holy Spirit. This Spirit would “fill our hearts with a strong faith” just as He filled her body with the Word made flesh, so that, as
co-creators we might “renew
the face of the earth.” Let us pray each day for the
Spirit’s coming…. Our Lady
continues: “Prayer and faith will fill your
heart with love and joy and you will be a sign for those who are far
from God.” Our Catholic Christian faith
is open to “signs” because of the humble
realization that human thought and language alone cannot possibly comprehend
or convey the wisdom of the ineffable transcendent God. Therefore, we accept and acknowledge Mystery. Mystery is mediated through
signs, symbols, sacraments, ritual, art, music, and the “smells and bells” of
liturgy that transcend the rational human
intellect and mere words. A transcendent God deserves a
trans-rational mode of worship—something more than what our frail “heads” alone can
devise. Recently, for a few days the nation’s eyes were turned toward our
Holy Father, Pope Francis, as the cable news and other media were riveted by
his every word and gesture while visiting the U.S. for the first time, giving
him an unprecedented amount of coverage as “the People’s Pope.” Indeed he has drawn the attention, respect and affection of
millions “who
are far from God”—many of whom had turned their
backs on Christianity and all religion. What is the attraction? Not only
through words but through symbolic deeds and
gestures, Francis exudes “love
and joy” wherever he goes. (In fact,
his first apostolic letter was entitled, “The Joy of the Gospel.”) As Our Lady’s message
indicates, here is a man for whom “prayer and faith have filled his heart
with love and joy” so that he has become “a sign for those who are far from God.” Consequently, in his “walking the talk” so
authentically, Francis’ similarity to the Gospel portrait of Jesus has made
him the visible successor to Peter and “Vicar of Christ on earth” in a way that all kinds of people can see—even non-Catholics, non-Christians, and non-believers. Sadly, we
often encounter proponents of the Christian religion who project anger,
judgment, self-righteousness, exclusivity and bitter condemnation bordering
on violence and hatred (all “in
the name of Jesus!”) rather than love and joy.
What sort of “prayer” and “faith” produce this brand of dogmatic, legalistic, harshly critical,
unloving, merciless Christianity? It is the same “Pharisaic” strain in religious folk that Jesus indicted in the Jewish leaders
of his own time—indeed the only human behavior that repeatedly triggered our Lord’s agitation and
frustrated chastisement! As Pope Francis warned in his address to Congress,
every religion suffers from forms of fundamentalism and we
must guard against “its many forms.” How can we do this in our own lives as
Catholics? Our Lady says,
“Little children, encourage each other to prayer
with the heart, so that prayer may fulfill your life; and each day, you,
little children, will be, above all, witnesses of serving God in adoration
and of your neighbor in need.”
Returning to her perennial message here, Our Lady again promotes “prayer
with the heart,” a phrase she introduced some
three decades ago in the early days of her apparitions at Medjugorje—but
in fact, an ancient
form of prayer going back to the Gospel
example of Jesus, the desert fathers and mothers, and the monastic tradition
of the first 1,500 years of the Church, both Eastern and Western. Pope
Francis made reference to this vitally important (but mostly lost) prayer
form in his speech to Congress when he spoke of the Trappist Cistercian monk,
Thomas Merton, as one of “four great Americans,” mentioning several times the
prayer of “contemplation.” Sadly,
this trans-rational (not to be confused with
“irrational”!) “heart”-prayer that
forms the mystical core of all the world’s great religious traditions was
largely lost to Christianity at the time of the Protestant Reformation. The
“Enlightenment” or “Age of Reason”’s myopic focus
on rationalism robbed Christianity’s treasure vaults of this “pearl of great price”: prayer of the heart. For the Church, the focus shifted to “damage control”—defending doctrine, repairing misunderstandings and correcting the
legitimate grievances of the reformers. Lost in the shuffle of a Church now
in “defense
mode” was the central pillar of our spirituality—the
contemplative dimension of the Gospel first articulated by Jesus himself saying, “When you pray, go into your inner
room, close the door, and pray to your Father who is unseen.” (Mt 6:6) Later
taught by the early Church fathers, the desert eremitical tradition of the 3rd
and 4th centuries, the anonymous English monastic author of The Cloud of Unknowing, the Russian Philokalia (or Way
of the Pilgrim with the “Jesus Prayer”), the great Carmelite reformers Teresa of Avila and John of the Cross,
and many others—this contemplative form of kenotic
(self-emptying) prayer in total silence (sometimes called meditation, recollection, mysticism, etc.) was the
patrimony of the Church for sixteen centuries. Along with our usual prayer
forms, it is primarily this silent “prayer
of the heart” that Our Lady has been trying
to resurrect in the world throughout the past 34 years of her messages at Medjugorje. Why does she bother? From the start, Our Lady
identified herself as the “Queen of Peace,” seeking “peace,
peace, peace—only peace!” What is the link
between her self-proclaimed mission of bringing peace on earth and her
relentless plea for “prayer with the heart”? Despite the
historical insults that have been leveled against contemplative prayer
practices and monasticism over the centuries by the Protestant reformers and their
descendents—including fearful suspicions of occult
activity and accusations of selfish escapism from the “real world”’s work and troubles—the truth is that “prayer
of the heart” in silence is perhaps the
only thing that will “save” the world from the egomaniacal messes we’ve created in our fallen human condition. It may well be the exact
pathway by which the Lord will come to restore all things in Christ;
today we see the birth of a so-called “new monasticism” among young people living in the world but following a
contemplative spiritual path coupled with daily works of mercy and commitment
to social justice. Far from being
an escape from “real life,” true prayer of the
heart and contemplation always issue in WORKS, bearing fruits of ACTION for
good in the world. This truth is attested by the
lives of countless mystic saints who accomplished unbelievably prolific
and priceless good works of bettering our world as a fruit of their contemplative prayer. In the Pope’s address to Congress, he
included Dorothy
Day as another of the “four great Americans”—one
whose cause for canonization is underway as the foundress of the Catholic Worker Movement which has tirelessly served the poor in our country for over 80
years. Like Merton’s, her autobiography (The Long Loneliness) is inspirational reading. She is one of many who are “above all, witnesses
of serving God in adoration and the neighbor in need.” These two pillars
of our faith that Jesus called “the whole Law and the Prophets”—love of God and love of neighbor—are seeded, nurtured and brought to full flower and fruition by “prayer of the heart.” Why is this so? What makes
the active fruits good is that “prayer of the heart” or contemplative prayer in silence is a
prayer of depth and transcendence in which the
ego is left behind as in no other prayer form. While
all other prayer forms might allow our consciousness to remain centered in
the selfish ego, in the empty unknowing nothingness of waiting, patience, stillness and silence, attentive only to the
Divine Presence and action, our consciousness is re-centered in LOVE, the indwelling God. Many encounter
this love in the silence of “Eucharistic adoration” before the Blessed
Sacrament. This experience of love in the heart brings about radical conversion—and even “peace.” The words below come from a
recent Christian-Muslim gathering called “Prayer as Meeting”: “At the
gathering, we prayed the salat and said Christian prayers. But we also sat in silence for
meditation. We call it prayer of the heart and they call it dhikr. It reduces many words to one word in a rich poverty of spirit. In this silence we touched a universality
that words usually only point to. It is
not an escape from reality but an embrace with the divine reality that we both know as love. Relationships are changed by this experience of silence in transcendence, in ways that words cannot achieve. We live together in a new way
when we have been patient together in the silence of love.” (Fr. Laurence
Freeman, OSB) October Musings . . . Month of “Major” Franciscans . . . Month of the Holy Rosary
. . . Month of Carmel’s “Big
Teresa”
& “Little
Therese” This
October as we celebrate the feast of St. Francis of Assisi, one of his
spiritual sons has just become the first saint canonized on U.S. soil! On September 23rd at the Basilica
of the Immaculate Conception in Washington, DC, Pope Francis canonized Junipero Serra, a Franciscan missionary
priest who founded the first nine of the 21 California missions—mostly on foot. This work took place late in
life, beginning when he was 56 years old, and in spite of a serious asthmatic
respiratory condition and a badly ulcerated leg. This
Franciscan friar loved, preached to and protected the indigenous peoples with
great zeal. “During his sermons he
would beat himself with a stone, burn the hairs on his chest, whip his back
until blood flowed. He thus testified to the natives that he was a sinner,
and that his wounds ran deep. But he also witnessed to the One who heals all
wounds. He would confess to another friar in the sanctuary of the mission
church, in full view of all. He loved to say Mass and bring others to the
Blessed Virgin Mary.” (Lisa Lickona) Thanks
to St. Junipero (named after Brother Juniper, close friend
of St. Francis of Assisi),
the beautiful California cities of San Diego,
Carmel-by-the-Sea, San Juan Capistrano, Santa Clara, Santa Barbara, San
Francisco, and Ventura (a.k.a. San Buenaventura—after St.
Bonaventure) have their holy names. From
one of his letters: They will find how sweet His yoke
can be, that what they now consider and endure as a great sorrow will be
turned into a lasting joy. Nothing in this life should cause us sadness.
Our clear duty is to conform ourselves in all things to the will of God, and
to prepare to die well. That is what counts; nothing else matters. If
this is secured, it matters little if we lose all the rest; without this all
else is useless. – St. Junipero Serra + + +
+ + +
+ + +
+ + +
+ Homage to Mary, Queen of the Holy Rosary (“Heavenly Lasso”): Feast Day October 7 Mi Guadalupe is a girl
gang leader in Heaven. She is
unlike the pale blue serene woman. She is
serene, yes, like a great ocean is serene. She is
obedient, yes, like the sunrise is obedient to the
horizon line. She is
sweet, yes, Like a
huge forest of sweet maple trees. She has
a great heart, vast holiness, and like
any girl gang leader ought, substantial hips. Her lap
is big enough To hold every
last one of us. Her
embrace can hold
us, All… And with
Such Immaculate Love. Guadalupe
is a girl gang leader in Heaven. I know
for a fact that she is Pachuca and wears the sign of La loca on
her hand… Sometimes
she drives a four on the floor with a bonnet and blue
dot taillights, prowling the deserts and the roadways to find
souls just like us. And I
pray to her, I pray to her… because she is the strongest
woman I know. – Clarissa Pinkola Estes + + +
+ + +
+ + +
+ + Carmelite
Wisdom from St. Therese (Oct 1) and St. Teresa (Oct
15) From St. Therese of Lisieux, a.k.a. the
Little Flower or Therese of the Child Jesus: Charity gave me
the key to my vocation….I understood
that the Church has a heart and that this heart is burning
with love; that it is love alone which makes the members work, that if love
were to die away, apostles would no longer preach the Gospel, martyrs would
refuse to shed their blood. I understood that love comprises all vocations,
that love is everything, that it
embraces all times and all places because it is eternal! Then,
overcome by joy, I cried, “Jesus, my love. At last I have found my vocation. My
vocation is love. In the heart of the Church, my mother, I will be love, and
then I will be all things.” Without love, deeds—even
the most brilliant—count as nothing. When
one loves, one does not calculate. The science of
loving: yes, that is the only kind of science I want. I’d barter away everything I possess to win it. I
know of one means only by which to attain perfection: LOVE. Let us love, since our heart is
made for nothing else. True charity
consists of bearing with all the defects of our neighbor, in not being
surprised at his failings, and in being edified by his least virtues. Charity must not remain shut up in the depths of the heart,
for no one lights a candle and puts it under a bushel. I
know that the fire of Love is more sanctifying than the fire of Purgatory.
I know that Jesus cannot will needless suffering for us, and that He would
not inspire me with the desires I feel if He were unwilling to fulfill
them. + + +
+ + +
+ + +
+ + +
+ + From St. Teresa of Avila, a.k.a. Teresa of Jesus: Love calls for
love in return. Let us strive to keep this always before our eyes and to
rouse ourselves to love Him. For if at some
time the Lord should grant us the grace of impressing His love on our hearts, all will become easy for us
and we shall accomplish great things quickly and without effort. We
need no wings to go in search of Him, but have only to look upon Him present within us. Let nothing
disturb you, let nothing frighten you. All things are passing. God never
changes. Patience attains all things. He who has God lacks nothing. God alone
suffices. I
do not fear Satan half so much as I fear those who fear him. God preserve us
from gloomy saints! Our
body has this defect—that the more it is provided care and comforts, the more
needs and desires it finds. We cannot know
whether we love God, although there
may be strong reason for thinking so, but there can be no doubt about
whether we love our neighbor or not. Be sure, that in proportion as you advance
in fraternal charity, you are increasing your love of God. Always
think of yourself as everyone’s servant; look for Christ our Lord in
everyone and you will then have respect and reverence for them all. Christ has no body
now, but yours. No hands, no feet on earth, but yours. Yours are the eyes
through which Christ looks compassion into the world. Yours are the feet
with which Christ walks to do good. Yours are the
hands with which Christ blesses the world. Christ has no body
now on earth but yours. It
is love alone that gives worth to all things. Prayer in my
opinion is nothing else than an intimate sharing between friends; it means
taking time frequently to be alone with Him who we know loves us. Remember
that you have only one soul;
that you have only one death to die; that you have only one life, which is
short and has to be lived by you alone; and there is only one Glory, which is
eternal. If you do this, there will be many things about which you care
nothing. The most potent
and acceptable prayer is the prayer that leaves the best effects….The best
effects are those that are followed up by actions—when the soul not only desires the honor of God, but really strives
for it. It
is foolish to think that we will enter heaven without entering into ourselves. The important
thing is not to think much but to love much; and so do that which best
stirs you to love. It is
presumptuous in me to wish to choose my path, because I cannot tell which path is
best for me. I must leave it to the Lord, who knows me, to lead me by
the path which is best for me, so that in all things His will may be done.
+ +
+ + +
+ + +
+ + +
+ + +
+ + St. Francis is not only the most attractive of
all the Catholic saints, he is the most attractive of Christians—admired by
Buddhists, atheists, completely secular modern people, and Communists, to
whom the figure of Christ himself is at best unattractive. Partly this is due
to the sentimentalization of the legend of his life
and that of his companions in the early days of the order. Many people today
who put his statue in their gardens know nothing about him except that he
preached a sermon to the birds, wrote a hymn to the sun, and called the
donkey his brother. These bits of information are important because they are
signs of a revolution of the sensibility—which incidentally was a metaphysical revolution of which St.
Francis himself was unaware. They stand for a mystical and emotional
immediate realization of the unity of being—a notion foreign
or antagonistic to the mainstream Judeo-Christian tradition. – Kenneth Rexroth Words of St.
Francis of Assisi It is no use walking anywhere to
preach unless our walking is our
preaching. It is not fitting, when one is in God’s service, to have a gloomy
face or a chilling look. Above all the grace and gifts that
Christ gives to his beloved is that of overcoming
self. Where there is charity and wisdom, there is neither fear nor
ignorance. While you are proclaiming peace with
your lips, be careful to have it even more fully in your heart. Grant me the treasure of sublime poverty. Permit the distinctive
sign of our order to be that it does not possess anything of its own beneath
the sun, for the glory of Your Name, and that it have
no other patrimony than begging. I have been all things unholy. If
God can work through me, He can work through anyone. No one is to be called an enemy; all are your benefactors, and no
one does you harm. You have no enemy
except yourselves. Sanctify yourself and you will
sanctify society. We should seek not so much to pray but to become prayer. What we are looking for is what is
looking. I have sinned against Brother Ass.
(his physical body)
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Mark Your Calendar!
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October 1 |
St. Therese of the Child Jesus (Lisieux) |
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2 |
The Guardian Angels |
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4 |
St. Francis of Assisi |
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6 |
Class: Mindfulness for Stress Reduction with Sue Yeo; 4 Tuesdays, 10
am-12 pm; SoL Center, 300 Bushnell; $45; call (210)
732-9927 |
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7 |
Our
Lady of the Rosary Merton Contemplative
Prayer/Meditation Group: Introduction
to Contemplative Dialogue; Wednesdays 11:45 am-12:45 pm; using booklets
from Merton Institute; Viva Books, 8407 Broadway; $25 includes booklet; call
(210) 826-1143 |
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8 |
Lecture Series: Prayer—Our Perennial Struggle with Fr. Ron Rolheiser,
OMI; 4 Thursdays of October; 7-9 pm, Oblate School of Theology Whitley
Theological Center; 285 Oblate Dr.; $60; call (210) 341-1366 x 212 |
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10 |
Six-Lecture Series: Restless Hearts—Mysticism, Spirituality
and Contemplation; Session 1:
“The Origins of Christian Mysticism” with Dr. Bernard McGinn of U. of
Chicago Divinity School; 9 am-12 pm; Oblate School of Theology Tymen Hall (in Benson Bldg),
285 Oblate Dr.; $40 (or $210 for all six sessions); to register, call (210)
341-1366 x 212 |
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12
& 19 |
Class: The Creation Story—Scriptural Commentary of the Hebrew Bible with
Rabbi Jeffrey Abraham; 2 Mondays, 7-9 pm; SoL Center,
300 Bushnell; $25; call (210) 732-9927 |
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15 |
St. Teresa of Jesus (Avila) |
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16 |
St. Margaret Mary |
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18
& 25 |
Class: New Light on Lost Writings of Early Judaism & Christianity
with Dr. Todd Hanneken (St. Mary’s U.); 2 Sundays,
7-9 pm; SoL Center, 300 Bushnell; $35; call (210)
732-9927 |
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20 |
Ministry Workshop: Using Individual Strengths & Gifts in
Parish Ministry with Dr. Nancy Kluge & Dr. Bryan Silva (on applying
the Myers-Briggs Typology Inventory in parish ministry); 8 am-4 pm, Oblate School
of Theology Whitley Theological Center, 285 Oblate Dr;
$75 incl. lunch & taking the M-B inventory; call (210) 341-1366 x 212 |
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22 |
Pope St. John Paul II |
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25 |
Rosary
Making: 2 pm-5:30 pm; St. Mary’s Church, 202 N. St. Mary’s, free parking
& materials |
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26 |
Class: A History of the Bible from Ancient Words to Modern Translation
with Dr. James Adair; 3 Mondays, 7-9 pm; SoL
Center, 300 Bushnell; $35; call (210) 732-9927 |
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28 |
St. Simon & St. Jude, Apostles |
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30 |
3-Day Social Justice Conference: Dorothy Day for Today with Robert
Ellsberg, Fr. Ron Rolheiser, OMI, Dr. Patti Radle; Oblate School of Theology Whitley Center, 285
Oblate Dr., $110, call (210) 341-1366 x 212 |
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31 |
PEACE
MASS: 12 pm, St. Mary’s Church, 202 N. St. Mary’s |
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To reject the contemplative
dimension of any religion is to reject the religion itself,
however loyal one may be to its externals and rituals. This is because the contemplative dimension
is the heart and soul of every religion. It initiates the movement into higher states of
consciousness. The great wisdom teachings of the Vedas, Upanishads, Buddhist
Sutras, Old and New Testaments, and the Koran bear witness to this truth.
Right now there are about two billion Christians on the planet. If a
significant portion of them were to embrace the contemplative dimension of
the gospel, the emerging global society would experience a powerful surge
toward enduring peace. If this contemplative dimension of the
Christian religion is not presented, the Gospel is not being adequately
preached. – Fr.
Thomas Keating, OCSO |
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rights reserved. No part of this newsletter may be reproduced without
permission. |