Category: Faith

Ambition

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Conversion, Discipleship, Faith, Service, spirituality1 Comment

Wednesday of the Eighth Week in Ordinary Time
May 29, 2024

Today’s Readings:

https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/052924.cfm

Then James and John, the sons of Zebedee,
came to Jesus and said to him,
“Teacher, we want you to do for us whatever we ask of you.”
He replied, “What do you wish me to do for you?”
They answered him,
“Grant that in your glory
we may sit one at your right and the other at your left.”
Jesus said to them, “You do not know what you are asking.
Can you drink the chalice that I drink
or be baptized with the baptism with which I am baptized?”…

… You know that those who are recognized as rulers over the Gentiles
lord it over them,
and their great ones make their authority over them felt.
But it shall not be so among you.
Rather, whoever wishes to be great among you will be your servant;
whoever wishes to be first among you will be the slave of all.
Mark 10: 35-38; 42-44

James and John are filled with the enthusiasm of their calling, but they are young in its understanding. They look past the challenge of their present circumstances to the glory on its other side. Jesus sets their ambition straight, as he does ours. First we must drink the cup that Jesus drank.

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy:

We too want our ultimate destination to be a place beside Christ. But to come to that place, we must follow Jesus closely in the choices of our own lives.

Poetry: Create in Me – Anna Beth Fore

Create in me a pure heart
filled with love, joy, and peace.
Calm these inner struggles
and give my soul release.

Renew my love and passion
for my Savior and my King.
Fill me with psalms and songs,
an offering to you I bring.

Cleanse me every day, Lord,
and make me pure and holy.
Comfort me with your Spirit
as he lives inside of me.

Transform me with your love,
your mercy, and your grace.
Strengthen me when I am weary
so that I can finish the race.

Welcome me with open arms
when my life on Earth is done.
Let the angels sing, “Hallelujah,”
when the battle on Earth is won.

Music: Are You Ready to Drink the Cup? – Cyprian Consiglio

Gird

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Conversion, Courage, Cross, Discipleship, Faith, spirituality2 Comments

Tuesday of the Eighth Week in Ordinary Time
May 28, 2024

Today’s Readings:

https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/052824.cfm

Gird up the loins of your mind, live soberly,
and set your hopes completely on the grace to be brought to you
at the revelation of Jesus Christ.
Like obedient children,
do not act in compliance with the desires of your former ignorance
but, as he who called you is holy,
be holy yourselves in every aspect of your conduct,
for it is written, Be holy because I am holy.

1 Peter 1: 13-16

Our reading from Peter uses strong phrases to direct our hearts fully to Christ.

  • Gird up the loins of your mind
  • Let your hopes rest completely on grace
  • Do not act from your former ignorance
  • Be holy

When my niece was a young teen, she had a placard in her bedroom that read “Put on your big girl pants and deal with it.” I thought it was an amazing charge for a thirteen-year-old kid. But she expected it of herself and proved eminently capable of practicing the advice.

James is giving early Christians the same kind of advice. Our capability to respond lies in the hope we place in the grace of Jesus Christ.

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy:

We ask for courage and fidelity in our commitment to Christ and to the Gospel.

Poetry: Don’t Quit – Edgar A. Guest

When things go wrong, as they sometimes will,
When the road you’re trudging seems all uphill,
When the funds are low but the debts are high,
And you want to smile but you have to sigh,
When care is pressing you down a bit…
Rest if you must, but don’t you quit!
Life is strange with its twists and turns,
As every one of us sometimes learns,
And many failures turn about
When we might have won had we stuck it out.
Don’t give up though the pace seems slow…
You may succeed with another blow.
Often the struggler has given up
When he might have captured the victor’s cup;
And he learned too late when the night came down,
How close he was to the golden crown.
Success is failure turned inside out…
And you can never tell how close you are
It may be near when it seems so far.
So stick to the fight when you’re hardest hit
It’s when things seem worst that you must not quit.

Music: Jesus, My Beloved – Jonathan Ogden

Precious

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Conversion, Faith, Hope, spirituality, suffering2 Comments

Monday of the Eighth Week in Ordinary Time
May 27, 2024

Today’s Readings:

https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/052724.cfm

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,
who in great mercy gave us a new birth to a living hope
through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead,
to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading,
kept in heaven for you
who by the power of God are safeguarded through faith,
to a salvation that is ready to be revealed in the final time.
In this you rejoice, although now for a little while
you may have to suffer through various trials,
so that the genuineness of your faith,
more precious than gold that is perishable even though tested by fire,
may prove to be for praise, glory, and honor
at the revelation of Jesus Christ.
1 Peter 1:3-7

In this beautiful instruction from Peter, we find:

  • an exuberant rejoicing in God
  • an invitation to inextinguishable hope
  • a realistic appraisal of Christian life
  • a testament to the precious gift of faith.

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy:

What is most precious to you in your life? And is your faith more precious than that? Peter gives us reason to answer “Yes”. Let’s pray with that today.

Prose: from C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity, ch. 12

Now faith, in the sense in which I am here using the word, is the art of holding onto things your reason has once accepted, in spite of your changing moods. For moods will change, whatever view your reason takes. I know that by experience. Now that I am a Christian, I do have moods in which the whole thing looks very improbable; but when I was an atheist, I had moods in which Christianity looked terribly probable. This rebellion of your moods against your real self is going to come anyway. That is why faith is such a necessary virtue; unless you teach your moods “where they get off” you can never be either a sound Christian or even a sound atheist, but just a creature dithering to and fro, with its beliefs really dependent on the weather and the state of its digestion. Consequently one must train the habit of faith.

Fix

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Church, Faith, Holy Spirit, Jesus, spirituality2 Comments

The Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity
May 26, 2024

Today’s Readings:

https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/052624.cfm

Moses said to the people:
“Ask now of the days of old, before your time,
ever since God created man upon the earth;
ask from one end of the sky to the other:
Did anything so great ever happen before?
Was it ever heard of?
Did a people ever hear the voice of God
speaking from the midst of fire, as you did, and live?

…This is why you must now know,
and fix in your heart, that the LORD is God
in the heavens above and on earth below,
and that there is no other.
Deuteronomy 4:32-33;39

Moses invites the people to fix their hearts on God Who amazes us in Divine Self-revelation.

With the solemn celebration of Trinity Sunday, the Church acknowledges the fullness of this revelation in Creator, Redeemer, and Sanctifier.

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy:

Have you ever heard the expression, “I will cover you in prayer”? When a friend says that, we are blessed with the gifts of presence, comfort, accompaniment, hope, and love.

In revealing the Trinity to us, God has covered us with the same gifts. We are called to “fix” our faith and living on this indescribable blessing, the way one would fix a tent by placing the pegs with care and attention.

Prose: from Pope Francis

We can study the whole history of salvation, 
we can study the whole of Theology, 
but without the Spirit 
we cannot understand. 
It is the Spirit that makes us realize the truth 
or — in the words of Our Lord — 
it is the Spirit that makes us know 
the voice of Jesus.

Music: O Lux Beata Trinitas – An Ambrosian Hymn, arranged by Ola Gjeilo, sung by ACJC Alumni Choir (Singapore)

The Ambrosian hymns are a collection of early hymns of the Latin liturgical rites, whose core of four hymns were by Ambrose of Milan in the 4th century.
The hymns of this core were enriched with another eleven to form the Old Hymnal, which spread from the Ambrosian Rite of Milan throughout Lombard Italy, Visigothic Spain, Anglo-Saxon England and the Frankish Empire during the early medieval period (6th to 8th centuries); in this context, therefore, the term “Ambrosian” does not imply authorship by Ambrose himself, to whom only four hymns are attributed with certainty, but includes all Latin hymns composed in the style of the Old Hymnal.

Pray

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Discipleship, Faith, Gospel, holiness, Jesus, Prayer, spirituality5 Comments

Saturday of the Seventh Week in Ordinary Time
May 25, 2024

Today’s Readings:

https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/052524.cfm

Beloved:
Is anyone among you suffering?
He should pray.
Is anyone in good spirits?
He should sing a song of praise…

…The fervent prayer of a righteous person is very powerful.
Elijah was a man like us;
yet he prayed earnestly that it might not rain,
and for three years and six months it did not rain upon the land.
Then Elijah prayed again, and the sky gave rain
and the earth produced its fruit.
James 5:13; 16-18

James tells us that prayer must be woven seamlessly into our lives. His remarks may remind us of Paul’s well-known exhortation to “Pray always!”

In our Gospel, Jesus tells us that a childlike innocence is essential to full union with God. In prayer, we are with God the way a child is with a loved and trusting parent. Jesus taught us this when he chose to begin his prayer, “Our Father …”

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy:

We ask for the grace of spiritual innocence, allowing us to trust God’s Presence in every aspect of our lives. Doing this, we keep an inner recognition and dialogue with God – we “pray always”

Poetry: Praying – Mary Oliver

It doesn’t have to be
the blue iris, it could be
weeds in a vacant lot, or a few 
small stones; just
pay attention, then patch

a few words together and don’t try 
to make them elaborate, this isn’t 
a contest but the doorway

into thanks, and a silence in which 
another voice may speak.

Music: The Lord’s Prayer – Perry Como

Vow

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Conversion, Courage, Discipleship, Eternal Life, Faith, spirituality3 Comments

Friday of the Seventh Week in Ordinary Time
May 24, 2024

Today’s Readings:

https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/052424.cfm

.. do not swear,
either by heaven or by earth or with any other oath,
but let your “Yes” mean “Yes” and your “No” mean “No,”
that you may not incur condemnation.
James 5:12

James lets us know that a vow sworn is a sacred and dangerous thing:

  • sacred because God is always at least the third party in our oaths, and
  • dangerous because it takes lifelong commitment to learn to live fully within the vows we make.

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy:
Let’s place our spirit close to God’s heart as we pray for insight into our life’s deep vows and promises. In that tender space, let us ask for renewed love, insight, and strength for the journey.

Poetry: The Neophyte – Alice Meynell

Who knows what days I answer for to-day:
Giving the bud I give the flower. I bow
This yet unfaded and a faded brow;
Bending these knees and feeble knees, I pray.

Thoughts yet unripe in me I bend one way,
Give one repose to pain I know not now,
One leaven to joy that comes, I guess not how.
I dedicate my fields when Spring is grey.

Oh, rash! (I smile) to pledge my hidden wheat.
I fold to-day at altars far apart
Hands trembling with what toils? In their retreat
I seal my love to-be, my folded art.
I light the tapers at my head and feet,
And lay the crucifix on this silent heart.

Music: Every Step You Take – The Police

The song, a longtime favorite of mine, mirrors the tone of James’s exhortation in today’s Epistle. It takes a little imaginative stretch, but I invite you to it. 🙂

Insipid

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Conversion, Discipleship, Eternal Life, Faith, Jesus, spirituality2 Comments

Thursday of the Seventh Week in Ordinary Time
May 23, 2024

Today’s Readings:

https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/052324.cfm

“Everyone will be salted with fire.
Salt is good, but if salt becomes insipid,
with what will you restore its flavor?
Keep salt in yourselves and you will have peace with one another.”
Mark 9: 49-50

Like James for the past few days, Jesus now has some tough, even startling, words for his followers. He tells them their faith and goodness will be tested, “salted”. But sometimes if the test cannot be withstood, one may become faithless and hard. Their religious practice becomes “insipid”. It loses “heart”, loses meaning.

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy:

We ask God for the spiritual honesty and courage to meet our lives with unwavering faith. We ask for the soul’s deep insight that allows us always to be a light for others, never a darkness.

Poetry: Late Sayings  - Scott Cairns reflects on the Beatitudes (to complement today's Responsorial Psalm)

Blessed as well are the wounded but nonetheless kind,
       for they shall observe their own mending.

Blessed are those who shed their every anxious defense,
              for they shall obtain consolation.

Blessed are those whose sympathy throbs as an ache,
              for they shall see the end of suffering.

Blessed are those who do not presume,
              for they shall be surprised at every turn.

Blessed are those who seek the God in secret,
              for they shall know His very breath rising as a pulse.

Blessed moreover are those who refuse to judge,
              for they shall forget their own most grave transgressions.

Blessed are those who watch and pray, who seek and plead,
              for they shall see, and shall be heard.

Music: Lead Me, Lord – John Becker

Puff…

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Discipleship, Faith, Gospel, Prayer, spirituality, suffering, Truth2 Comments

Wednesday of the Seventh Week in Ordinary Time
May 22. 2024

Today’s Readings:

https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/052224.cfm

You have no idea what your life will be like tomorrow.
You are a puff of smoke that appears briefly and then disappears.
Instead you should say,
“If the Lord wills it, we shall live to do this or that.”
James 4:13-15

From the passages of these few days, it appears that James was a “no-nonsense”, fire and brimstone preacher. Instructing against pride and boastfulness, he forcefully reminds his listeners that they have no control over their lives. The only thing they can control is their commitment to God, and their openness to God’s Will.

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy:
We pray in faith and trust to our God who loves us beyond our comprehension. Indeed, we do not know what tomorrow – or even this afternoon – will bring. But we ask for the strength and joy to receive our lives with hope and fidelity.

Poetry: by Joy Harjo

To pray you open your whole self

To sky, to earth, to sun, to moon

To one whole voice that is you

And know there is more

That you can't see, can't hear

Can't know except in moments

Steadily growing, and in languages

That aren't always sound but other

Circles of motion.

Music: Be Thou My Vision –
The text is based on a Middle Irish poem most attributed to Dallán Forgaill, an early Christian Irish poet born in 530 AD. Since the early 20th century, the text has been sung to an Irish folk tune, known in church hymnals as ‘Slane’.

First/Last

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Conversion, Discipleship, Faith, Jesus, ordinary time, Service, spirituality1 Comment

Tuesday of the Seventh Week of Ordinary Time
May 21, 2024

Today’s Readings:

https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/052124.cfm

They came to Capernaum and, once inside the house,
he began to ask them,
“What were you arguing about on the way?”
But they remained silent.
For they had been discussing among themselves on the way
who was the greatest.
Then he sat down, called the Twelve, and said to them,
“If anyone wishes to be first,
he shall be the last of all and the servant of all.”
Taking a child, he placed it in their midst,
and putting his arms around it, he said to them,
“Whoever receives one child such as this in my name, receives me;
and whoever receives me,
receives not me but the One who sent me.”
Mark 9:33-37

Here we are, friends, back in Ordinary Time after our sacred journey with Jesus through Lent and Eastertide. Drenched in the Spirit of Pentecost, we pick up with the Gospel of Mark which we left back in March.

And what is the first lesson of this reclaimed time? It is one of the many sacred inversions in the Gospel which assure us that the fullness of the Christian life is merciful service – that a holy emptiness is the preferred dwelling of God’s Spirit.

If anyone wishes to be first,   
he shall be the last of all and the servant of all.

Today, in God’s Loving Mercy:

We pray for the insight and strength to choose a Gospel-rooted life despite the contradictions of the world. We ask the Holy Spirit, renewed in us on Pentecost, to steep us in the selflessness that is true love.

Poetry: Where Is God? – Mark Nepo

It’s as if what is unbreakable—
the very pulse of life—waits for
everything else to be torn away,
and then in the bareness that
only silence and suffering and
great love can expose, it dares
to speak through us and to us.

It seems to say, if you want to last,
hold on to nothing. If you want
to know love, let in everything.
If you want to feel the presence
of everything, stop counting the
things that break along the way.

Music: Will You Let Me Be Your Servant

Devoted

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Community, Faith, healing, Mary, Mercy, spirituality6 Comments

Memorial of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of the Church
May 20, 2024

Today’s Readings:

https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/052024.cfm

After Jesus had been taken up to heaven,
the Apostles returned to Jerusalem
from the mount called Olivet, which is near Jerusalem,
a sabbath day’s journey away…
… All these devoted themselves with one accord to prayer,
together with some women,
and Mary the mother of Jesus, and his brothers.

Acts 1: 12;14

Even though there are only scriptural snippets to support it, we can clearly discern Mary’s faithful devotion to the Gospel mission and the nascent Church. We can imagine Mary, whose whole life was filled with and inspired by the Holy Spirit, mentoring the younger disciples with her faith and wisdom.

We call on Mary today to be with us as we too labor to be faithful to our call to spread the Gospel with energy and fidelity.

My local readers may recognize the above photo as that of the Marian statue which stood for a century over our beloved Misericordia Hospital. With the recent transfer of the hospital to the University of Pennsylvania, the beautiful statue needed a new home where her vigilant oversight could be honored and extended to the future.

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy:
Seeing the statue can remind us of Mary’s role as Mother of the Church – a Church that greatly needs her guidance and inspiration as we work to carry the Gospel through the 21st century.

On May 29, 2024, this statue will be rededicated in its new home on the Sisters of Mercy motherhouse grounds. All are welcome for this event, especially all of you who have been a treasured part of the mission of Misercordia Hospital. It will be a joy to gather with you all.

Dedication of the statue of
Our Mother of Mercy
from Misericordia Hospital
at
Sisters of Mercy
515 Montgomery Avenue
Merion Station, PA 19066
Wednesday, May 29, 2024
at 1:00 PM
(Refreshments to follow)

RSVP by Friday May 24, 2024
cmaher@sistersofmercy.org

Video: