Category: justice

Mercy

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Charity, Discipleship, Faith, Gospel, healing, Jesus, justice, Mercy, spirituality1 Comment

Memorial of Our Lady of the Rosary
October 7, 2024

Today’s Readings:

https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/100724.cfm

But a Samaritan traveler who came upon him
was moved with compassion at the sight.
He approached the victim,
poured oil and wine over his wounds and bandaged them.
Then he lifted him up on his own animal,
took him to an inn, and cared for him.
The next day he took out two silver coins
and gave them to the innkeeper with the instruction,
‘Take care of him.
If you spend more than what I have given you,
I shall repay you on my way back.’
Which of these three, in your opinion,
was neighbor to the robbers’ victim?”
He answered, “The one who treated him with mercy.”
Jesus said to him, “Go and do likewise.”
Luke 10:33-37

Mercy sees you, welcomes you, acts for you, abides with you. Wrapped in Mercy, we find the spiritual comfort which allows us healing rest from those who did not see, welcome, act for, or abide with us.

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy:
May we open ourselves to receive such Mercy. May we strenghten ourselves to give it generously.

Poetry: Xenia – Ryan Wilson

“Xenia” is the ancient Greek concept of hospitality,
the generosity shown to those who are far from home.

One day a silent man arrives 
At your door in an outdated suit, 
Threadbare and black, like a lost mourner 
Or a Bible salesman who’s been robbed. 
Penniless, he needs a place to stay. 
And you, magnanimous you, soon find 
This stranger reading in your chair, 
Eating your cereal, drinking your tea, 
Or standing in your clothes at the window 
Awash in afternoon’s alien light. 
You tire of his constant company. 
Your floorboards creak with his shuffling footfalls, 
Haunting dark rooms deep in the night. 
You lie awake in blackness, listening, 
Cursing the charity or pride 
That opened up the door for him 
And wonder how to explain yourself.

He smells like durian and smoke 
But it’s mostly his presence, irksome, fogging 
The mind up like breath on a mirror … 
You practice cruelty in a mirror, 
Then practice sympathetic faces. 
You ghoul. 
Your cunning can’t deceive you. 
You are afraid to call your friends 
For help, knowing what they would say. 
It’s just you two. 
You throw a fit when 
He sneaks water into the whisky bottle, 
Then make amends. 
You have no choice 
Except to learn humility, 
To love this stranger as yourself, 
Who won’t love you, or ever leave.

Music: The Good Samaritan – Dallas Holm

Beaten, weary, left along the way
Dry from thirst ’til word I could not say
Then you came walking by and looked into my eyes
And saw my need and stopped to rescue me

Others came and others went on by
Refused to help or just too tired to try
Alone at last I sat, my head fell slowly back
And words from deep within me reached the sky

‘I’m hungry, please feed me
I’m naked, please clothe me
I’m so alone, won’t someone come to me?’
The sound of my words died
Oh, well, at least I tried
And trying seemed the only thing to do

But no sooner had I stopped and you were there
And then I knew that God had heard my prayer
I should have realized, and not have been surprised
His eye is on the sparrow, so why not me

Beaten, weary, left along the way
Dry from thirst ’til word I could not say
Then you came walking by, and looked into my eyes
And saw my need and stopped to rescue me
Then you came walking by, and looked into my eyes
And saw my need and stopped to rescue me

Tidings

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Faith, Gospel, Jesus, joy, justice, Mercy, spiritualityLeave a comment

Wednesday of the Twenty-second Week in Ordinary Time
September 4, 2024

Today’s Readings:

https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/090424.cfm

The Lord sent me to bring glad tidings to the poor
and to proclaim liberty to captives.

Luke 4:18

In today’s Gospel, Jesus zealously launches his universal ministry. He has been rejected in his hometown of Nazareth and revered in Capernaum. Now he readies himself to break in a redeeming tide over all the nations. His ministry promises waves of joy to those who are poor and liberty to those held captive.

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy:
Christ’s ministry in our world has not changed. We are his agents called now to break over our suffering world in waves of mercy, justice, and joy.

Poetry: Tides – Mary Oliver

Every day the sea
blue gray green lavender
pulls away leaving the harbor’s
dark-cobbled undercoat

slick and rutted and worm-riddled, the gulls
walk there among old whalebones, the white
spines of fish blink from the strandy stew
as the hours tick over; and then

far out the faint, sheer
line turns, rustling over the slack,
the outer bars, over the green-furled flats, over
the clam beds, slippery logs,

barnacle-studded stones, dragging
the shining sheets forward, deepening,
pushing, wreathing together
wave and seaweed, their piled curvatures

spilling over themselves, lapping
blue gray green lavender, never
resting, not ever but fashioning shore,
continent, everything.

And here you may find me
on almost any morning
walking along the shore so
light-footed so casual.

Music: Tides of the Soul – Ty Burke

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

Walk

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Conversion, Eternal Life, Faith, holiness, justice, Mercy, repentance, spiritualityLeave a comment

Memorial of Saint Augustine, Bishop and Doctor of the Church
August 28, 2024

Today’s Readings:

https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/082824.cfm

Blessed are you who fear the LORD,
who walk in his ways!
For you shall eat the fruit of your handiwork;
blessed shall you be, and favored.
Psalm 128:1-2

In today’s Gospel, Jesus really slams the Pharisees! They had to walk away from his condemnation thinking twice about the pretense of their lives!

Paul advises his followers not to “walk in disorderly way” – a little bit gentler admonition, but still a call to get one’s act together.

Our instructive psalm tells us why we should pay attention to the reproofs of Jesus and Paul. It reminds us that to walk in the way of the Lord brings us eternal blessing and favor.

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy:
We ask to continually learn how to walk in God’s grace for there is always a new challenge on Life’s pathway.

Thought:

As you start to walk on the way,
the way appears.

Rumi

Music: Walk in the Light – Aretha Franklin

Jesus is the light of the world
Come on choir

Walk in the light (walk in the light)
Beautiful light (well it’s a beautiful light)
Come where the dewdrops of mercy shine bright (Oh Lord)
Shine all around us by day and by night
Oh oh oh oh, Jesus is the light of the world

I wonder, do you know that this evening
Yeah yeah yeah

Walk in the light (we’re walk in the light)
Beautiful light (well it’s a beautiful light)
Come where the dewdrops of mercy shine bright 
Oh Lord, shine all around us by day and by night
Oh Lord, Jesus is the light of the world

Oh oh oh, oh oh oh oh, yeah

Walk in the light (we’re going the distance, yeah)
Beautiful light (we’re going the distance where the light)
Come where the dewdrops of mercy shine bright (of mercy shine bright)
Shine all around us by day and by night
(Oh Lord) Jesus is the light of the world (the Lord is the light of the world)

He’s shining (Yes, he’s shining)
He’s shining (oh yes he is, he’s shining)
He’s shining in my soul (oh yes he is, oh yeah)

Just

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Charity, Community, Discipleship, Faith, Gospel, justice, Love, spirituality1 Comment

Memorial of Saint Pius X, Pope
August 21, 2024

Today’s Readings:

https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/082124.cfm

Jesus told his disciples this parable:
“The Kingdom of heaven is like a landowner
who went out at dawn to hire laborers for his vineyard.
After agreeing with them for the usual daily wage,
he sent them into his vineyard.
Going out about nine o’clock,
he saw others standing idle in the marketplace,
and he said to them, ‘You too go into my vineyard,
and I will give you what is just.’
Matthew 20:1-4

Jesus tells the parable of the generous landowner who measures out recompense by love not law. Jesus teaches that this new law of love is the Godly means to calculate justice.

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy:
We pray to live by the kind of loving justice Jesus calls us to, not by the measurements that keep others in subservience or oppression.
We might ask ourselves these questions:

  • What really belongs to me?
  • If I have achieved or received much in life is it not by the grace of God and good fortune?
  • How can I help others have what they justly deserve?

Poetry: from Rumi

When I am with you, everything is prayer.
I prayed for change,
so, I changed my mind.

I prayed for guidance
and learned to trust myself.

I prayed for happiness
and realized I am not my ego.

I prayed for peace
and learned to accept others unconditionally.

I prayed for abundance
and realized my doubt kept it out.

I prayed for wealth
and realized it is my health.

I prayed for a miracle
and realized I am the miracle.

I prayed for a soul mate
and realized I am with the One.

I prayed for love
and realized it is always knocking,
but I have to allow it in.

Music: Already All I Need – Christy Nockels

Peace

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Community, Courage, Cross, Discipleship, Gospel, Jesus, justice, Mercy, spirituality2 Comments

Memorial of Saint Bonaventure, Bishop and Doctor of the Church
July 15, 2024

Today’s Readings:

https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/071524.cfm

Jesus said to his Apostles:
“Do not think that I have come to bring peace upon the earth.
I have come to bring not peace but the sword.
For I have come to set
a man against his father,
a daughter against her mother,
and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law;
and one’s enemies will be those of his household.
Matthew 10:34-36

I would not have liked hearing these words from Jesus, would you? The last thing I would have ever wanted was to be set against my precious mother! So WHAT is Jesus talking about?

These words are central to Christ’s mandate to his disciples. He is telling them that they will inevitably meet painful conflict while living out his mission. Sometimes the conflict will even be within their families and among their friends.

This is because God’s Peace is not quiet indifference but the striving for just equanimity for all people. This is the sword of discipleship – we must cut ourselves away from anything that turns us from a just and merciful God.

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy,
We pray for graced insight that we may see where the sword is pointing in our lives, and for courage that we may do the necessary cutting to be worthy disciples and build an honest peace in our world.

Poetry: Swords Into Plowshares – Daniel Berrigan, SJ
This poem was written in response to the conviction of the Plowshares Eight, of whom Berrigan was a member, for their civil disobedience against nuclear war.

Everything enhances, everything
gives glory—everything!

Between bark and bite
Judge Salus’s undermined soul
betrays him, mutters
very alleluias.

The iron cells—
Row on row of rose trellised
Mansions, bridal chambers!

Curses, vans, keys, guards—behold
the imperial lions of our vast acres!

And when hammers come down
and our years are tossed to four winds—

why, flowers blind the eye, the saints
pelt us with flowers!

For every hour
scant with discomfort
(the mastiff’s baleful eye,
the bailiff’s mastery)—

see, the Lord’s hands heap
eon upon eon,
like fruit bowls at a feast.

Music: Go Light Your World – Chris Rice

Fruit

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Charity, Discipleship, Faith, Holy Spirit, justice, spirituality2 Comments

Wednesday of the Twelfth Week in Ordinary Time
June 26, 2024

Today’s Readings:

https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/062624.cfm

A good tree cannot bear bad fruit,
nor can a rotten tree bear good fruit.
Every tree that does not bear good fruit will be cut down
and thrown into the fire.
So by their fruits you will know them.
Matthew 7: 18-20

Jesus speaks these words to warn his followers about false prophets. These charlatans may be clothed in a gentle sheep’s skin, but inside they are voracious wolves consuming everything for their own gain. They are liars, thieves, cheats, and pretenders.

Yet many people trust and believe them. How can that be? Are we just too naive to see them for what they are? Maybe. But I think it’s more likely that we want to believe their lies because we think we will benefit from them. We excuse their cheating and veiled thievery because it hasn’t hurt us, just the “other guy”. We espouse their pretenses because we mistakenly believe they will advance us as well as the “wolves”.

Jesus knows we’re not stupid. He says there is one clear and sure-fired way to identify a false prophet. By their fruits you shall know them – and those “fruits” should be the fruits of the Holy Spirit. If, despite the rotten fruit they have produced, we follow them then we will end up in the fire just like they will.

An image today instead of a poem

Music: Ubi Caritas – Where Love and Charity Abide, There is God

Rain

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Charity, Discipleship, Faith, Forgiveness, healing, inclusivity, justice, Mercy, spirituality4 Comments

Tuesday of the Eleventh Week in Ordinary Time
June 18, 2024

Today’s Readings:

https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/061824.cfm

Love your enemies
and pray for those who persecute you,
that you may be children of our Creator God,
Who makes the sun rise on the bad and the good,
and causes rain to fall on the just and the unjust.
Matthew 5:44-45

It must have been so hard to hear and accept Jesus’s words in his Sermon on the Mount. These listening disciples had been raised on the Deuteronomic principle “An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth”. What could ever make them turn that principle inside out to do just the opposite of what they had always thought? What would make us turn from this kind of “justice”? After all, it’s even-steven, isn’t it?

In Jesus Christ, there is no even-steven. The Mercy of God is given to all of us without limits. It rains from the heart of God over all Creation. Jesus showed us that there is no place in Mercy for quid pro quo justice. If a disciple wants to love like Jesus, this precept is foundational.

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy:
Perhaps we are someplace where we can watch the rain today. If not we can remember how rain falls without distinction over everything within its embrace. So too does God’s Mercy fall on us moving us to be its agents in our world.

Enjoy the Peaceful Rain

Poetry: from The Merchant of Venice – William Shakespeare

The quality of mercy is not strained;
It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven
Upon the place beneath. It is twice blest;
It blesseth him that gives and him that takes:
'T is mightiest in the mightiest; it becomes
The throned monarch better than his crown:
His sceptre shows the force of temporal power,
The attribute to awe and majesty,
Wherein doth sit the dread and fear of kings;
But mercy is above this sceptred sway;
It is enthronèd in the hearts of kings,
It is an attribute to God himself;
And earthly power doth then show likest God's
When mercy seasons justice.

Music: Norwegian Rain – David Lanz

Reconciled

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Charity, Community, Creation, Discipleship, Faith, Gospel, Jesus, justice, spirituality4 Comments

Memorial of Saint Anthony of Padua, Priest and Doctor of the Church
June 13, 2024

Today’s Readings:

https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/061324.cfm

Therefore, if you bring your gift to the altar,
and there recall that your brother
has anything against you,
leave your gift there at the altar,
go first and be reconciled with your brother,
and then come and offer your gift.
Matthew 5: 23-24

Jesus teaches a profound lesson in today’s Gospel. We cannot be in balance with God if we are out of balance with our neighbor.

In the “court” of God’s justice, that balance resides not in judgment or vengeance. It resides in a love beyond “liking” — in reconciliation, forgiveness, mercy, patience, hospitality, reverence, and service toward one another.

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy:

We realize that we can’t like everybody. We can’t feel good toward everybody. We can’t approve of everybody. But we can choose to be Christlike to everybody.

May we grow in that grace, inspired by the awareness that we are One in God with all Creation.

Poetry: One Hundred Love Sonnets: XVII – Pablo Neruda

I don’t love you as if you were a rose of salt, topaz,
or arrow of carnations that propagate fire:
I love you as one loves certain obscure things,
secretly, between the shadow and the soul.
I love you as the plant that doesn’t bloom but carries
the light of those flowers, hidden, within itself,
and thanks to your love the tight aroma that arose
from the earth lives dimly in my body.
I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where,
I love you directly without problems or pride:
I love you like this because I don’t know any other way to love,
except in this form in which I am not nor are you,
so close that your hand upon my chest is mine,
so close that your eyes close with my dreams.

Music: Amor Dei – Stephen Peppos

Caiaphas

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Courage, Faith, Gospel, Holy Spirit, Jesus, justice, spiritualityLeave a comment

Saturday of the Fifth Week of Lent
March 23, 2024

Today’s Readings:

https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/032324.cfm

So the chief priests and the Pharisees
convened the Sanhedrin and said,
“What are we going to do?
This man is performing many signs.
If we leave him alone, all will believe in him,
and the Romans will come
and take away both our land and our nation.”
But one of them, Caiaphas,
who was high priest that year, said to them,
“You know nothing,
nor do you consider that it is better for you
that one man should die instead of the people,
so that the whole nation may not perish.”

John 11: 47-50

From the moment described in this Gospel, down through the ages, the name “Caiaphas” shouts infamy. At a moment when he could have made all the difference in history, Caiaphas folded to political expediency, planting the seed for Jesus’s crucifixion.

Moral courage is a gift of the Holy Spirit. It strengthens us to tell the truth when doing so may cost us life, limb, or desired status in the world.

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy:

With the gift of free will, God has given us tremendous power, just as God gave Caiaphas. Our words, or our silences, can make or break the flow of grace in the world. By the practice of prayerfully considering our allegiances and testimonies, we can fortify our spirits with a sacred honesty – the kind which Caiaphas lacked on that momentous day.

  • Why am I making this choice?
  • Why am I voicing this opinion?
  • Why am I standing on this side of justice or mercy?
  • Who benefits, or who suffers, because of my stance?

And, ultimately, will my testimony make the way for God’s grace?

Poetry: All Is Truth – Walt Whitman

O me, man of slack faith so long!
Standing aloof—denying portions so long;
Only aware to-day of compact, all-diffused truth;
Discovering to-day there is no lie, or form of lie, and can be none,
but grows as inevitably upon itself as the truth does upon
itself,
Or as any law of the earth, or any natural production of the earth
does.

(This is curious, and may not be realized immediately—But it must be
realized;
I feel in myself that I represent falsehoods equally with the rest,
And that the universe does.)

Where has fail'd a perfect return, indifferent of lies or the truth?
Is it upon the ground, or in water or fire? or in the spirit of man?
or in the meat and blood?

Meditating among liars, and retreating sternly into myself, I see
 that there are really no liars or lies after all,
And that nothing fails its perfect return—And that what are called
lies are perfect returns,
And that each thing exactly represents itself, 
and what has preceded it,
And that the truth includes all, and is compact, just as much as
space is compact,
And that there is no flaw or vacuum in the amount of the truth—but
 that all is truth without exception;
And henceforth I will go celebrate anything I see or am,
And sing and laugh, and deny nothing.

Music: If We’re Honest – Francesca Battistelli