Category: Forgiveness

Love Anoints Us

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn dying, Faith, Forgiveness, friendship, Jesus, Lent, Mercy, spirituality4 Comments

March 29, 2026
Palm Sunday

Purity of heart is to be without guile, hidden agendas.
It is to be honestly intentioned in our actions and words.

During Holy Week, a fundamental question comes before us. How should the precious oil be used – tenderly poured out or reasonably saved? It is a question that challenges us to balance justice with mercy, reality with hope, law with passion, to be pure of heart. How are we being asked to open our alabaster jar?

After Peg’s father died, she rummaged through parts of his house preparing it for sale. When Peg was a child, the bottom drawer of the china closet was always her dad’s exclusive domain. She prepared to open it now like a priest approaching the sacred altar. Inside, Peg found the normal treasures stored against a rainy day: rubber bands, expired coupons, Band-aids, and a Swiss Army knife.

In an old wallet, she discovered a forgotten twenty-dollar bill and a creased, browning paper. Unfolded, the note revealed a 1960’s Christmas shopping list. Beside Peg’s name was scribbled “skates, pajamas and Slinky.” Beside her mother’s name, there was a single phrase: “Chanel N°5.”

Peg’s middle class family avoided extravagance. With four children, they could not afford it. Her father’s one excursion into luxury was to anoint her mother with this prized perfume. The annual act released a balm of silent devotion between them redeeming any of the year’s frayed misunderstandings.

During Holy Week, we see Mary anoint Jesus’s feet with costly aromatic nard. We watch Jesus kneel to pour a sacred blessing over his disciples’ feet. We experience God’s lavish mercy wash over us in blood and water, in sacrament and sacrifice. These acts draw us into God’s infinite, unquenchable love.

Our names have been folded eternally into God’s heart. An extravagant mercy has been given for us. This week, walking with Jesus from the supper table, through the garden and on to Calvary, may we embrace the deep anointing of God’s Passion for us. May it redeem us and open us to full Easter joy!

Music: Agnus Dei – Monks of the Abbey of Notre Dame

Suggested Scripture: Philippians 2:1-11

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For Your Reflection:

  • What feelings or reactions do I have after reading this reflection?
  • Do my feelings or reactions remind me of any passage or event in scripture, especially in the life of Christ? 
  • What actions might I take today because of my response to these readings?

The Great Forgiveness

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Creation, Faith, Forgiveness, spirituality2 Comments

March 20, 2026
Spring Equinox

Forgiveness is the conscious choice
to release resentment and a desire for vengeance,
while still acknowledging the wrong done,
and is rooted in God’s mercy and grace.

Ah, Equinox – respite from the cold!

Today our Earth will put away her winter jewels, her cold snow pearls and glistening ice diamonds stored until distant December. With them, she lays aside her cool reserve, the stark elegance of silhouetted trees against a white landscape. She says, “I have finished my silent retreat.”

Instead, Lady Earth unveils her costume jewelry – that improbable mix of pinks, purples, greens, and yellows. Even if this morning, she wraps them in a silver cashmere fog, we know it hides a riotous, tumbling April.

Every year, we wonder if those bare trees and barren hillsides will ever green again. But they do! Spring is the act of “Great Forgiveness”. It is the time when Nature mirrors the Infinite Mercy of her Creator and says, “Fear not, Winter. I am deeper than your cold. My resilience has redeemed us both for another chance at life.”

We, too, as human beings, are capable of such resilience. I remember my mother’s infinite patience with a sometimes-annoying neighbor. Edna’s seemingly innocent conversation harbored veiled references to her economic superiority. Little wintry comments like, “It’s a shame you can’t get a Hoover. It would make your life so much easier”. Even as a child, (who had no idea what a Hover was) I was nettled beyond tolerance by the insensitivity of the statement.

But my mother, who was no pushover and who did not suffer fools gladly, was patient and faithful. She knew Edna, though careless in her opinions, didn’t mean to hurt or shame her.

Such thoughtless remarks could have hung like icicles in mid-air, but my Mom clipped them with her wonderful capacity for humorous honesty. “Eddie,” she said, “you can bring your Hoover over and do my rugs every Friday.” Edna laughed at herself, rescinding the tactless comment with an “I’m sorry, El. You know I didn’t mean anything by it.”

My mother taught me to live from the “Great Forgiveness” which can warm any cold. She left a great space for people before ever closing in with judgement.

At one point when I was still very young, my mother became quite ill and after a long hospitalization, returned home for an extended recuperation. During that time, Edna came every day to cook for our large working family. Weekly, she cleaned our house with the same decrepit vacuum she had earlier criticized.

Without a word, Edna challenged me to learn another lesson about the nature of fidelity and true friendship and the commitment to give it voice without words.

Years later, I read a quote that captured these lessons: “Always be kind. We never know the battles someone else is fighting.” These are lessons I remember with gratitude today in this equinox of another “Great Forgiveness”. Forgiveness is a largesse we can imitate if we simply remember the mercies we ourselves have received.

Blessings to you all and a joyous Spring!

Music: Forgiveness – Matthew West

Suggested Reading: Psalm 19

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For Your Reflection:

  • What feelings or reactions do I have after reading this reflection?
  • Do my feelings or reactions remind me of any passage or event in scripture, especially in the life of Christ? 
  • What actions might I take today because of my response to these readings?

Miserere

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Conversion, Faith, Forgiveness, healing, Love, Psalms, spirituality1 Comment

February 22, 2026
First Sunday of Lent

Supplication is a humble and earnest prayer
that asks God for specific spiritual or material aid. 

They stood quietly by a sunlit window. “I have forgotten how to have fun,” Anne said, gazing wistfully toward the wintering trees.

Her friend knew the statement to be true and did not argue. Recently retired, Anne had managed a heavy career by rigorously systematizing her life. She was dependable and predictable – like a trusted clock. But somehow, her joy had been caught in the gears.

Sometimes, change is as simple as confronting unexamined routines. At other times, it requires a profound turning. In this week’s readings, we hear the language of such radical transformation: “be reconciled, be holy, ask, repent, forgive” – words commanding a ruthless examination of our attitudes. They suggest that, in order to renew our hearts, we must let something in us die.

Paul begins the week reminding us that our sinful world is redeemable through the gracious gift of Jesus Christ. Believing this, we will have the courage for true transformation. Such faith frees us of our blindness to the unholy in our lives.

Throughout the week, Esther, Jonah, the God of Moses, and Jesus himself encourage us. We make this Lenten journey in the company Holy Ones who radicalized their lives in faith, awareness, action and joy.

Unless, like Anne, we discover some discomfort in our souls, we will not seek change. Such discovery requires that we pray at the windows of our souls. Have we forgotten the spring-like beauty of a life lived deeply in God? Have we never known it in the first place? This week, we are invited to seek God’s Mercy, to return to joy, or maybe to find it for the first time!

Music: Miserere Mei – Mozart

Suggested Reading:

Psalm 51, interpreted by Rev. Christine Robinson

Have mercy on me, O God,
For I’ve messed up again
Sinned against You in thought, word and deed,
and in what I have left undone.
Been–all too human.

Can you make me a new heart, O God?
and a right spirit? Can you break my willful plundering
of all that is Yours?
If I got it together again, others would follow—
I could teach, guide, help—and I would!

O Lord, open my lips,
that I may praise you.
I know you don’t want ritual sacrifice
were I to give a burnt offering you’d be exasperated.
What you want is that new heart and right spirit.
For this, I pray.

For Your Reflection:

  • What feelings or reactions do I have after reading this reflection?
  • Do my feelings or reactions remind me of any passage or event in scripture, especially in the life of Christ? 
  • What actions might I take today because of my response to these readings?

Joel’s Invitation

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Conversion, Eternal Life, Faith, Forgiveness, Hope, Lent, spirituality5 Comments

Ash Wednesday
February 18, 2026

Contrition is an act of the will, not just an emotion,
involving grief for past sins and a desire to regain God’s friendship.
There are two types:
perfect contrition, motivated by a love for God, and
imperfect contrition, motivated by a fear of punishment or hatred of sin.

“Even now,” declares the LORD, “return to me with all your heart,
with fasting and weeping and mourning.”
Rend your heart and not your garments.
Return to the LORD your God Who is gracious and compassionate,
slow to anger and abounding in love, Who relents from overwhelming us.

Joel 2:12-13

“Even now…” – two of the most powerful words in scripture. Picture yourself saying them to a long-lost friend, or that friend to you. Even now – after all these years, after all you took for granted, after all your ingratitude, forgetfulness, pretense, indifference. Even now, I love and forgive you.

With the touch of sacred ashes, God reiterates that assurance to us … Even now, God waits and wants to restore us to wholeness, as in this story where you might even find yourself.

She had arranged to visit with an old college friend. They had been separated too long by the distancing choices that life often demands. She wanted to reconnect to that rare experience of shared transparency found just once or twice in a lifetime – the gift of a real friend.

They sat on a porch overlooking a gentle pond. The day was bright, the coffee hot, the chairs comfortable. But the magic was gone. Only half her friend had arrived for the cherished conversation. The other half – joy, adventure and the excess of youthful hope – had been lost. Somewhere in the intervening years, her friend had suffered a wound she did not share. This one afternoon would be too short a time to give that wound a name.

The ministry of healing requires time, whether it is to our own soul or to another’s that we bring the sweet ointment of restoration. It requires the quiet listening of a loving spirit. It requires the honest naming of wounds and the ardent desire to be made new.

As we begin our Lenten experience, God is waiting to receive us. God already knows the wounds we will bring to the conversation, already sees where our heart’s light has dimmed. God holds our half-heartedness next to his own heart and yearns to heal us.

Can we hear God’s unique invitation to us in this Lenten season? Can we confidently expose to the Divine gaze the depth of our need for grace and transformation? Can we journey with Christ, through his passion and death, to the wholeness we are called to?

Music: Parce Domine – 6th-century Latin antiphony sung here by A Capella Catholic Choir

Suggested Reading: Joel 2:12-17

Click for Scripture

For Your Reflection:

  • What feelings or reactions do I have after reading this reflection?
  • Do my feelings or reactions remind me of any passage or event in scripture, especially in the life of Christ? 
  • What actions might I take today because of my response to these readings?

Candlemas: A Seasonal Anchor

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Christmastide, Courage, Creation, Eternal Life, Faith, Forgiveness, Jesus, Mary, Seasons, spiritualityLeave a comment

Feast of the Presentation
February 2, 2026

Candlemas,
also known as the Feast of the Presentation of Jesus Christ,
the Feast of the Purification of the Blessed Virgin Mary,
or the Feast of the Holy Encounter,
is a Christian feast day commemorating
the presentation of Jesus
at the Temple by Joseph and Mary.
It is based upon the account in
Luke 2:22–40.

How do the great trees die and come to life again? It’s a question we might ponder every winter as the bare, black branches fill with ice. Their stark emptiness seems a place from which there is no return. But we know otherwise. In the relentless cold of every February, our experience whispers the hope for April. Our liturgical year is filled with lynchpins to stabilize and orient us in this hope.

The Feast of Candlemas (February 2), an ancient celebration of hope, is one of the seasonal anchors Medieval people used to ground their faith through its various seasons. The Feast commemorates Mary’s Purification and the Presentation of Christ to the world – thus the candles!

Other ancient and seasonal feasts were:

May 3: Roodmas – celebrating the discovery and veneration of the True Cross (called “Rood” in Middle English)
Aug 1: Lammas – Originating from the Old English hlafmaesse (“loaf-mass”), it involved blessing loaves made from the new crop, signifying gratitude for the summer’s bounty and preparation for the coming winter.
Sept 29 Michealmas – Festival of St. Michael the Archangel, known as the protector against evil and leader of heaven’s armies
Nov 11 Martinmas – a festival celebrated on November 11th, marking the end of the harvest and the start of winter, honoring St. Martin of Tours, a soldier famous for sharing his cloak with a beggar, symbolizing light and charity as days grow shorter
Dec 25 Christmas – the ultimate celebration of hope in the Light of Jesus Christ

Like nature, each one of us has our seasons. Our lives contain the cycles of our youth and aging, birth and death. Our daily experiences turn in both the warm and the chilly intervals of our lives.

  • We have blossomed with the expectant life of spring: a new job, relationship, adventure.
  • We have cultivated love over warm summers of dedication and growth – our faith, families, friends, and ministries.
  • We have reaped the autumnal returns of our efforts, walking away from a red and golden field carrying a well-earned harvest – graduations, anniversaries, promotions, retirements.
  • Certainly, each of us has known our own winters, when cold has threatened and dark has isolated – and yet, like the trees – we have survived.

As we experience the depths of “Winter 2026”, Candlemas seems an opportune time to review the lessons of the season – especially the chapters on deep roots, inner quiet, and a hidden spiritual warmth that defies freezing.

In the winters of our lives, we learn what truly sustains us. We are called to delve into the power of endurance, resilience, forgiveness, honesty, loyalty, and faithfulness. These are the winter virtues that preserve life deep under the surface of any paralyzing storm. These are the salts that keep life’s highways passable, allowing us to stay connected to all that keeps us vibrant.

On any given day of the year, we can experience “winter”. Think of the times you have received (or given) the “cold shoulder”. Remember when your explanations have been given an icy reception? Haven’t there been conversations where you were frozen out? Can’t you still see the frosty stare you got from someone who thought you were beneath them? We have all known some sub-zero responses when we were really looking for a warm word. We have all received some chilly greetings when we needed not to feel like an isolated stranger.

Hospitality is not listed as a Fruit of the Holy Spirit. Nevertheless, it is the melding of many of them. Hospitality is a radical welcome rooted in God’s love. It is the perfect antidote to all our methods of freezing one another out. It is the human anti-freeze that reminds us that we need one another’s warmth to survive the treacheries of life. It is a virtue to be deeply pondered in this societal age of frigid inhumanity to those we judge to be “alien”.

If there is someone in your life that you have exiled to the Arctic, consider reaching out in hospitality, care, forgiveness, or honesty. This winter, let go of the glacial grudges, silences, and harbored hurts that sometimes freeze our souls and kill our hope of returning life. Listen to the voice of the dark February nights. It is telling us how to move toward spring.

Music: We Are Called to Welcome Strangers – Jubilate

Suggested Scripture: 1 Peter 4:7-11

Click for Scripture

For Your Reflection:

  • What feelings or reactions do I have after reading this reflection?
  • Do my feelings or reactions remind me of any passage or event in scripture, especially in the life of Christ? 
  • What actions might I take today because of my response to these readings?

Longing for Spring?

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Creation, Faith, Forgiveness, healing, Seasons, spirituality4 Comments

February 9, 2025

Comfort Zone – Stephen Halpern

Is it damp, drippy February where you are? Are you longing for spring? It just does something for you, doesn’t it? On that first really warm afternoon, all the long, cold hours of winter suddenly coalesce into a small memory and disappear like an ice cube at the equator.

That same moment of new life can occur after any “cold season” — even a cold season of the heart. It can occur after a season of anger, loss, doubt, fear, or distrust . It can occur with something so small as a word, a glance, a smile offered in encouragement, love or forgiveness.

Think of a time in your life, perhaps, when a relationship felt “frozen” in anger or doubt. Think of that moment when one of you said to the other, “ I’m sorry”, “I didn’t mean to hurt you.”, “I love you no matter what.” In a small phrase, winter turned to spring and life was possible again!

Catherine McAuley understood the profound power of a small word, a glance, or a smile. In the 1800’s, she told the first Sisters of Mercy: “There are things the poor prize more highly than gold, tho’ they cost the donor nothing; among these are the kind word, the gentle, compassionate look, and the patient hearing of their sorrows.”

Each one of us finds ourselves poor in something at sometime in our lives. We may be poor in confidence, strength, courage, or determination. We may be at a point in our lives where we feel we cannot sustain one more worry or responsibility. We look to one another for the small “season-changing” word, glance, or smile.

To consistently be the kind of person who offers that season-changing gift takes concentration, inner clarity, and courage. It is not about being a “pollyanna”, sowing smiles without thought or substance. It means, instead, staying in touch with our interior life, keeping ourselves awake and responsive to our blessings, and sincerely connecting with those around us in reverence and hope for their lives. As we long for spring, may each of us see ourselves more clearly as the “life-giver” we can be. May we radiate that power for our own good and the good of all those whose lives we affect.

Music: The Moment Is Yours – Nicholas Gunn

For Your Reflection

  • What feelings or reactions do I have after reading this reflection?
  • Do my feelings or reactions remind me of any passage or event in scripture, especially in the life of Christ? 
  • What actions might I take today because of my response to these readings?

Suggested Scripture: 1 Peter 4:8-11

Click for Scripture

Forgiveness

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Charity, Conversion, Discipleship, Eternal Life, Faith, Forgiveness, spirituality1 Comment

Thursday of the Thirty-second Week in Ordinary Time
November 14, 2024

Today’s Readings:

https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/111424.cfm

Beloved:
I have experienced much joy and encouragement from your love,
because the hearts of the holy ones
have been refreshed by you, brother.
Therefore, although I have the full right in Christ
to order you to do what is proper,
I rather urge you out of love,
being as I am, Paul, an old man,
and now also a prisoner for Christ Jesus.
I urge you on behalf of my child Onesimus,
whose father I have become in my imprisonment,
who was once useless to you but is now useful to both you and me.
Philemon 1:7-11

Did you ever have to intercede for a friend? Or if you were the friend, did anyone ever have to intercede for you? That’s what is happening in this passage.

Onesimus, the escaped slave of Philemon, had also been accused of petty theft. During his escape, he comes into Paul’s company, is converted, and befriends and assists Paul.

Paul pleads with Philemon to forgive and reconcile with Onesimus as a brother in Christ.

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy:

We give thanks for those who have stood by us in times of testing, who knew our hearts better than others did, and who represented us in Christ.

Poetry: “Onesimus” by Tania Runyan

Since I stole your money, Philemon, and even more, myself, the body
that broke earth and stacked stones at daybreak while you slept,

you have every right to lash me till the whites of my intestines show,
brand FUG on my forehead, or throw me to the lions, who love especially

the taste of escaped slaves, our blood sweet with freedom’s fleeting breath.
But Paul, wild-eyed with Christ, has washed down his prison walls

with prayer. He knows you will take me back, not a slave, but a brother
delivering koinonia to your congregation in this present evil age, teaching

how to pray paralytics into motion and how to sleep in peace
when soldiers sharpen swords outside your windows. Paul calls me his son, no—

his very heart. I am no longer your body but will reside in yours,
pump forgiveness and prayer through your veins. I will make you

see Christ in every jangling harlot and rotting, leprous face.
I will make you a slave to God’s bidding.

Music: Return to the Heart – David Lanz

Foolish

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Community, Cross, Faith, Forgiveness, Gospel, inclusivity, justice, Mercy, peace, spirituality2 Comments

Friday of the Twenty-first Week in Ordinary Time
August 30, 2024

Today’s Readings:

https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/083024.cfm

Brothers and sisters:
Christ did not send me to baptize but to preach the Gospel,
and not with the wisdom of human eloquence,
so that the cross of Christ might not be emptied of its meaning.

The message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing,
but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.
1 Corinthians 1:17-18

Paul writes that the meaning of the Cross depends on who you are. If you believe, it manifests God’s Power. If you do not believe, it signifies foolishness.

The Gospel and the Cross turn the realities of the world upside down. For those who have falsely believed that power exists in egotism, legalism, division, aggression, vengeance, and greed, Paul says, “No!”. These are only signs that you are perishing.

The power of the Cross is manifested in mercy, justice, community, peace, forgiveness and generosity. This is the path to salvation.

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy:
We ask for the courage to trust the contradictory wisdom of the Gospel, and to live a life that reveals the “foolish” power of the Cross.

Poetry: Jesus Is Nailed to the Cross – Malcolm Guite

See, as they strip the robe from off his back
And spread his arms and nail them to the cross,
The dark nails pierce him and the sky turns black,
And love is firmly fastened on to loss.
But here, a pure change happens.
On this tree, loss becomes gain, death opens into birth.
Here wounding heals and fastening makes free, 

Earth breathes in heaven, heaven roots in earth. 
And here we see the length, the breadth, the height, 
Where love and hatred meet and love stays true, 
Where sin meets grace and darkness turns to light, 
We see what love can bear and be and do.
And here our Saviour calls us to his side, 
His love is free, his arms are open wide.

Music: The Power of the Cross – Stuart Townend

Grudge

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Courage, Discipleship, Faith, Forgiveness, healing, Mercy, spirituality2 Comments

Memorial of the Passion of Saint John the Baptist
August 29, 2024

Today’s Readings:

https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/082924.cfm

John had said to Herod,
“It is not lawful for you to have your brother’s wife.”
Herodias harbored a grudge against him
and wanted to kill him but was unable to do so.
Herod feared John, knowing him to be a righteous and holy man,
and kept him in custody.
When he heard him speak he was very much perplexed,
yet he liked to listen to him.
Matthew 6:18-20

Our Gospel today describes the manner of death for John the Baptist. It is a sad and horrifying story. But the sadder story is how Herodias’s grudge poisoned both her heart and the cowardly heart of Herod.

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy:
We examine our own hearts for any shadow of grudge or ill-feeling we might hold against others. It may be a small fracture, but it can widen over the years to become spiritually poisonous. We pray for the grace to be able to heal, to change, to forgive, and to be truly compassionate.

Poetry: Things That Cause a Quiet Life – Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey

My friend, the things that do attain
The happy life be these, I find:
The riches left, not got with pain,
The fruitful ground; the quiet mind;

The equal friend; no grudge, no strife;
No charge of rule nor governance;
Without disease the healthy life;
The household of continuance;

The mean diet, no dainty fare;
True wisdom joined with simpleness;
The night discharged of all care,
Where wine the wit may not oppress;

The faithful wife, without debate;
Such sleeps as may beguile the night:
Content thyself with thine estate,
Neither wish death, nor fear his might.

Music: J.S. Bach / Christ unser Herr zum Jordan kam, BWV 7
This is one of several church cantatas which Johann Sebastian Bach composed for the Feast of St. John the Baptist.

Reform

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Conversion, Courage, Discipleship, Faith, Forgiveness, spirituality1 Comment

Saturday of the Sixteenth Week in Ordinary Time
July 27, 2024

Today’s Readings:

https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/072724.cfm

Thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel:
Reform your ways and your deeds,
so that I may remain with you in this place.
Put not your trust in the deceitful words:
“This is the temple of the LORD!
The temple of the LORD! The temple of the LORD!”
Only if you thoroughly reform your ways and your deeds;
if each of you deals justly with his neighbor;
if you no longer oppress the resident alien,
the orphan, and the widow;
if you no longer shed innocent blood in this place,
or follow strange gods to your own harm,
will I remain with you in this place,
in the land I gave your fathers long ago and forever.
Jeremiah 7:3-7

Jeremiah tells the people that God wants to reform them in a very particular way. They are to be reshaped by justice, truthfulness, mercy, holy hospitality, non-violence, and faithful worship.

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy:
We examine our lives for where we need reformation. Don’t tell me you don’t need it. Everybody needs it. We get weary, distracted, hurt, stubborn, fooled, proud, and arrogant. These human conditions knock us out of spiritual shape. How great that God grants us the indulgence to reform and gladly assists us in the process!

Wisdom:

“In a higher world
it is otherwise,
but here below to live
is to change,
and to be perfect
is to have changed often.”

St. John Henry Newman

Music: Purple Indulgence – Masako