Category: holiness

Oh, Fig!

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Conversion, Faith, holiness, Hope, repentance, spiritualityLeave a comment

Saturday, October 27, 2018

Readings: http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/102718.cfm

Today, in Mercy, our readings are not reassuring. They basically tell us that it’s a tough world out there, and it might get us – body and/or soul. They tell us to straighten up and live right before it’s too late!

Lk 13_7 fig tree

I don’t really like the “in your face” readings, but they certainly are clear and effective. Just picture that poor fig tree, trying like crazy – for three years – to bear fruit! I know that I’ve been trying my whole life to overcomes some of my fruitlessness. I certainly hope God continues to be patient with me!

Nevertheless, the message of today’s Gospel is clear. Don’t take that patience for granted.Repent of any small godlessness you’re clinging to.

  • Forgive the recent and long ago hurts you’ve locked up inside.
  • Make amends for any meannesses you can remember.
  • “Show and Tell” your love to the people who love you.
  • Show and Tell your blessing to the people who don’t.
  • Be Mercy every time you get a chance.

Paul says it like this: Live the truth in love.

Let’s do it while we can.

Music: Amazing Grace ~ sung by Sean Clive

Look Good or Do Good? Hmmm.

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Gospel, holiness, Holy Spirit, Hope, joy, Love, Mercy, peace, spirituality2 Comments

Wednesday, October 17, 2018

Readings: http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/101718.cfm

Today, in Mercy, our readings continue the theme of sincere faith versus hypocritical practices.

Paul really lets the Galatian community have it. Apparently, their behavior had slipped pretty low!  Paul’s list of things to be avoided contains some shocking stuff, like orgies, bursts of fury, and drinking bouts. Sounds bad! A lot worse, I hope, than any list he might make about us if he were writing now. I wonder?

Lk 11_42 spices

In our Gospel, Jesus let’s loose on some of the Pharisees too. He points out that they practice the tiniest, visible observances so that people see them as holy. But they ignore the more important requirements of love, justice and mercy. In other words, they look good but don’t do good.

As we pray with these readings, we could try to address the small hypocrisies in our own lives – a kind of “weed the garden” approach. Surely it would help our spiritual life to get rid of anything like orgies, fury and drunkenness. But I think most of us, dear readers, are pretty much beyond that. 🙏

I prefer to take my cues from Paul’s accompanying list of virtues to be pursued: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. How obvious are these things in my life? When I lie my head on the pillow at night, are these the things I remember about my day? Have I given these gifts to others? Have I received them with gratitude?

As we read about the tithes of mint, rue and other garden herbs, the cooks among us might like to imagine life as a great bouillabaisse, perfectly seasoned for God with all the spices on Paul’s menu. What little herb do you need to add right now?

Music: The Fruits of the Spirit ~ Selah

Bask in God’s Glory

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Eternal Life, Faith, holiness, Love, spirituality2 Comments

Saturday, October 13, 2018

      Reading: http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/101318.cfm

Today, in Mercy, Paul continues opening the minds and hearts of the Galatians to their new Christian identity. It is one inspired and impelled by faith rather than by mere observance of laws.

There are times when all religions, and some of their followers, still struggle with this truth. External observance is sometimes invoked as a measure of holiness or faithfulness. But law will never trump Love.

Just as in any human relationship, we cannot measure love and devotion by external signs. We can send a beloved bushels of flowers, but if our heart is distracted and lukewarm those flowers are a mockery.

Our Gospel tells us that the true measure of our devotion is how responsive we are to God’s Word – how “clothed” we are in Christ. The Psalm today invites us to “glory in God’s Holy Name”. We are to rest our souls in God, the way we might sink our sore body into a warm, healing bath. We are to “clothe” ourselves in the portion of God’s glory inherited through our Baptism.

I absolutely love the picture I’m sharing today. My grand-nephew stands in a stream of refreshing water, totally delighted and free. 

Ps 105_RG Glory

We stand in such a fountain of God’s infinite love and grace. May we glory in it, be healed by it, be enlivened by it, be a living blessing because of it.

Music: A precious song by John Nuttall – I Delight in You

Where Were You?

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Faith, holiness, spirituality1 Comment

Wednesday. October 3, 2018

                        Readings:  http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/100318.cfm

Today, in Mercy, Job proves his faith in God. His tremendous troubles will not shake him from his deep loyalty to an awesome God.

As well as remaining steadfast, Job uses his circumstances to deliver both a stirring, poetic description of an Omnipotent Creator, and an personal testament to an intimate Companion.

Job9_11

Reading slowly through this beautiful passage, let’s open our imaginations to see the Mountain Mover, the Sun Commander, the Ocean Walker the Star Designer Who is Job’s God.

If our prayer is caught in some old, small image of God, this passage encourages us to reach for the awesome Presence of the God Who loves us – and to trust that Love with the utter simplicity like Job’s.

Music: Where Were You – Mars Hill Music

The Little Way to Holiness

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Eternal Life, Faith, holiness, spirituality4 Comments

Monday, October 1, 2018

                 Readings: http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/100118.cfm

Today, in Mercy, we begin a week of readings from the Book of Job, a poetic masterpiece and theological treasure. These readings from Job always occur during the 26th week of the Liturgical Year. 

It is so fitting that they should begin this year on the feast Saint Thérèse of the Child Jesus, a French Catholic Discalced Carmelite nun – popularly known as “The Little Flower”. Thérèse, like Job, experienced much suffering in her life. 

little flower

Some came from external circumstances, such as her mother’s death when Thérèse was only four years old, as well as Thérèse’s own tuberculosis and early death,

But much of Thérèse’s suffering came from within. She possessed a soul of remarkable religious sensitivity to the point of scrupulosity. She struggled with this for much of her early life until a spiritual breakthrough brought her peace. 

Thérèse called this experience a “complete conversion” through which she “felt, in a word, charity enter my heart, the need to forget myself to make others happy—Since this blessed night I was not defeated in any battle, but instead I went from victory to victory and began, so to speak, “to run a giant’s course” (Psalms 19:5).”

This turning from self toward the needs of others is the basis for the truly Christian life. In each life, the call to make this turn comes in different forms. Thérèse calls her approach “The Little Way”. Inspired by a passage from Proverbs, she reimagined her journey to holiness: “Whosoever is a little one, let him come to me” (9:4)

Thérèse wrote:
“Love proves itself by deeds, so how am I to show my love? Great deeds are beyond me. The only way I can prove my love is by scattering flowers and these flowers are every little sacrifice, every glance and word, and the doing of the least actions for love.”

The spirituality of Saint Thérèse of the Child Jesus has inspired many, thus this simple childlike woman has been declared a Doctor of the Church and a Saint.

Music: Art for God – Sr. Marie-Anastasia Communauté des Béatitudes

In this video, sung in French, you will hear and see some of Thérèse’s words. The painting represents her desire to find a “little way” to God.

What Would I Ask For?

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Conversion, dying, Eternal Life, holiness, Prayer, Truth2 Comments

Wednesday, September 26, 2018

          Readings:  http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/092618.cfm

Today, in Mercy, what an interesting prayer we find in Proverbs! The speaker beseeches God to grant him two things before death:

  • to be surrounded by truth and
  • to be neither rich nor poor

A fascinating and radical request, don’t you think? And we get eavesdrop on it.

Prov30_7 truth

The supplicant fears riches because they may cause him to forget his need for God.
He fears poverty because it might cause him to steal and thus betray God’s law.
All he wants is a nice, even life with not too much drama. I get it, don’t you!

In our Gospel, Jesus sends his disciples out, telling them to let go of drama too. If people don’t engage you, move on he says. He instructs them not to be caught up in material possessions, but to leave all behind that for the sake of the truth they will be preaching.

Both these readings are really about truth and freedom, two gifts that allow us to live in grace, hope and joy. They are about not being bound by our possessions, our pretenses, our success, or what people think of us. They are about being at peace with who we really are before God and others.

The Proverbs passage makes me wonder—  if someone were eavesdropping on our most radical prayer, what things they might they hear us asking for? What is it that would free us to be our truest selves before God?

Some quiet music to think about that question:

Anchoress ~ Kerani 

In God’s Hand

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Conversion, Discipleship, Eternal Life, Faith, holiness, Prayer, spirituality1 Comment

Tuesday, September 25, 2018

          Readings:  http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/092518.cfm

Today, in Mercy, our readings instruct us on what it means to really belong to God – heart and soul.

Proverbs tosses out a series of minstrel-like two-liners that could easily be overlooked for their beauty and depth. For example, the first couplet says: 

Like a stream is the king’s heart
in the hand of the LORD;
wherever it pleases him, he directs it.

Would we all not desire that kind of heart, where our thoughts and choices are so directed by God’s power and grace – held and guided into freedom by God’s loving hand? How confident, peaceful and joyful our lives would be!

Psalm 199 discern

Today’s Psalm 119 is a passionate prayer to be guided through an entangling world by our deep loyalty to God’s own truth, learned by meditating day and night on God’s goodness.

Our Gospel, in an often misinterpreted incident, shows us how Jesus considers his true disciples as close to him as his own mother and family.

So today, to deepen our own closeness to God, let us practice making our ordinary life into a constant prayer – allowing it to flow, like water, through God’s tender, guiding hand. 

We can do this by gratefully noticing God’s Presence in nature, in our companions, in the opportunities for kindness, honesty and service  that come to us today. 

Or, sadly, our experiences today might cause us to notice God’s absence in these places. This offers us an incentive to invite, beg and pester God to transform the desert places in our lives and world.

Whichever approach we take, it will open up a constant conversation with God about our life as we experience it at each moment. We begin to listen better to the Word of God revealing itself in our daily life. We begin to live more consciously in God’s Presence… in God’s dear family.

God’s Law is already written deep in the fabric of our lives. We pray for discernment to discover that guiding grace by opening our hearts to God’s Presence in our every experience.

Music: I Belong to You ~ Hillsong

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=WV6_nPD2sG4

Jealousy Dresses in Many Costumes

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn holiness, inclusivity, spirituality3 Comments

Sunday, September 23, 2018

Reading: http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/092318.cfm

Today, in Mercy, our Sunday readings each address, in some way, the motivations and judgments of the heart.

Most of us are good people, or at least we want to be. But life can still get us mixed up in situations and decisions which test our character and challenge our moral fortitude. A few characters from today’s readings seem beset with such dilemmas.

The voice within the Wisdom passage belongs to a hard-hearted and jealous person who finds the just person obnoxious. The speaker can’t stand being shown up by the good man’s character. It challenges his comfortable, self-absorbed existence.

In our epistle, James gives us the powerful admonitions, “Where jealousy and selfish ambition exist, there is disorder and every foul practice.” He tells us that our hearts should be filled instead with the wisdom from above, yielding peace, gentleness and Mercy.

When I watch the news, or observe the day’s political dramas, I long for the honest, sincere and decent world James describes. I long for a world where we respect and honor each other beyond politics, gender, color, nation, religion, and sexual orientation – for a world where we make choices FOR one another, not against.

How can we help realize a world like that by the choices we make in our personal lives? How can we minimize the jealousy that is born of self-interest and prejudice?

In the Gospel, Jesus tells us the way. His disciples are busy trying to figure out which of them is the greatest, missing -as they so often do- the whole point of discipleship. Jesus is gentle with them. He tells them to look at a little child. There they will find what is most important – in simplicity, vulnerability, openness, innocence. They will see that this is the way Jesus is with them.

If we can approach and receive one another with just an ounce of such selflessness, we might begin to change the world.

Music: Ubi Caritas ~ Taizé Community

Ubi caritas et amor, ubi caritas, Deus ibi est.

Where there is charity and love, God abides.

Love is …

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Charity, Community, holiness, Jesus, joy, Love1 Comment

Wednesday, September 19, 2018

       Readings: Click here for readings

Today, in Mercy, we encounter the often-read, less-practiced Corinthians passage on love. Could there be any word more massacred in our human language? Watch a few minutes of “Bachelorette”, or read a few Valentine’s cards, or listen to a commercial that tells you how much you’ll love some car! You’ll see what I mean.

Our souls so desperately need to learn and re-learn Paul’s definition of love.

1Cor13_loove

To open, Paul tells us that nothing we do matters if it is done without love. Does this mean we have to enjoy executing all the duties required of us? I think not. Sometimes a duty feels like a drudgery.

But Paul is speaking here to our motivation. All that we do must be done because we care for and honor ourselves and others. This lightens any sense of burden and gives us a resilience and joy even in difficulty. This is what real love looks like.

Paul goes on to name the specific characteristics of love.  If you’re like me, this section is like a checklist against which I measure myself:

  • Patient? – sometimes. 
  • Jealous, pompous, boastful, rude? – uh oh!
  • Does not seek its own interests? – (alarms now going off)

Yes, the deeper we go into this passage, the more we realize how far we are from the kind of love Paul describes.

The whole point of the spiritual journey is to continually refine our understanding and practice of love until it fits more perfectly to the pattern of Jesus Who is Love.

Let’s all pray today to “clang” a little less, and love a lot more.

Music: Love Goes On ~ Bernadette Farrell

A Faith that Delights God

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Creation, Faith, holiness, spiritualityLeave a comment

Monday, September 17, 2018

Readings: http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/091718.cfm

Today, in Mercy, Jesus, in amazement, praises the faith of the centurion. What was it about this man’s faith that could astound even God?  How would my faith make Jesus feel?

faith

We are taught that faith is a gift. We can’t earn it or acquire it on our own. We can though – once we have been given it – exercise it, polish it, cherish it and share it in order to make it stronger.

What is faith exactly?

Well, first off, we get faith mixed up with a lot of things that it is not. 

Faith is not the same as religion or religious denomination. Faith transcends Catholicism, Protestantism, Judaism or Islam. These are the only frameworks in which we sometimes practice our faith.

 Faith isn’t devotions, or prayers, or the formulas we pull out when we are in trouble. It is not the Prayer to St. Anthony when we can’t find our car keys. It is not the novena we say to receive a special favor. These are only practices which allow us to express our faith in human terms.

And most importantly, faith is not an ideology by which we exceptionalize and elevate ourselves, suggesting that others are less because of their choice of religious practice.

If we take a clue from today’s Gospel, we could describe faith like this:

  • It is the unshakable understanding that all Creation belongs to God, including every aspect of my life.
  • It is the trust that God wills our good in all things. 
  • It is the sure confidence that God abides with us in all circumstances.
  • It is the giving of my heart to this abiding God in a relationship of mutual love.
  • It is a life that bespeaks these confidences.

The centurion must have had this kind of faith and it delighted Jesus. Let’s pray for a faith that can do that for God!

Music: Be Still – David Kauffman