Category: Faith

Psalm 145: Grateful Songs

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Community, Faith, joy, Lent, Poetry, Psalms5 Comments

Wednesday of the Fourth Week of Lent

March 17, 2021

Today’s Reading

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, we pray with Psalm 145, a hymn of exuberant and confident gratitude to an infinitely generous God.

The LORD is gracious and merciful,
    slow to anger and of great kindness.
The LORD is good to all
    and compassionate toward all his works.

Psalm 145: 8-9

It’s a good psalm for this St. Patrick’s Day. Even though the liturgy stays with the Lenten Mass, today the Irish are praying with their patron Saint. 

So when we read the following psalm verse, we think of the witness of our ancestors who suffered for and remained steadfast in the Faith:

The LORD is faithful in all his words
    and holy in all his works.
The LORD lifts up all who are falling
    and raises up all who are bowed down.

Psalm 145: 13-14
Nana (Ellen)

With an unquestioning allegiance, they transmitted that faith to the next generations. My great-grandmother was such a transmitter. Sixteen years old in 1884, she came alone to the U.S. carrying the thick Londonderry accent that made it hard for me to fully understand her.

When I was still a toddler, Nana would call me to her side to teach me the Hail Mary. I was resistant, wanting to wear the rosary for a necklace instead. But my mother told me that nevertheless, for my very young night prayers, I would repeat the prayer’s phrases with an evident Irish accent.

Of course, the accent did not remain. And Nana, although she lived until she was 83, slipped into dementia in her later years. But Ellen McGone’s mark on my spirit abides. It was burnished by her children, my grandmother and especially my granduncles. They chose to transmit the heritage by songs sung at every family gathering to the accompaniment of harmonica, pipe whistle, and a small squeezebox. Of course, they didn’t sound like the great John McCormack. But they thought they did, and so did I!

Happy Saint Paddy’s Day

CHORUS

When Irish Eyes are Smiling sure it’s like a morn in spring
In the lilt of Irish laughter you can hear the angels sing
when Irish hearts are happy all the world seems bright and gay
but when Irish eyes are smiling sure they’ll steal your heart away

There’s a tear in your eye and I’m wondering why
that it ever should be there at all
with such power in your smile sure a stone you’d beguile
and there’s never a teardrop should fall

when your sweet lilting laughter’s like some fairy song
and your eyes sparkle bright as can be
Oh then laugh all the while and all other times smile
and then smile a smile for me

For your smile is a part of the love in your heart, 
And it makes even sunshine more bright. 
Like the linnet’s sweet song, crooning all the day long, 
Comes your laughter and light for the springtime of life 
Is the sweetest of all 
There is ne’er a real care or regret; and while springtime is ours 
Throughout all of youth’s hours, let us smile each chance we get. 

On this feast of the great and glorious St. Patrick, we might – no matter our heritage – want to pray with and for our treasured forbears who have nurtured in us the gifts of love, faith and heritage:

Great is the LORD and worthy of much praise,
whose grandeur is beyond understanding.

One generation praises your deeds to the next
and proclaims your mighty works.

They speak of the splendor of your majestic glory,
tell of your wonderful deeds.

They speak of the power of your awesome acts
and recount your great deeds.

They celebrate your abounding goodness
and joyfully sing of your justice.

The LORD is gracious and merciful,
slow to anger and abounding in mercy.

Psalm 145: 4-8

Poetry: Songs of Our Land by Frances Brown

Songs of our land, ye are with us for ever,
The power and the splendor of thrones pass away;
But yours is the might of some far flowing river.
Through Summer's bright roses or Autumn's decay.

Ye treasure each voice of the swift passing ages,
And truth which time writeth on leaves or on sand;
Ye bring us the thoughs of poets and sages,
And keep them among us, old songs of our land.

The bards may go down to the place of their slumbers,
The lyre of the charmer be hushed in the grave,
But far in the future the power of their numbers
Shall kindle the hearts of our faithful and brave,

It will waken an echo in souls deep and lonely,
Like voices of reeds by the summer breeze fanned;
It will call up a spirit for freedom, when only
Her breathings are heard in the songs of our land.

For they keep a record of those, the true-hearted,
Who fell with the cause they had vowed to maintain;
They show us bright shadows of glory departed,
Of love that grew cold and hope that was vain.

The page may be lost and the pen long forsaken,
And weeds may grow wild o'er the brave heart and hand;
But ye are still left when all else hath been taken,
Like streams in the desert, sweet songs of our land.

Songs of our land, ye have followed the stranger,
With power over ocean and desert afar,
Ye have gone with our wanderers through distance and danger,
And gladdened their path like a homeguiding star.

With the breath of our mountains in summers long vanished,
And visions that passed like a wave from the sand,
With hope for their country and joy from her banished.
Ye come to us ever, sweet songs of our land.

The spring time may come with the song of our glory,
To bid the green heart of the forest rejoice,
But the pine of the mountain though blasted and hoary,
And the rock in the desert, can send forth a voice,

It was thus in their triumph for deep desolations,
While ocean waves roll or the mountains shall stand,
Still hearts that are bravest and best of the nations,
Shall glory and live in the songs of our land

Music: Hymn to Our Lady of Knock sung by The McBennett Sisters, a trio from Co. Armagh, Northern Ireland

They were people of all ages
Gathered round the gabled wall
Poor and humble, men and women
Little children at your call,
We are gathered here before you
And our hearts are just the same
Filled with joy at such a vision
As we praise your name.

      Golden Rose, Queen of Ireland
      All my cares and troubles cease
      As I kneel with love before you
      Lady of Knock, My Queen of Peace

Though your message was unspoken
Still the truth and silence reigns
As I gaze upon your vision
And the truth I tried to find
Here I stand with John the Teacher
And with Joseph at your side
And I see the Lamb of God
On the altar glorified.

Golden rose …

And the lamb will conquer,
And the woman clothed in the sun,
Will shine her light on everyone.
Yes, the lamb will conquer,
And the woman clothed in the sun,
Will shine her light on everyone.

Golden rose … 

Psalm 46: Secret Stream

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Faith, holiness, Lent, Poetry, Prayer, PsalmsLeave a comment

Tuesday of the Fourth Week of Lent

March 16, 2021

Today’s Readings

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, we pray with Psalm 46 which celebrates the felt assurance of God’s presence no matter surrounding circumstances.

God is our refuge and our strength,
    an ever-present help in distress.
Therefore we fear not, though the earth be shaken
    and mountains plunge into the depths of the sea.

Psalm 46: 2-3

That kind of faith is pretty amazing! It’s easy to celebrate God when things are going well – but earth shaking and mountains plunging? That’s something else. What’s the secret to that kind of faith?

Such believers seem to have found the “stream”:

There is a stream whose runlets gladden the city of God,
    the holy dwelling of the Most High.
God is in its midst; it shall not be disturbed;
    God will help it at the break of dawn.

Psalm 46: 4-5

In her “Four Waters of Prayer”, St. Teresa of Ávila describes how we find this stream. Imagine your soul as a garden that needs to be nourished by prayer.

  • The first way to nourish it is like drawing water from a well. It is a very active kind of prayer in which we use our faculties to come closer to God.
  • The second way is like a water-wheel. As we accustom ourselves to prayer, it becomes easier to enter a sacred space.
  • The third way is a stream. It is the point in our spiritual lives where prayer, awareness of God, flows throughout our day.
  • The Fourth Water is the prayer of ecstasy when we are filled with and by God as by a luxuriant rain.

You can read St. Teresa’s descriptions here. The language is that of the 16th century but the wisdom is eternal. 

Click to read St. Teresa of Avila

Poetry: Poem for St. John of the Cross by Lisa Zimmerman

 In the dark night of the soul,
bright flows the river of God

John of the Cross
Saint John of the Cross,
Your father married for love
an orphan below his noble station.
Discarded by his wealthy kindred
they say your parents nurtured you in poverty—
and the bread was as sweet as any bread

and the days offered their shiny hands
and their little streams of water
singing in the glades.

I see you wandering happily as a boy,
the sun a crown on your small head,
your bare feet scuffing the dust.
God chirped like a wood lark
in the throat of afternoon
and the lonely months in prison
were far ahead beneath the great shadow
of the future.

I try to follow you there, O mystic,
to watch you defy your greedy brethren
monks who will reject your reforms, your love
of less, of days returned to prayer and fasting.

Fat and threatened, they silenced you
in a narrow stone cell, one tiny window
like the one in the soul where day after day
the voice of God pierced your suffering.

Out of emptiness, a full heart—
out of abandonment, a poem of seeking—
out of utter darkness, a gleam of pure light—
love’s last trembling boat waiting for you
to get in, and row.

Music: Streams in the Desert – Abigail Miller

Psalm 30: from the Nether World

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn FaithLeave a comment

Monday of the Fourth Week of Lent

March 15, 2021

Today’s Readings

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, we pray with Psalm 30, a perfect prayer for where we find ourselves in the course of the pandemic.

Psalm 30 is a song of thanksgiving. It names the dreadful things from which the psalmist is grateful to have been delivered.

I will extol you, O LORD, for you drew me clear
    and did not let my enemies rejoice over me.
O LORD, you brought me up from the nether world;
    you preserved me from among those going down into the pit.

Psalm 30: 3-4

When we read the entire psalm,
we meet someone who remembers having a very pleasant life
—- moving along, perhaps, in joyful oblivion.

Then “BOOM!”

Complacent, I once said,
“I shall never be shaken.”
LORD, you showed me favor,
established for me mountains of virtue.
But when you hid your face
I was struck with terror.

Psalm 30: 8-9

I think a lot of us felt some similar emotions last March. How about you?

And the psalmist, again like many of us, begged God for help:

Hear, O LORD, have mercy on me;
LORD, be my helper.

Now, it feels that deliverance has come, It is time to remember deeply and to give thanks. Like the psalmist, we benefit from reflecting on our experience, folding it into our depths, and coming into deeper relationship with God. What has happened to us and our global community will, and should, change us. We pray that it may make us closer to God and one one another.

You changed my mourning into dancing;
you took off my sackcloth
and clothed me with gladness.
So that my glory may praise you
and not be silent.
O LORD, my God,
forever will I give you thanks.

Psalm 30: 13-14

Poetry: Passing away, Saith the World by CHRISTINA ROSSETTI

Passing away, saith the World, passing away: 
Chances, beauty and youth, sapp'd day by day: 
Thy life never continueth in one stay. 
Is the eye waxen dim, is the dark hair changing to grey 
That hath won neither laurel nor bay? 
I shall clothe myself in Spring and bud in May: 
Thou, root-stricken, shalt not rebuild thy decay 
On my bosom for aye. 
Then I answer'd: Yea.

Passing away, saith my Soul, passing away: 
With its burden of fear and hope, of labour and play, 
Hearken what the past doth witness and say: 
Rust in thy gold, a moth is in thine array, 
A canker is in thy bud, thy leaf must decay. 
At midnight, at cockcrow, at morning, one certain day 
Lo, the Bridegroom shall come and shall not delay: 
Watch thou and pray. 
Then I answer'd: Yea.
 
Passing away, saith my God, passing away: 
Winter passeth after the long delay: 
New grapes on the vine, new figs on the tender spray, 
Turtle calleth turtle in Heaven's May. 
Though I tarry, wait for Me, trust Me, watch and pray. 
Arise, come away, night is past and lo it is day, 
My love, My sister, My spouse, thou shalt hear Me say. 
Then I answer'd: Yea. 

Music: Mourning into Dancing – Bowling Family

Laetare Sunday — Remember Joy!

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Community, Courage, Faith, Hope, Lent2 Comments
Today’s Readings

In preparing for today’s reflection, I decided to look back a year ago to Laetare Sunday 2020. We were just beginning a very troubling and painful journey. We had no idea the depths to which it would take us. I hadn’t even learned to call our enemy “Covid”, as you will see. 

Yet as I read the past reflection in the light of where we are today, I was filled with awe, gratitude, sadness and remembrance.

I thought it might be good to offer the selection as a re-read for today as we stand on the brink of hope, Daylight Savings Time and a Spring that, for twelve terrible months, we couldn’t count on seeing.

As we begin to help one another heal, hope, and fully live again, let’s continue to pray for another. Thank you all for being part of the Lavish Mercy community whose prayer helped carry us all through these times.

May God bless you all  — and good health, good heart, good Spirit to every one of you.

Laetare! Rejoice! Lent has run half its distance to Easter.

I know it may be a bit difficult to rejoice in this Corona time, but think of this:
Spring has stepped over the horizon!  The long winter watch is over. But before we shake off its black velvet wraps for good, it might be well to think about what winter has taught us. It may strengthen us for this unusually challenging spring!

The stretch of time between November and April is all about waiting. Bulbs wait under the frozen earth.  Bears hibernate in the cold mountains.  Birds migrate, their old nests empty until the spring. All creation seems to enter a time of patience and unrealized expectation.  But it is not a time of desolation.  It is a time of hope for things yet unseen. Perhaps we can make our Corona time that kind of hopeful time.

We human beings also experience “winter” – not simply the seasonal one – but “winters of the spirit”.  We all go through times when our nests have been emptied; times when all the beautiful flowering aspects of our lives seem dormant; times when our vigor and strength seem to hide in the cave of depression or sadness.  These “winters” take many forms.  We may find ourselves sick of a job we had always loved. We may find a long, committed relationship wavering.  We may find the burdens of age or economics overwhelming us.  We may be the unwilling bearers of responsibilities we had not bargained for.

But if we listen, under the deep silence of waning winter, the wind rustles.  It carries the hint of a new season.  It carries the hope of the renewing cycle of our lives.  In that silence, we may be able to hear our own heartbeat more clearly.  We may come to a clearer understanding of what is most important in our lives.  In the stillness, we may be forced to know and understand ourselves in a deeper way.

In this time of global angst and uncertainty, I think of a powerful image from the works of St. Teresa of Avila.  St. Teresa imagines God as a warm healer leaning over our frozen world, setting free the beauty of our spirits. This is what she says:

And God is always there, if you feel wounded.
He kneels over this earth like a divine medic,
and His love thaws the holy in us.

Teresa of Avila

Every time you touch another person’s life,  — in these times, from at least six feet away — you have the chance to change winter into spring.  You have a chance to be like God.

Call someone who may feel very alone.  Be “Laetare” for them! Pray for someone suffering illness or loss. Send healing hopes to those you may not even know in distant places of our shared earth. Light, Easter rising and renewed life will come. Let us trust God and hold one another up as we wait.

Music: Laetare Jerusalem – Discantus

Laetáre Jerúsalem:
et convéntum fácite
ómnes qui dilígitis éam:
gaudéte cum laetítia,
qui in tristítia fuístis:
ut exsultétis, et satiémini
abubéribus consolatiónis véstrae.

Ps.: Laetátus sum in his quae dícta sunt míhi:
in dómum Dómini íbimus. 

Glória Pátri, et Fílio,
et Spirítui Sáncto.
Sicut erat in princípio,
et nunc, et semper,
et in saécula saeculórum. Amen. 

Laetáre Jerúsalem:
et convéntum fácite
ómnes qui dilígitis éam:
gaudéte cum laetítia,
qui in tristítia fuístis:
ut exsultétis, et satiémini
abubéribus consolatiónis véstrae.

Rejoice, O Jerusalem: 
and come together all you that love her: 
rejoice with joy you that have been in sorrow: 
that you may exult, 
and be filled from the breasts of your consolation

Ps.: I rejoiced at the things that were said to me: 
we shall go into the house of the Lord. 

Glory be to the Father, 
and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit;
as it was in the beginning, 
is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen.

Psalm 51: I Desire Mercy

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Conversion, Faith, Love, Mercy, Prayer, PsalmsLeave a comment

Saturday of the Third Week of Lent

March 13, 2021

Today’s Readings
Hosea’s Warning

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, we pray with Psalm 51 which, together with our other readings, tests the depths and sincerity of our prayer.

A clean heart create for me, God;
renew within me a steadfast spirit.

Psalm 51:12

Our readings today put this consideration before us:

What is prayer really,
and what is the quality of my prayer?

Hosea tells us

For it is love that I desire, not sacrifice,
    and knowledge of God rather than burnt offerings.

Luke tells us

For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled,
and the one who humbles himself will be exalted.

And our psalm tells us

For you are not pleased with sacrifices;
    should I offer a burnt offering, you would not accept it.
My sacrifice, O God, is a contrite spirit;
    a heart contrite and humbled, O God, you will not spurn.

To sum up our readings, here’s what prayer is NOT:

  • It is not a roll call of our sacrifices and righteousness.
  • It is not fasting, or paying tithes, or even keeping the commandments.

Then what is it?

Prayer is an intimate exchange with God
with whom we are humble, honest,
open, generous and grateful
– with Whom we are safe, confident and in love.

Prayer is our response to God
who desires our merciful hearts.
… so
Let us Pray.

Poetry: A Prayer from Teresa of Avila 

May today there be peace within.
May you trust God that you are exactly where you are meant to be.
May you not forget the infinite possibilities that are born of faith.
May you use those gifts that you have received, 
and pass on the love that has been given to you.
May you be content knowing you are a child of God.
Let this presence settle into your bones, 
and allow your soul the freedom to sing, dance, praise and love.
It is there for each and every one of us.

Music: Peaceful Moments – Regi Stone

Psalm 81: Through the Storm

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Courage, dying, Eternal Life, Faith, Jesus, Lent, Poetry, Psalms1 Comment

Friday of the Third Week of Lent

March 12, 2021

Today’s Readings

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, we pray with Psalm 81, another call to listen to God’s Word in order to find the fullness of life:

If only my people would hear me,
    and Israel walk in my ways,
I would feed them with the best of wheat,
    and with honey from the rock I would fill them.

But honestly, isn’t it hard to listen sometimes. Even the psalm suggests that there are such loud, distracting events in our lives that we sometimes can’t hear that Word:

In distress you called, and I rescued you.
 Unseen, I answered you in thunder;
    I tested you at the waters of Meribah.
Hear, my people, and I will admonish you;
    O Israel, will you not hear me?

The psalm shows us that God’s deepest Word
comes to us in thunder, in storm.
It is a truth Jesus embraced on Calvary.
It is a truth our lives will sometimes require of us.

This morning my prayer is filled with thoughts of my friend whose young daughter died last week. When even I, who never met Emily, can feel the overwhelming sadness of her untimely death, what unbearable storm must surround her parents! How can they hear the word of faith in the tumult?

Many years ago, I attended an evening event on the other side of my state. During the ceremony, a tornado touched down very nearby. After several frightening hours, I was able to travel back to my hotel, about five miles away.

But the roads were blocked with debris. The streets lights and signs had been blown down. And I was completely unfamiliar with the vicinity. I did eventually make it “home” to the hotel, but it wasn’t the same as I had left it. Part of the roof lay across the street. The window in my room had been fractured and boarded up.

For me, the memory is a parable about suffering. When the storm comes, we may pass through it, but we are not unchanged. Our world is not unchanged.

Jesus was not unchanged by Good Friday and Easter Sunday. By hearing God’s Word in the storm, Jesus was transformed. This is the legacy of faith Christ has given us in the Paschal Mystery. May it strengthen, heal, and transform us this Lent. May it comfort all those who so dearly love Emily.

Poetry: The Man Watching  by Rainer Maria Rilke, Translated by Robert Bly

I can tell by the way the trees beat, after
so many dull days, on my worried windowpanes
that a storm is coming,
and I hear the far-off fields say things
I can’t bear without a friend,
I can’t love without a sister.

The storm, the shifter of shapes, drives on 
across the woods and across time,
and the world looks as if it had no age:
the landscape, like a line in the psalm book, 
is seriousness and weight and eternity.

What we choose to fight is so tiny! 
What fights with us is so great. 
If only we would let ourselves be dominated
as things do by some immense storm, 
we would become strong too, and not need names.

When we win it’s with small things, 
and the triumph itself makes us small. 
What is extraordinary and eternal
does not want to be bent by us. 
I mean the Angel who appeared
to the wrestlers of the Old Testament:
when the wrestlers’ sinews 
grew long like metal strings, 
he felt them under his fingers 
like chords of deep music.

Whoever was beaten by this Angel 
(who often simply declined the fight) 
went away proud and strengthened
and great from that harsh hand, 
that kneaded him as if to change his shape. 
Winning does not tempt that man. 
This is how he grows: by being defeated, decisively, 
by constantly greater beings.

Music: Moonlight Sonata in a Thunderstorm 

Psalm 95: Image of God

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Faith, Lent, Poetry, Prayer, PsalmsLeave a comment

Thursday of the Third Week of Lent

March 11, 2021

Today’s Readings

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, we pray with Psalm 95, another frequent friend of our prayer.

Psalm 95 is an “enthronement psalm” which calls us to worship God as Ruler. Our verses today also use the images of Rock and Shepherd as images to help us understand the nature of God’s presence in our lives.

We can know God only through images. Most of us don’t have direct revelations. 😉 The images we choose and cultivate have a profound impact on our relationship with God and on how we live our lives in God’s image.

Psalm 95 offers us two pictures of God today. These two metaphors evoke some similar sentiments. They also contrast in other ways. Praying with ikons like these can be a beneficial way to come deeply into God’s Presence by touching into our deepest spiritual needs.

Poetry: Rainer Maria Rilke, Poems from the Book of Hours

You are the future, the great sunrise red
above the broad plains of eternity.
You are the cock-crow when time’s night has fled,
You are the dew, the matins, and the maid,
the stranger and the mother, you are death.
You are the changeful shape that out of Fate
rears up in everlasting solitude,
the unlamented and the unacclaimed,
beyond describing as some savage wood.
You are the deep epitome of things
that keeps its being’s secret with locked lip,
and shows itself to others otherwise:
to the ship, a haven — to the land, a ship.

Music: Made in the Image of God – We Are Messengers

Psalm 147: Count Your Blessings

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Creation, Faith, Hope, Lent, Poetry, Prayer, Psalms2 Comments

Wednesday of the Third Week of Lent

March 10, 2021

Today’s Readings

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, we pray with Psalm 147, a poem filled with reasons to love and praise God. Today’s selected verses mention just a few of those reasons.

The blessings of security and family:

Worship the Lord, O Jerusalem; praise your God, O Zion,
who has strengthened the bars of your gates, 
who has blessed your children within you.

Psalm 147: 12-13

The blessings of diverse Creation:

The Lord sends out a command to the earth, 
and this word runs very swiftly.
The Lord gives snow like wool 
and scatters hoarfrost like ashes

Psalm 147: 15-16

The blessings of faith and religious heritage:

The Lord declares the word to Jacob, 
statutes and judgements to Israel.
The Lord has not done so to any other nation; 
to them these judgements have not been revealed.

Psalm 147: 19-20

Sometimes we spend a lot of energy praying over the things we think we need rather than recognizing all that we have.

This morning as I prayed, a personal thanksgiving psalm unfolded in my heart:

  • Hundreds of snow geese followed their yearly flight path right over my home, honking a symphony of hope.
  • The sun rose warm, tugging a clear promise of spring up over the horizon.
  • The Psalms lay open in my lap, a rich gift of the ages to my sometimes thin prayer.
  • My beloved communities slowly awakened and blossomed around me – my Mercy sisters, the toddlers in the daycare below me, the daily hum of the Motherhouse across the path outside my window, the buses carrying children to our Mercy schools
  • My family texting from their faraway homes.
  • I imagined myself as a small part of the magnificent communities described by beloved Pope Francis in Laudato Sí and Fratelli Tutti.
  • I felt those communities slowly beginning to recover from this past year’s devastation.
  • I prayed my sense of blessing into those still so deeply broken by global suffering, begging for their healing.

Gratitude for my blessings overwhelmed me, as it did our psalmist in #147:

Hallelujah!
How good to sing praise to our God;
how pleasant to give fitting praise.

Psalm 147:1

Poem: God Moves in a Mysterious Way – William Cowper

God moves in a mysterious way,
    His wonders to perform;
He plants his footsteps in the sea,
    And rides upon the storm.

Deep in unfathomable mines
    Of never failing skill;
He treasures up his bright designs,
    And works His sovereign will.

Ye fearful saints fresh courage take,
    The clouds ye so much dread
Are big with mercy, and shall break
    In blessings on your head.

Judge not the Lord by feeble sense,
    But trust him for his grace;
Behind a frowning providence,
    He hides a smiling face.

His purposes will ripen fast,
    Unfolding ev'ry hour;
The bud may have a bitter taste,
    But sweet will be the flow'r.

Blind unbelief is sure to err,
    And scan his work in vain;
God is his own interpreter,
    And he will make it plain.

Music: The Snow Goose – John Ritchie

Speaking of geese this morning, one of my all time favorite stories is “The Snow Goose” by Paul Gallico. I hope many of you have read it. It’s beautiful. I found a website that talks all about it, even with a Richard Harris movie included! For those who might be interested in a literary excursion 😀:

Musty Books: “The Snow Goose” by Paul Gallico (1941)

Psalm 25: Remember me?

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Conversion, Faith, Mercy, Poetry, Prayer, PsalmsLeave a comment

Tuesday of the Third Week of Lent

March 9, 2021

Today’s Readings

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, we pray with Psalm 25, a gentle call for God’s attention:

The tone of this very human prayer is this: “Pay attention to me, God!”
Think of a toddler peppering her parent – “Mommy, look! Daddy, watch!

That’s what Psalm 25 is – a peppering of God.🤗

It’s not exactly that we feel forgotten by God. We know that can never happen, right? But we want God to put aside everything that might be occupying the Divine Attention, turn around and focus on us, listen intently to our prayer.

Remember that your compassion, O LORD,
    and your kindness are from of old.
In your kindness remember me,
    because of your goodness, O LORD.

Praying with Psalm 25 might lead us to realize that it is not God who must remember, or pay attention. It is us! In our need, we must recall God’s long faithfulness to us and therefore TRUST that God is with us – always – in any current circumstance. We must pray to discover God present there.

Your ways, O LORD, make known to me;
    teach me your paths,
Guide me in your truth and teach me,
    for you are God my savior.

Poetry: Psalm 25 – Trust by Christine Robinson

I put my trust in you, O God, as best as I am able. 
   May I be strong. May I not be afraid
May all who open their hearts
  hear your voice and know your love.

Lead me, teach me, help me to trust.
You are gracious to us, O God
You guide us, you forgive our clumsy ways
You help us prosper.

When I am sad and anxious
  I school my heart to trust
I act with integrity and uprightness
  And hope to feel your touch in my heart.
May it be so for all the peoples of the earth
  Who call you by many names.

Music: Two selections today

  1. To You O Lord – Marty Haugen

2. For lovers of Bach, like me, you might enjoy this:

Psalm 25 – Nach dir, Herr, verlanget mich, BWV 150 (For Thee, O Lord, I Long. Thought to be the earliest extant Cantata by Johann Sebastian Bach)

Here is a link to a great Bach website where I found some of my material for today.

Bach Website

Psalm 42/43: So Thirsty!

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn FaithLeave a comment

Monday of the Third Week of Lent

March 8, 2021

Today’s Readings

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy, we pray with Psalm 42 and 43 which, in some ancient Hebrew texts, were combined into one psalm.

Athirst is my soul for God, the living God.
   When shall I go and behold the face of God?

Psalm 42:3

We human beings experience thirst on many levels. We thirst for water, for knowledge, for happiness, for peace. 

Our accompanying readings today tell the stories of two Old Testament figures who thirsted for God’s life and healing – Naaman the leper and the widow of Zarephath.

Jesus says that among many lepers and widows, they were unique in having their thirsts quenched – their longings answered with miracles.

Why was that?

Both Naaman and the widow were able
to give up the outcome they expected
in order to receive the miracle God offered.

Naaman had expected an extraordinary prophetic light-show. But, with encouragement, he yielded to the common waters Elisha prescribed.

The widow had expected to starve and die. But she yielded to the generous sharing of her last water and bread.

Like these two seekers, we need our many thirsts slaked too. Throughout our lives, we pray for our own big and small miracles. But the miracle will almost always come to us in a manner we had not expected just as it did to Naaman and the widow.

Our supplications rarely find expected answers. Rather, our prayer transforms us to engage the grace already present in our ordinary circumstances:

  • the healing, like Naaman’s, in our ordinary rivers
  • the enduring sustenance, like the widow’s, in our simple stores

Send forth your light and your fidelity;
    they shall lead me on
And bring me to your holy mountain,
    to your dwelling-place.

Psalm 43:3

Poetry: New Year Re-Solutions, 2021 by Richard Blanco, author of the 2019 book How to Love a Country, and the 2013 inaugural poet of the United States for the inauguration of President Barack Obama; he was the first Latino to hold the role.

Stop closing the shades, let the sun glow again 
like a god who loves and wakes me to me 
in the wake of its divine light traveling millions of miles
to ripple mauve and amber into my window, raise 
my shut eyes open, done dreaming. Breathe. 
Let my coffee’s steamy soul rise and bless me 
every day with its aroma before I take my first sip. 
Name each day a miracle, linger again in its mystery
of possibilities. Breathe. Set the mime-hands of my watch
back two minutes every day, until time and me disavow 
each other’s obligations. Open the newspaper, but read
between the black and white lines for its lies. Breathe. 
Stop walking my dog, let him dog-walk me unleashed
through his park. Let his nose compass me toward 
the smells of all I’ve stopped taking in: the sweet,
ancient dank of mud and mosses, the incense
of pine tree bark. Let his ears point me to listen again
to all I’ve become deaf to: the wind harping through
the strings of leaved branches, the opera of wrens
gossiping about the weather’s secrets. Breathe. Don’t deal
with the mail every day, let bills and notices pile up
like a house of cards until it collapses on the kitchen counter. 
Take up cooking again, but add music to my recipes: 
sway my hips as I beat eggs to conga beats, tap my feet
as I chop shallots to the staccato of piano keys, sing along
as I strum the sauces slow and tender to the croon
of a folk guitar. Bake all the desserts I deserve, dip 
my finger into the frosting first, bite into the crust, lick
the plate clean, feast on my life. Breathe. Indulge 
myself more often alone in the living room where
I’d forgotten to live. Take down my old photo albums
from the shelves, stare at all the dusty years of myself
in those eyes I had forgotten were mine and still love
me. Breathe. Sit on the porch every night, but stop
asking the moon: Who am I? Accept the moon as simply 
the moon, and me as simply me, just as bright
and wise, just as scared and delicate as I was
last year, and will be this year, and the next and 
the next, perfectly imperfect in the nothing of 
my everything, breathing as if each breath
is forever my first and my last.

Music Come to the Water – John Foley