Category: Love

Espouse

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Conversion, Faith, Forgiveness, Love, Mercy, spiritualityLeave a comment

Monday of the Fourteenth Week in Ordinary Time
July 8, 2024

Today’s Readings:

https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/070824.cfm

I will espouse you to me forever:
I will espouse you in right and in justice,
in love and in mercy;
I will espouse you in fidelity,
and you shall know the LORD.
Hosea 2:21-22

The prophet Hosea is a consummate poet. He uses the metaphor of espousal to convey the profound and merciful love of God for the people. Hosea contemplates his own life and his experience of marital infidelity to more deeply understand the relationship between a forgiving God and a false-hearted people. The language is beautiful, powerful, at times unsettling. It is intended to turn Israel’s heart – and ours – fully toward God’s love in repentance and fidelity.

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy

God is the Lover and Spouse of our souls, of the whole Church, and of all Creation. In trust and openness, let us give ourselves to that Divine Mercy in every aspect of our lives.

Poetry: Hosea and Gomer by John Piper

This beautiful poem helps us more deeply understand the Book of Hosea.

The old man and his wife sat by
The winter fire and looked out high
Above the plains of Ephraim,
And saw around the last regime
Of Israel the shadows snake
Their way from east to west and take
Possession of Samaria.
“How long until Assyria,’
They thought, “would break Hoshea’s rod,
And violate the wife of God?”

But strange as it may seem, the doom
They saw across the land left room
For hope. And when they looked into
Each other’s eyes, as they would do
At night, they knew, as none could know
But they, that God would bend his bow
Against the charms of foreign men,
And take his faithless wife again.
They knew it could and would be done,
As surely as the rising sun
Drives darkness back unerringly,
And drowns it in the western sea.
They knew, because they had rehearsed
The tragedy and played it first
Themselves with passion and deceit.

“It’s true that life is far more sweet,”
Hosea thought, “when it is lost,
Then bought again at dreadful cost;
And love grows strong when it must wait,
And deep when it is almost hate.”

Such things as these he often said
To Gomer as they watched the red
And crimson echoes of the sky
Descend Mount Tabor’s cliffs and die
In darkness far below. And she
Would say to him, “Your love for me
Was like a mountain waterfall,
And I the jagged stone. Of all
The knives and hammers once applied
None made me smooth or clean. They tried,
But harlotry was in my blood,
Until your love became a flood
Cascading over my crude life
And kept me as your only wife.”

They knew as none but they could know
What it would mean that long ago
The Lord allowed his love to swell,
And married faithless Israel.

The passing of the years now found
The children grown and gathered ’round
This night: Jezreel and Loammi,
Hosea’s sons, and at his knee
Loruhamah. The room was sweet
With memories, and each replete
With pleasure and with ample pain.
Among the memories one main
Experience above the rest
Embraced them all. It was the best;
Indeed it was the mountain spring
Of every happy stream from which
The family ever drank, and rich
With hope. It was Hosea’s love.
The children stood in wonder of
The way he loved, and Gomer too.
But this had not always been true.

Hosea used to say, “It’s hard
To be a seer, and prophet bard.
The price is high when he must sing
A song of ruin over everything
In lyrics written with his life
And lose his children and his wife.”

And so it was, Hosea heard
The Lord. It was the strangest word
A holy prophet ever got:
And every pointed precept shot
Like arrows at Hosea’s life:
“Go take a harlot for your wife,”
Thus says the Lord, “And feel with me
The grief and pain of harlotry.
Her father’s name is Diblaim;
He makes fertility with cream
And raisin cakes. He will not see
Her go without a price, for she
Has brought him profits from her trade.
Now go, and let her price be paid;
And bring her back and let her bear
Your son. Call him Jezreel. For there
Is coming soon a day when I
Will strike and break the bloody thigh
Of Jehu’s brutal house, and seal
With blood the valley of Jezreel.

And after that, though she’s defiled.
Go in, and get another child,
And make your tender face like rock.
Call her Loruahmah and lock
Your heart against all sympathy:
`Not pitied’ is her name. No plea
From faithless Israel will wake
My sympathy till I forsake
My daughter in the wilderness.

Now multiply once more distress:
Hosea, go beget a son,
For there is yet one child to shun,
And call him Loammi, in shame,
For `Not My People’ is his name.”

Hosea used to walk along
The Jordan rim and sing the song
His father Beeri used to sing.
Sometimes the tune and truth would bring
Him peace, and he would pause and look
At all the turns the Jordan took,
To make its way down to the sea,
And he would chant from memory:

Think not, my son, that God’s great river
Of love flows simply to the sea,
He aims not straight, but to deliver
The wayward soul like you and me.
Follow the current where it goes,
With love and grace it ever flows.
The years went by, the children grew,
The river bent and Gomer knew
A dozen men. And finally
She left and traveled to the sea,
And sold herself to foreign priests
Who made the children serve at feasts
Until they had no shame.
And then
The God of grace came down again,
And said, “Hosea, go, embrace
Your wife beside the sea. And place
Your hand with blessing on the head
Of Loammi, and raise the dead
Loruhamah to life in me,
And tell Jezreel that I will be
For him a seed of hope to sow
In righteousness. Hosea, go,
The gracious river bends once more.”

And so the prophet loved these four
Again, and sought them by the sea,
And bought them with the equity
Of everything he owned.
That was
The memory tonight, because
Hosea loved beyond the way
Of mortal man. What man would say,
“Love grows more strong when it must wait,
And deeper when it’s almost hate.”

Jezreel spoke softly for the rest,
“Father, once more let us be blessed.
What were the words from long ago
That gave you strength to love us so?
Would you please bless us with your rhyme,
And sing it for us one more time?”

“Think not, my son, that God’s great river
Of love flows simply to the sea,
He aims not straight, but to deliver
The wayward soul like you and me.
Follow the current where it goes.
With love and grace it ever flows.”
“And children,” Gomer said with tears,
“Mark this, the miracle of years.”
She looked Hosea in the face
And said, “Hosea, man of grace,
Dark harlotry was in my blood,
Until your love became a flood
Cascading over my crude life
And kept me as your only wife.
I love the very ground you trod,
And most of all I love your God.”

This is the lamp of candle four:
A bride made ready at the door.
A shabby slave waits her embrace,
Blood-bought and beautified by grace.

Music: Hosea – Gregory Norbet

When a Beloved Tree Falls

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Community, Creation, dying, Faith, Love, Mercy, spirituality11 Comments

July 6, 2024

Last week, a great tree was felled at the edge of our Motherhouse lawn. Having stood for decades near the Guardian Angel, it had shaded many generations on their way to Mercy: students, staff, visitors, and the Sisters themselves on their many ins and outs to this common home.

The whole community which gathers here daily felt a pang at the hewing, knowing that we had shared the very breath of this tree for so long. Its leafy embrace offered us a place to cool in the present, a way to remember the beauty of the past, and a security about the future. Seeing it disassembled by necessity gave a bittersweet pain. But there was a peace in knowing that our tree had come to completion with honor and dignity.

We drew so much from the presence of that tree, but perhaps we can draw even more from its absence. The lines of Gregory Norbet’s hymn “Hosea” come to mind:

Trees do bend, though straight and tall.
So must we to others’ call
Long have I waited for your coming home to me,
And living deeply our new life.

Our tree, even in its retreat, still speaks to us – a truth becoming profoundly evident these days as we mourn the passing of our sister and friend Marie Ann Ellmer. She stood straight and tall among us, but another call came precipitously in the early morning last week.

When a beloved dies, one with whom we drew the same breath and hope, part of us dies. Whether a great tree or a magnanimous soul, they take something with them of the life we shared. When we mourn them, it is that which is taken that we pine for. But as we fold their lives under Love’s eternal blanket, it is that which they have left us that gives joyful peace.

That glorious tree and dear Marie Ann seem to be one now in the solemn aura that follows death. Both, in rare beauty, brought others to the precious gift of Mercy. Both remain treasured in its Everlasting Power. And both have given back to Creation the blessed graces that made them shine among us.

Secret

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Faith, Gospel, holiness, Jesus, Love, Prayer, spirituality2 Comments

Wednesday of the Eleventh Week in Ordinary Time
June 19, 2024

Today’s Readings:

https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/061924.cfm

But when you give alms,
do not let your left hand know what your right is doing,
so that your almsgiving may be secret.

But when you pray, go to your inner room, close the door,
and pray to your Father in secret.
And your Father who sees in secret will repay you.

But when you fast, anoint your head and wash your face,
so that you may not appear to others to be fasting,
except to your Father who is hidden.
And your Father who sees what is hidden will repay you.
Matthew 6:3-4;6;17-18

In these verses, Jesus tells us that our relationship with God – through almsgiving, prayer, and fasting – is private, personal, and intimate. When we commune with God through these actions, it is secret – a love shared between you and the Divine Beloved.

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy:

Let’s think about our acts of generosity, prayer, and spiritual discipline as gifts given to God, even though they are offered through our service to others. Living a grateful life, we are delighted by God’s gifts to us given from an Infinite Love. May we respond by our humble efforts to delight God in return.

Poetry: from St. Teresa of Avila

Christ has no body on earth but yours. 
Yours are the eyes with which 
he looks compassionately on this world. 
Yours are the feet with which 
he walks to do good. 
Yours are the hands with which 
he blesses all the world. 
Christ has no body now on earth
but yours!

Music: God Has No Body Now But Yours – David Ogden based on Teresa of Avila

Flourish

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Courage, Creation, Eternal Life, Faith, Gospel, Hope, Jesus, Love, Psalms, spirituality1 Comment

Eleventh Sunday in Ordinary Time
June 16, 2024

Today’s Readings:

https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/061624.cfm

The just one shall flourish like the palm tree,
like a cedar of Lebanon shall they grow.
They that are planted in the house of the LORD
shall flourish in the courts of our God.
Psalm 92:13-14

This verse from Psalm 92 ties together all our readings for today.

In the passage from Exodus, God takes a tiny twig, protects and nourishes it, and it flourishes. The analogy describes God’s relationship with Israel and with us. We are called to flourish in the Kingdom of God.

In Corinthians, Paul expresses the conviction that we will receive our recompense according to how we flourish in response to God’s grace.

And in our Gospel, Jesus teaches that our faith – God’s gift to us – is the small seed that flourishes into eternal life, the fullness of life in God.

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy:

We realize that each of these flourishings begins with a tiny hope – a twig, a courageous aspiration, a mustard seed.

Such is life. It is the small but consistent acts of faith, hope, and love that eventually yield abundant harvest. – embracing us with all Creation in God’s complete Love.

Poetry: Mustard Seed – Meister Eckhart

I.

In the Beginning
High above understanding
Is ever the Word.
O rich treasure,
There the Beginning always bore the Beginning.
O Father’s Breast,
From thy delight
The Word ever flows!
Yet the bosom
Retains the Word, truly.

II.

From the two as one source,
The fire of love.
The bond of both,
Known to both,
Flows the All-Sweet Spirit
Co-equal,
Undivided
The Three are One.
Do you understand why? No.
It best understands itself.

III.

The bond of three
Causes deep fear.
Of this circle
There is no understanding.
Here is a depth without ground.
Check and mate
To time, forms, place!
The wondrous circle
Is the Principle,
Its point never moves.

IV.

The mountain of this point
Ascend without activity.
O intellect!
The road leads you
Into a marvelous desert,
So broad, so wide,
It stretches out immeasurably.
The desert has,
Neither time nor place,
Its mode of being is singular.

V.

The good desert
No foot disturbs it,
Created being
Never enters there:
It is, and no one knows why.

It is here, it is there,
It is far, it is near,
It is deep, it is high,
It is in such a way
That it is neither this nor that.

VI.

It is light, it is clear,
It is totally dark,
It is unnamed,
It is unknown,
Free of beginning or end.
It stands still,
Pure, unclothed.
Who knows its dwelling?
Let him come forth
And tells us what sort it is.

VII.

Become like a child,
Become deaf, become blind.
Your own something
Must become nothing;
Drive away all something, all nothing!
Leave place, leave time,
Avoid even image!
Go without a way
On the narrow path,
Then you will find the desert’s track.

VIII.

O my soul,
Go out, let God in!
Sink all my something
In God’s nothing.
Sink in the bottomless flood!
If I flee from You,
You come to me.
If I lose myself,
Then I find You,
O Goodness above being!

Music: The Ride of the Valkyries – Richard Wagner

I love to listen to this masterpiece when I imagine God opening heaven to all Creation at the end of time.

Cross

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Cross, Faith, Jesus, Love, spirituality, suffering2 Comments

Solemnity of Most Sacred Heart of Jesus
June 7, 2024

Today’s Readings:

https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/060724.cfm

When Israel was a child I loved him,
out of Egypt I called my son.
Yet it was I who taught Ephraim to walk,
who took them in my arms;
I drew them with human cords,
with bands of love;
I fostered them like one
who raises an infant to his cheeks;
Yet, though I stooped to feed my child,
they did not know that I was their healer.
Hosea 11:1;3-4

Our readings today invite us to pray with the profoundly beautiful image of the Sacred Heart, the mystery of divinity and humanity united in the person of Jesus. The tenderness of Hosea flows into Paul’s description of the “inscrutable riches of Christ”. These passages culminate in John’s depiction of the unbroken body of Jesus on the Cross.

Together, these readings present us with the mystery of love fulfilled by sacrifice, a reality we may resist in our lives, but one that is nevertheless true. All love entails sacrifice. Jesus loves us completely and sacrificed his Sacred Heart completely for that Love.

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy:

We pray to grow in our understanding of the Cross and of the mystery of Love as revealed to us in the Sacred Heart.

Poetry: To the Sacred Heart of Jesus – Thérèse of Lisieux, translated by Donald Kinney, OCD

At the holy sepulchre, Mary Magdalene,
Searching for her Jesus, stooped down in tears.
The angels wanted to console her sorrow,
But nothing could calm her grief.
Bright angels, it was not you
Whom this fervent soul came searching for.
She wanted to see the Lord of the Angels,
To take him in her arms, to carry him far away.
Close by the tomb, the last one to stay,
She had come well before dawn.
Her God also came, veiling his light.
Mary could not vanquish him in love!
Showing her at first his Blessed Face,
Soon just one word sprang from his Heart,
Whispering the sweet name of: Mary,
Jesus gave her back her peace, her happinesss.
O my God, one day, like Mary Magdalene,
I wanted to see you and come close to you.
I looked down over the immense plain
Where I sought the Master and King,
And I cried, seeing the pure wave,
The starry azure, the flower, and the bird.
“Bright nature, if I do not see God,
You are nothing to me but a vast tomb.”
I need a heart burning with tenderness
Who will be my support forever,
Who loves everything in me, even my weakness…
And who never leaves me day or night.”
I could find no creature
Who could always love me and never die.
I must have a God who takes on my nature
And becomes my brother and is able to suffer!
You heard me, only Friend whom I love.
To ravish my heart, you became man.
You shed your blood, what a supreme mystery!…
And you still live for me on the Altar.
If I cannot see the brilliance of your Face
Or hear your sweet voice,
O my God, I can live by your grace,
I can rest on your Sacred Heart!
O Heart of Jesus, treasure of tenderness,
You Yourself are my happiness, my only hope.
You who knew how to charm my tender youth,
Stay near me till the last night.
Lord, to you alone I’ve given my life,
And all my desires are well known to you.
It’s in your ever-infinite goodness
That I want to lose myself, O Heart of Jesus!
Ah! I know well all our righteousness
Is worthless in your sight.
To give value to my sacrifices,
I want to cast them into your Divine Heart.
You did not find your angels without blemish.
In the midst of lightning you gave your law!…
I hide myself in your Sacred Heart, Jesus.
I do not fear, my virtue is You!…
To be able to gaze on your glory,
I know we have to pass through fire.
So I, for my purgatory,
Choose your burning love, O heart of my God!
On leaving this life, my exiled soul
Would like to make an act of pure love,
And then, flying away to Heaven, its Homeland,
Enter straightaway into your Heart.

Music: Only You – Michael Zabrocki

More

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Cross, Discipleship, Faith, Jesus, Love, spirituality2 Comments

Friday of the Seventh Week of Easter
May 17, 2024

Today’s Readings:

https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/051724.cfm

After Jesus had revealed himself to his disciples
and eaten breakfast with them, 
he said to Simon Peter,
“Simon, son of John, do you love me more than these?”
Simon Peter answered him, “Yes, Lord, you know that I love you.”
Jesus said to him, “Feed my lambs.”
John 21:15

Perhaps we have spoken or heard these questions as we move through our heart’s life:

  • Do you love me?
  • How much do you love me?
  • Will you always love me?
  • Do you still love me?

But true love is immeasurable. It has shades and intensities, but it doesn’t have limits. True love is all; it’s everything – fidelity, forgiveness, delight, hope, chaos, perseverance, sacrifice, joy and generosity.

Jesus knows Peter possesses all these commitments to Him. But He is asking Peter to test himself before Peter is called to take Christ’s place on earth.

The only “more” that ever touched human love was when Jesus took our flesh to live, die, and rise for all of us. Jesus wants to hear Peter say he has that kind of sacrificial Love.

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy:

Jesus knows us too, and how we want to love him well; how we may want to love him “more”. Let’s talk with him about that in our prayer today, asking to not let our chances for loving God slip by without our notice.

Poetry: This Paltry Love – Jessica Powers

I love you, God, with a penny match of love
that I strike when the big and bullying dark of need
chases my startled sunset over the hills
and in the walls of my house small terrors move.
It is the sight of this paltry love that fills
my deepest pits with seething purgatory,
that thus I love you, God—God—who would sow
my heights and depths with recklessness of glory,
who hold back light-oceans straining to spill on me, on me,
stifling here in the dungeon of my ill.
This puny spark I scorn, I who had dreamed
of fire that would race to land’s end, shouting your worth,
of sun that would fall to earth with a mortal wound
and rise and run, streaming with light like blood,
splattering the sky,
soaking the ocean itself, and all the earth.

Music: If I Love You – Rodgers and Hammerstein

Love

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Charity, Eternal Life, Faith, Holy Spirit, Jesus, Love, spirituality4 Comments

Sixth Sunday of Easter
May 5, 2024

Today’s Readings:

https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/050524.cfm

Jesus said to his disciples:
“As the Father loves me, so I also love you.
Remain in my love.
If you keep my commandments, you will remain in my love,
just as I have kept my Father’s commandments
and remain in his love.

“I have told you this so that my joy may be in you
and your joy might be complete.
John 15:9-11

What would it be like if we loved as the Creator loves – eternal life flowing out from Trinitarian Love to sustain all of us for always?

Jesus says that this is how the Father loves, and how Jesus loves all of us. He says that we abide in this Love when we indeed love God above all and our Neighbor as ourselves.

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy:

Honestly, can there be a more ubiquitous word than “Love”, and yet we find so little of its true practice in our increasingly self-absorbed and violent culture!

If, when we “love”, it does not strengthen sacred life in another or in the world, then we have not truly loved. We may have desired, admired, adulated, or ingratiated, but we have not loved as God loves.

Let’s pray to be open and responsive to the gift of God’s Love flowing into our hearts.

Prose: from Embodied Love in John of the Cross – Richard P. Hardy, Ph.D.

For John of the Cross, being wholly converted into divine love means actually living God's own life:
The soul lives the life of God.
And the will, which previously loved in a base and deadly way with only its natural affection, is now changed into the life of divine love, for it loves in a lofty way with divine affection, moved by the strength of the Holy Spirit in which it now lives the life of love. By means of this union God's will and the soul's will are now one.
Finally all the movements, operations, and inclinations the soul had previously from the principle and strength of its natural life are now in this union dead to what they formerly were, changed into divine movements, and alive to God.

Music: Amazing Love – Peggy Duquesnel

Joy

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Eternal Life, Faith, Jesus, joy, Love, spirituality1 Comment

Memorial of Saint Athanasius, Bishop and Doctor of the Church
May 2, 2024

Today’s Readings:

https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/050224.cfm

Jesus said to his disciples:
“As the Father loves me, so I also love you.
Remain in my love.
If you keep my commandments, you will remain in my love,
just as I have kept my Father’s commandments
and remain in his love.

“I have told you this so that
my joy might be in you and
your joy might be complete.”
John 15: 9-11

What a joy to hear someone say, “I love you.”! What a gift to be invited to “remain” in another’s heart!

Jesus wants his disciples, and he wants us, to have that joy. He wants it so much that his own joy depends on it!

God wants our love. God wants us to remain in God’s heart!

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy:

Let yourself just sink into that amazing revelation, Beloved of God! Jesus’s declaration and invitation are specifically made to YOU!

Poetry: The Madness of Love – Hadewijch Of Antwerp

The madness of love
Is a blessed fate;
And if we understood this
We would seek no other:
It brings into unity
What was divided,
And this is the truth:
Bitterness it makes sweet,
It makes the stranger a neighbor,
And what was lowly it raises on high.

Music: Ode to Joy from Beethoven’s 9th Symphony

1 Joyful, joyful, we adore You,
God of glory, Lord of love;
Hearts unfold like flow’rs before You, Op’ning to the sun above.
Melt the clouds of sin and sadness; Drive the dark of doubt away;
Giver of immortal gladness,
Fill us with the light of day!

2 All Your works with joy surround You, Earth and heav’n reflect Your rays,
Stars and angels sing around You,
Center of unbroken praise;
Field and forest, vale and mountain, Flow’ry meadow, flashing sea,
Chanting bird and flowing fountain Praising You eternally!		3 Always giving and forgiving,
Ever blessing, ever blest,
Well-spring of the joy of living,
Ocean-depth of happy rest!
Loving Father, Christ our Brother,
Let Your light upon us shine;
Teach us how to love each other,
Lift us to the joy divine.

4 Mortals, join the mighty chorus,
Which the morning stars began; 
God’s own love is reigning o’er us, 
Joining people hand in hand.
Ever singing, march we onward,
Victors in the midst of strife;
Joyful music leads us sunward
In the triumph song of life.

Will

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Eastertide, Faith, Love, Mary, Psalms, spirituality3 Comments

Solemnity of the Annunciation of the Lord
April 8, 2024

Today’s Readings:

https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/040824.cfm

Sacrifice and offering you did not desire,
but a body you prepared for me;
in holocausts and sin offerings you took no delight.
Then I said, ‘As is written of me in the scroll,
behold, I come to do your will, O God.

Hebrews 10:5-7; cf: Psalm 40:7-9

On this Feast of the Annunciation, we remember Mary’s choice to love the world according to the manner of God. It was not a choice she made for the first time during the angel’s visit. Mary had always lived her young life patterned on grace and fidelity. Therefore, she was ready when the angel offered her the choice that changed the world.

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy:

As human beings, we may be inclined to think of “God’s Will” as a pre-ordained pattern for our lives – rather like a document that, if we could get hold of it, we could follow exactly to achieve salvation. We may even mistakenly think that it is God’s Will that we, or our sisters and brothers, suffer.

We might ask ourselves instead, “What is God’s Will, really?”. The life of Christ, reflected in the Gospel, tells us this: God’s Will is Love. So when Psalm 40 interprets Mary’s Fiat as ” … behold, I come to do Your Will…”, what we might understand is this:

Your Will, O God, is Love.
I open my heart to be your Love in the world,
in whatever pattern your grace may come to me,
whether it be through the joys or the sorrows
of the human condition.

Poetry: Fiat – Robert Morneau

On her bed of doubt,
in wrinkled night garment,
she sat, glancing with fear
at a golden shaft of streaming light,
pondering perhaps, "Was this
but a sequel to a dream?"
The light too brief for disbelief,
yet its silence eased not her trembling.
Somehow she murmured a "yes"
and with that the light's love and life
pierced her heart
and lodged in her womb.
The room remained the same
- rug still need smoothing
- jug and paten awaiting using.
Now all was different
in a maiden's soft but firm fiat.

Music: O Santissima – interpreted by Andrea Montepaone

O sanctissima, o piissima,
dulcis Virgo Maria!
Mater amata, intemerata,
ora, ora pro nobis.

Tu solatium et refugium,
Virgo Mater Maria.
Quidquid optamus, per te speramus;
ora, ora pro nobis.

Ecce debiles, perquam flebiles;
salva nos, o Maria!
Tolle languores, sana dolores;
ora, ora pro nobis.

Virgo, respice, Mater, aspice;
audi nos, o Maria!
Tu medicinam portas divinam;
ora, ora pro nobis.		O most holy, o most loving,
sweet Virgin Mary!
Beloved Mother, undefiled,
pray, pray for us.

You are solace and refuge,
Virgin Mother Mary.
Whatever we wish, we hope it through you;
pray, pray for us.

Look, we are weak and deeply deplorable;
save us, o Mary!
Take away our lassitude, heal our pains;
pray, pray for us.

Virgin, look at us, Mother, care for us;
hear us, o Mary!
You bring divine medicine;
pray, pray for us.

One

On By Renee Yann, RSMIn Charity, Community, Eastertide, Faith, inclusivity, Jesus, Love, spirituality2 Comments

Second Sunday of Easter 
Sunday of Divine Mercy
April 7, 2024

Today’s Readings:

https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/040724.cfm

The community of believers was of one heart and mind,
and no one claimed that any of his possessions was his own,
but they had everything in common.
With great power the apostles bore witness
to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus,
and great favor was accorded them all.

Acts 4: 32-33

In this passage from Acts, community is noted as an essential aspect of life in Christ. We were not created to be alone. We are created to find God in the love of our sisters and brothers. That merciful and generous love, imitative of Jesus, makes us one with Him in the Trinity, that primordial Community of Generative Love.

Today, in God’s Lavish Mercy:

We pray to understand that our capacity for community deepens in relationship to our generous and merciful love for each person. As we widen our circle of mercy and caring mutuality, the face of God becomes clearer in our lives.

Poetry: When Someone Deeply Listens to You – John Fox

When someone deeply listens to you
it is like holding out a dented cup
you’ve had since childhood
and watching it fill up with
cold, fresh water.
When it balances on top of the brim,
you are understood.
When it overflows and touches your skin,
you are loved.
When someone deeply listens to you
the room where you stay
starts a new life
and the place where you wrote
your first poem
begins to glow in your mind’s eye.
It is as if gold has been discovered.
When someone deeply listens to you
your barefeet are on the earth
and a beloved land that seemed distant
is now at home within you.

Music: In Christ There Is No East or West – Choir and Congregation, St. Martin in the Fields, London