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Medjugorje
Message: August 25, 2013 Dear children! Also today, the Most High is giving me the
grace to be with you and to lead you towards conversion. Every day I am sowing
and am calling you to conversion, that you may be prayer, peace, love—the
grain that by dying will give birth a hundredfold. I do not desire for you,
dear children, to have to repent for everything that you could have done but
did not want to. Therefore, little children, again, with enthusiasm say: ‘I
want to be a sign to others.’ Thank you for having responded to my call. |
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Published
by the Marian Center of San Antonio / A Catholic Evangelization Ministry For this month of September when high-yield winter wheat is typically
sown, Our Lady makes brilliant use of her Son’s gospel image of the Sower and the Seed found in
Matthew 13, telling us that her work of calling and leading us
to conversion in Medjugorje is the work of a
sower. Just as in the Gospel metaphor the “seed sown” represents various
types of persons—those who hear the word of the kingdom of heaven without
understanding it; those who hear it with joy and receptivity but have no root
of lasting commitment when trouble comes; those who hear it but worldly
anxiety and the lure of riches are more powerful; and finally those who “hear the word and understand it, who
bear fruit a hundred or sixty or thirty fold”—Our Lady’s message this month invites us to be the “good seed” that
yields “a hundredfold.” Very significantly, Our Lady identifies this “good seed” with another
Gospel image given by Jesus, the “grain of wheat that
dies” (John 12:24): “Amen,
amen, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it
remains just a grain of wheat; but if it dies, it produces much fruit.” Our Lady says: “Every day I am sowing
and am calling you to conversion, that you may be prayer, peace, love—the
grain that by dying will give birth a hundredfold.” Following the clear logic of this parable and metaphor, we see that
for Our Lady, conversion means dying to self. It means that as “good seed”
to be sown for God’s kingdom (persons fit for fruitful conversion), we must “be prayer,
peace, love—the grain that by dying will give
birth a hundredfold.” But how can a person “be” prayer? “Be” peace? “Be” love? Mahatma Gandhi famously said, “You must be the change you wish to see in the world.” Lip service won’t do; it is not enough to say we want
peace, to say we want love; we must “be” peace and “be” love ourselves in order for peace and love to ever blossom or
appear as fruits in our life. In other words, we must lead
by example: lead our own life into
peace and love, and then—for the harvest of a “hundredfold”—lead others into peace and love by our example, by our very “BEING.” Our “being” thus becomes a sign for others, for the world, for whoever we meet. But how is this way of “being” connected to “dying”? Jesus taught
bluntly that to be his followers we must die: “Whoever
wishes to come after me must deny himself, take up
his cross, and follow me. For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it,
but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.” (Mt
16:24-25) This deliberate “losing” of
one’s life is surely not a call to the suicide of physical death. Rather it
is a summons to the voluntary, consciously chosen path of dying to our false self or ego. In order
to “be” prayer, peace and love, we clearly must give up our present identity,
whatever it is, for most assuredly we are not currently “prayer,
peace, and love.” Instead, who
we are is bound up with a thousand egocentric notions of “me, myself, and I” based on phony illusions of our own imagined safety/security,
esteem/affection, and power/control. In true “conversion” all of this must be
laid down, crucified, given up to
death. To “be” prayer we must die to our habitual way of scheming and manipulating people and events
to satisfy our own selfish wishes and plans, instead surrendering all to Divine Providence: “Thy will, not mine be done.” Gradually, this letting go and consent lived at a deep level, from moment to moment, will become a hallmark
of our identity, a “sign” that others can see; we will no longer
be “in charge” or “running
the show” (from our ego-self) but
instead we will “be” PRAYER. A living image of the God within. To “be” peace we must die to our habitual way of reacting in anger and
arrogance when confronted with opposing viewpoints or actions that leave us
feeling injured, trespassed or disrespected. Instead, we restrain our
tongue and any retaliatory gestures, abandoning all to Divine Order
with trust
that God makes all things work together for good, without
active or passive aggressiveness.
Eventually, our ability to “respond” calmly rather than “react” negatively
will be a “sign” to others that we no longer need to “be right” or “be
the winner” (from our ego-self) but
instead we will “be” PEACE. A living image of the God within. Finally, to “be” love we must die to our habitual way of trying to possess the
affection or esteem of other people and jealously guard it for ourselves,
instead open-heartedly and open-handedly sharing ourselves without any possessiveness at all. Gradually, our
generous and free-flowing love for all will become a “sign” to others;
we will no longer assert our “special” or “exclusive” status with particular people (from our ego-self) but instead we
will “be” LOVE for all creation, inclusively. A living image of the God within. Our Lady concludes her message by acknowledging that the path of
conversion—of being the “good seed” that will yield “a hundredfold”—is not easy for us, nor what we naturally “want” or “desire” in our normal state of
ego-bound consciousness. It is something that we must make a conscious
effort to remember and to want,
deeply and passionately. She says: “I do not desire for
you, dear children, to have to repent for everything that you could have done
but did not want to.” Here Our Lady is candidly and
realistically reminding us that we will surely have to reckon with our
choices and use of time, talent and treasure in this life. When approaching
repentance for sin, we often fixate upon our sins of “commission”—the bad/wrong things that we “do” or commit; only rarely do we
contemplate our sins of “omission”—the many good or positive behaviors that we omit doing out
of sheer laziness or the disinclination or lack of “desire”—simply because we
“don’t want to.” In our fallen human nature, the “path of least resistance” is ever the broad and easy road that leads to destruction—never the
“narrow gate” and rocky path leading to life. Our Lady stirs us to refresh and renew our own desire to be
the high-yielding grain of wheat by saying: “Therefore,
little children, again, with enthusiasm say: ‘I want to be a
sign to others.” The Greek word is “enthousiasmos”: “possessed or inspired by God,” from the root “en-theos” which means “having God within.” As Ralph Waldo Emerson
said, “Nothing great was ever achieved
without enthusiasm.” This month’s message from
Our Lady calls each of us to the greatest achievement of all: the conversion
of life and transformation in Christ that is the dying
to self which yields the hundredfold
harvest of fruit: being an enthusiastic “sign
to others” of all humans “en-theos”—“having God within.” “The
seed of God is in us. . . . Pear seeds grow into pear trees, nut seeds into
nut trees, and God seed into God.” --
Meister Eckhart September Musings: The “Welcoming Prayer”
—Abandonment/Surrender/Consent …The Jewel of “Acceptance”… Wisdom of Pope
Francis … Spiritual Evolution …The Mystic Mind …
“Deliberately dismantle the emotional programs of the false self.”
Fr. Thomas Keating uses these words to instruct us on the contemplative
dimension of the Gospel, and the dying to self that lies at the
heart of the Christian spiritual journey. When we sit in silent centering
prayer, rather than giving ourselves (as we usually do) to the incessant egoic clamoring of the false self’s desires, attachments,
and aversions, we are consenting to God’s presence and action
within. The Welcoming Prayer
is a method of “consent-on-the-go” where we consent to God’s presence and
action within the ordinary daily activities of life in our reactions
to events and situations. This prayer form is
based on the 17th century French spiritual classic Abandonment to Divine Providence by
Fr. Jean-Pierre de Caussade, SJ. While words like “abandonment” and “surrender”
are antithetical to our Western “can-do” mentality of aggressive
competitiveness, this spirituality of “consent”—so vividly demonstrated by Mary and Jesus—has proven extremely
powerful and effective in bringing about the inner “change” or “conversion”
of transformation in Christ to those who practice it. The purpose of the
Welcoming Prayer is to deepen our relationship with God through consenting
in life’s ordinary activities. This prayer helps to dismantle the emotional
programs of the false-self system and heal the wounds of a lifetime by
addressing them where they are stored: in
the body. It furthers the work of
transformation in Christ that begins on our meditation cushion or chair, in
the silent sitting of centering. To practice the Welcoming Prayer is an
opportunity to make choices free of the
false-self system—responding instead of reacting to the
present moment and whatever it contains. Through the action of the Holy
Spirit, this practice enables us to take appropriate action as freely
and lovingly as possible in any situation that presents itself in our
daily life. To welcome and to let go is one of the most radically
loving, faith-filled gestures we can make in each moment of the day. It is an
open-hearted embrace of all that is, both in
ourselves and in the world. The
Welcoming Prayer Method: 1) Something
“happens”….Focus, feel, and sink into the feelings, emotions, thoughts,
sensations and commentaries taking place in your body. 2) Welcome
the Divine Indwelling presence of God in these feelings, emotions, thoughts, sensations or commentaries by
gently saying, interiorly, “Welcome, welcome, welcome.” 3) Let
go by repeating the following sentences: “I
let go of the desire for security. I let go of the desire for affection. I let go of the
desire for control. I let go of the desire to change this feeling or situation.” +
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+ + + Closely related to the
Welcoming Prayer is the deep spiritual wisdom of the 12-Step Program’s
teaching on ACCEPTANCE,
found in the “Big Book” Alcoholics
Anonymous: Acceptance is the answer to all my problems
today. When I am disturbed, it is because I find some person, place, thing,
or situation—some fact of my life—unacceptable
to me, and I can find no serenity until I accept that person, place, thing,
or situation as being exactly the way it is supposed to be at this moment.
Nothing, absolutely nothing, happens in God’s world by mistake. Until I accept
life completely on life’s terms, I cannot be happy. I need to concentrate
not so much on what needs to be changed in the world as on what needs to
be changed in me and in my attitudes. …I don’t know what’s good for me.
And if I don’t know what’s good for me, then I don’t know what’s good or bad
for you or for anyone. So I’m better off if I don’t give advice, don’t figure
I know what’s best, and just accept life on life’s terms, as it
is today—especially my own life, as it actually is…. When I focus on what’s good today, I
have a good day, and when I focus on what’s bad, I have a bad day. If I focus
on a problem, the problem increases; if I focus on the answer, the answer
increases…. My serenity is inversely
proportional to my expectations.
The higher my expectations of other people are, the
lower is my serenity. I can watch my serenity level rise when I discard my
expectations….I must keep my magic magnifying mind on my acceptance and off
my expectations, for my serenity is directly proportional to my
level of acceptance…. Acceptance is the key to my relationship with
God today….I do whatever is in front of me to be done, and I leave the
results up to Him; however it turns out, that’s God’s will for me. (pp.
417-420) +
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from our Holy Father, Papa Francesco: “Your fidelity to the
Church still needs you to stand strong against the hypocrisies that result
from a closed and sick heart. But your main task isn’t to build walls,
but bridges. It is to establish a dialogue with all persons,
even those who don’t share the Christian faith but who cultivate outstanding
qualities of the human spirit and even with those who oppress the Church and
harass her in manifold ways….Through dialogue it is always possible to
get closer to the truth, which is a gift of God, and to enrich one
another. Dialogue means being convinced that the other has something good
to say, making room for their point of view, their opinion, their proposals….For
dialogue to exist, it is necessary to lower the defenses and open the doors.”
(6/14/13) “A few days ago…we
read the story of the miracle of the loaves….‘They all ate and were satisfied. And when the leftover fragments were
picked up, they filled twelve wicker baskets.’ Jesus asks his
disciples not to throw anything away: no waste! There
is this fact of twelve baskets: Why twelve? What does this mean? Twelve is
the number of the tribes of Israel, which symbolically represent all people.
And this tells us that when food is shared in a fair way, with solidarity,
when no one is deprived, every community can meet the needs of the poorest. Human
ecology and environmental ecology walk together. So I would like us
all to make a serious commitment to respect and protect creation, to be
attentive to every person, to counter the culture of waste and
‘disposable’ culture, to promote a culture of solidarity and of
encounter.” “War is madness. It is the
suicide of humanity. It is an act of faith in money, which for the
powerful of the earth is more important than the human being.” (3/5/13) +
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Evolutionary Path Spiritual evolution is a process of liberation. It
completes biological evolution which has brought us to the relative freedom
of rational consciousness. But full access to that stage of
development is limited by attachment to lower forms of consciousness that are not
free. Beyond rational consciousness, the path to interior freedom
expands to become a union of wills with that which is Freedom itself. Spiritual evolution is the path of
liberation from the false self, the ego, and the separate-self sense. These illusions are the source
of all human misery, limitation, and sin. The process opens not only to
the union of wills between God and us in the… Transforming Union, but to
participating in the freedom of Ultimate Reality. The spiritual traditions of the
various religions are normally designed to be paths to the experience of
Ultimate Reality. Why not be open to them all, and thus to complement the
practical wisdom provided by our own spiritual tradition?… God initially hides behind words
that sometimes sound commanding, limiting, and even threatening. By these admonitions he awakens
first our sense of responsibility for our behavior and accountability for our
actions. He draws us along the path of liberation from the false
self, the emotional programs for happiness that cannot possibly work,
over-identification and dependency on various groups to which we belong, and
finally from the separate-self sense—that is, from attachment to any self
at all. What remains when this is completed is the divine Self manifesting in
us….In and with Christ we…lose ourselves in the love that rushes with
boundless delight between the three Trinitarian relationships. Humanity is also a way for God to be
Trinity; a created way, but still a manifestation of who and what God is:
perfect unity amid infinite diversity. The highest call of
humanity is to manifest the Unmanifested….
Ultimately there is only That Which Is. Rational
consciousness is a major step along the evolutionary way, but it is only the
beginning. We must bring our conscious presence to the Divine
Presence, our nothingness to the Creator of all that we are—body,
soul and spirit. – Fr. Thomas Keating, OCSO Alternative
Consciousness: “The Mind of Christ” The ability to stand back and calmly observe our inner dramas,
without rushing to judgment, is foundational for spiritual seeing. It is the primary form
of “dying to self” that Jesus lived personally and the
Buddha taught experientially. The growing consensus is that, whatever you
call it, such calm, egoless seeing is
invariably characteristic of people at the highest levels of doing and loving
in all cultures and religions. They are the ones we call sages or wise
women or holy men. They see like the mystics see. Many of us call it the
contemplative mind; Paul calls it “the mind of Christ,” but have no
doubt it is an alternative consciousness to our ordinary calculating
mind. Do not let the word “mystic”
scare you. It simply means one who has
moved from mere belief systems or belonging systems
to actual inner experience. All spiritual traditions agree that such a
movement is possible, desirable, and available to everyone. In fact, Jesus
seems to say that this is the whole point!
--Fr. Richard Rohr,
OFM
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Mark Your Calendar!
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September 2 |
Labor Day |
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4 |
6-week
Preparation for “Total Consecration to
Jesus Christ through Mary” according to St. Louis de Montfort; six weekly
talks by Fr. James Marshall, SJ, 7-9 pm (following 6 pm Mass); with Total
Consecration ceremony following 7 pm Mass on October 7, Feast of the Holy
Rosary; Our Lady of Guadalupe Church, 1321 El Paso; for info: (210) 226-4064 |
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4 (11, 18, 25) |
“Sacred Fire: Sexuality in Our Lives” Lecture Series w/ Fr. Ron Rolheiser, OMI; 4 Wednesdays in Sept; 7-9 pm; Oblate
School of Theology Whitley Theological Center; 285 Oblate Dr.; $50; 341-1366 |
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4-5 |
“Bridges
to Contemplative Living” & “Reflections
on Contemplative Living” 8-week series of recorded retreats with Thomas
Merton; 1-3 pm Wednesdays & Thursdays, Oblate School of Theology, 285
Oblate Dr.; $75 each series or $135 for both; call 210-341-1366 x 212 |
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7 |
“Mysticism
Across Traditions” (1st Fall class in “Portraits of World Mysticism” series); 9 am-12 noon, Oblate
School of Theology Whitley Theological Center, 285 Oblate Dr;
$40; call (210) 341-1366 x 212 |
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13 |
Interfaith Event: “In the Footsteps of Francis and the Sultan: A Model for Peacemaking”
(film, food, “Pilgrimage of Compassion” to a mosque and church, &
interfaith panel discussion); 6-9 pm, St. Francis of Assisi Parish Hall, 4201
DeZavala Rd; free & open to public; (210)
829-3854 |
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14 |
Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy
Cross |
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17
& 24 |
Class: “Sacred Dance in Judaism, Christianity and Islam” with Sr. Martha
Ann Kirk & others; 2 Tuesdays, 7-8:30 pm; SoL
Center, 300 Bushnell; $35; call (210) 732-9927 |
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20-21 |
12th Annual Catholic
Women’s Conference: “Come to Me” sponsored
by Pilgrim Center of Hope; Henry B. Gonzalez Convention Center; $65 including
Sat. lunch (discounts available); call (210) 521-3377 |
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20-22 |
Relics of St. Therese of Lisieux on display for veneration at Basilica of the
National Shrine of the Little Flower, 1715 N. Zarzamora |
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21 |
St. Matthew, Apostle Study Day: “Called to Be 21st Century Prophets” with Sr. Sarah
Sharkey, OP & Fr. Ken Hannon, OMI; 9:30 am-3:30 pm; Oblate School of Theology
Whitley Theological Center; $50 incl. lunch; 210-341-1366 |
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23 |
Presentation: “Listening for God’s Heartbeat:
Discipleship in John’s Gospel” with Fr. Ron Rolheiser,
OMI; 7-9 pm, SoL Center, 300 Bushnell Ave., $15;
call (210) 732-9927 |
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23-25 |
Silent Guided Retreat: “My Deepest Me is God”—St. Catherine of Genoa; offered in English
& Spanish; Oblate Renewal Center, 285 Oblate Dr.; $175 incl. meals &
lodging; call (210) 341-1366 x 212 |
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28 |
PEACE
MASS: 12 pm, St. Mary’s Church, 202 N. St. Mary’s; Rosary at 11:30 am |
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29 |
Rosary-making:
2:00-5:30 pm, St. Mary’s Church, 202 N. St. Mary’s; free parking &
materials |
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Prayer for Our Shepherds Lord Jesus Christ, our Savior and High Priest, through the
loving hands of your holy Mother Mary, please guide and protect all priests,
bishops, cardinals and Pope Francis, your Vicar on earth. Help them to live
out the dignity of their priestly vocation with all its challenges,
difficulties, temptations, and personal sacrifices, always united to You with
eyes fixed on the cross of
self-emptying love which alone can sustain them. Help them to repair, rebuild and renew Your Church with
courage and humility, united to your Sacred Heart of all-inclusive love, with
a penitential soul and docility to the inspirations of the Holy Spirit for
any changes ordained by Your Divine Will. Give them strength and joy to labor
in Your vineyard for the salvation of souls. In Jesus’ name, amen.
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reserved. No part of this newsletter may be reproduced without permission.
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