Saturday of the Nineteenth Week in Ordinary Time
August 17, 2024

Today’s Readings:

https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/081724.cfm

A clean heart create for me, O God;
and a steadfast spirit renew within me.
Cast me not out from your presence,
and your Holy Spirit take not from me.
Give me back the joy of your salvation,
and a willing spirit sustain in me.
Psalm 51:12-14

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Today’s familiar and beloved Responsorial Psalm repeats yesterday’s heartfelt plea for spiritual innocence.

Jesus blesses such innocence in our Gospel by saying:

Jesus said,
“Let the children come to me, and do not prevent them;
for the Kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these.”

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy:
We pray for that deep trust in God which yields spiritual innocence. Such innocence is not naïve or childish. Rather it has discovered the profound wisdom that gives everything to God.

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Poetry: Mary Oliver from House of Light

Still, what I want in my life is to be willing to be dazzled 
— to cast aside the weight of facts 
and maybe even to float a little 
above this difficult world. 

I want to believe I am looking 
into the white fire of a great mystery. 
I want to believe that the imperfections are nothing 
— that the light is everything 
— that it is more than the sum 
of each flawed blossom rising and falling. 
And I do. 

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Music: Innocence – Jonas Kvarnström