The kingdom of God does not mean eating or drinking this or that, it means righteousness and peace and joy brought by the Holy Spirit. Rm 14:17-18
Some days ago the priest in my parish said that the Kingdom is here and now. That Christ said "the Kingdom of God is among you" and that we should be trying to enter and be in the kingdom right now right here, and stop thinking about it being something that "happens" after death. (of course it is, but you get what I'm saying)
and then the Beloved shows me this verse....
Righteousness. Following the commandments of God and the precepts of the Church. Fulfilling our vocation, and not only that! It means having a "right" heart. A pure heart, a selfless heart, a virtuous heart.... This is our part of the deal. It is working, fighting, bleeding for a right heart. It is having spiritual discipline. It is prayer, mortification and the practice of penance and virtue.
Peace. This is a fruit of Trust. The true Peace comes from Trusting that God is a loving God that cares for us. That whatever happens He is God and since He is Good and Loves us...it will be ok. This part of the kingdom requires us to have Trust in Him...and His part is the fruit of that Trust... Peace.
Joy. This is a fruit of Love. It is a response of knowing ourselves Loved... supremelly Loved by Him, the most beautiful of the sons of men (psalm 45), the Beauty ever ancient-ever new. It comes from a dialogue with the Beloved, it comes from sitting under the stars resting in His chest, listening to His heart beat, while His warm pierced hand rests in ours, as He kisses our forehead.... it is Joy, it is the Joy of being loved by Love himself! But in our world, specially in our culture and time when despair, desperation, loneliness, suicide, tears are so common, and for those of us for whom despair is a temptation, as enticing as any drug, we are called to make a choice for Joy. To make the choice to listen to His whispers, to accept His love, so we can have Joy.
Prayer, Mortification, the Practice of virtue (purity, patience, selflessnes, LOVE), Trust in Him that brings Peace, and allowing ourselves to be loved that brings Joy...
summed up: Living a life of Love with Him and with them (our brothers and sisters)... THAT IS THE KINGDOM! HERE AND NOW!
Thursday, September 6, 2007
Wednesday, September 5, 2007
"Only if we look to Christ, if we love him, will we overcome laziness and love of comfort, will we emerge from the ivory tower that each of us tends to build for himself, will we make many blind people see Christ, many deaf people hear him, and many cripples walk beside him. God needs our cooperation." In Conversation with God. Francis Fernandez.
Artwork by Macha Chmakoff
Tuesday, September 4, 2007
He taught them as one who had authority
Mark 1:22
"Jesus doesn't expound just a mere opinion, nor does He show any sign of uncertaint or of doubt. He does not speak like the prophets, in God's name, because He is not just another prophet: he speaks in his own name: I say to you..." In Conversation with God. Francis Fernandez.
Friday, August 31, 2007
Entice Me
The red beads of the rosary
Between my fingers
The pang of hunger
In my insides
Prayer and mortification
The wings of perseverance
Yet it all becomes sand dust
It all becomes a clanging cymbal
if I do not walk into the night
to meet You.
Place Your warm hand
Over mine
Kiss my forehead
Entice me.
Between my fingers
The pang of hunger
In my insides
Prayer and mortification
The wings of perseverance
Yet it all becomes sand dust
It all becomes a clanging cymbal
if I do not walk into the night
to meet You.
Place Your warm hand
Over mine
Kiss my forehead
Entice me.
painting by Myra Mandel
Thursday, August 30, 2007
heartbeat
Your Heart
My Soul
Your hand of rubies,
Enclosing my hand of flesh
Your radiance dancing
to the song of the Trinity
I cannot hear it, Beloved,
but I’ll let you lead me.
I’ll dance in silence
Resting my head upon Your chest
Dancing to the melody
Of your heartbeat…
Painting by Myra Mandel
My Soul
Your hand of rubies,
Enclosing my hand of flesh
Your radiance dancing
to the song of the Trinity
I cannot hear it, Beloved,
but I’ll let you lead me.
I’ll dance in silence
Resting my head upon Your chest
Dancing to the melody
Of your heartbeat…
Painting by Myra Mandel
Wednesday, August 29, 2007
Come be my Light
Come, be my light.
Come, be my strength.
The waves of this black ocean
rise above me.
Come calm the storm
within me.
Come, be my strength.
The waves of this black ocean
rise above me.
Come calm the storm
within me.
drawing by Edouard Leon Louis
Tuesday, August 28, 2007
wow!
Closing speeches and adresses of Vatican II Council.
TO WOMEN (read by Leon Cardinal Duval of Algiers, Algeria, assisted by Julius Cardinal Doepfner of Munich, Germany, and Raul Cardinal Siloa of Santiago, Chile.)
And now it is to you that we address ourselves, women of all states—girls, wives, mothers and widows, to you also, consecrated virgins and women living alone—you constitute half of the immense human family.
As you know, the Church is proud to have glorified and liberated woman, and in the course of the centuries, in diversity of characters, to have brought into relief her basic equality with man. But the hour is coming, in fact has come, when the vocation of woman is being achieved in its fullness, the hour in which woman acquires in the world an influence, an effect and a power never hitherto achieved. That is why, at this moment when the human race is under-going so deep a transformation, women impregnated with the spirit of the Gospel can do so much to aid mankind in not falling.
You women have always had as your lot the protection of the home, the love of beginnings and an understanding of cradles. You are present in the mystery of a life beginning. You offer consolation in the departure of death. Our technology runs the risk of becoming inhuman. Reconcile men with life and above all, we beseech you, watch carefully over the future of our race. Hold back the hand of man who, in a moment of folly, might attempt to destroy human civilization.
Wives, mothers of families, the first educators of the human race in the intimacy of the family circle, pass on to your sons and your daughters the traditions of your fathers at the same time that you prepare them for an unsearchable future. Always remember that by her children a mother belongs to that future which perhaps she will not see.
And you, women living alone, realize what you can accomplish through your dedicated vocation. Society is appealing to you on all sides. Not even families can live without the help of those who have no families. Especially you, consecrated virgins, in a world where egoism and the search for pleasure would become law, be the guardians of purity, unselfishness and piety. Jesus who has given to conjugal love all its plenitudes, has also exalted the renouncement of human love when this is for the sake of divine love and for the service of all.
Lastly, women in trial, who stand upright at the foot of the cross like Mary, you who so often in history have given to men the strength to battle unto the very end and to give witness to the point of martyrdom, aid them now still once more to retain courage in their great undertakings, while at the same time maintaining patience and an esteem for humble beginnings.
Women, you do know how to make truth sweet, tender and accessible, make it your task to bring the spirit of this council into institutions, schools, homes and daily life. Women of the entire universe, whether Christian or non-believing, you to whom life is entrusted at this grave moment in history, it is for you to save the peace of the world.
--------------------
Gosh! the Church's call to women is for us "to save the peace of the world"! Wow! I gotta take that to prayer, I love the comment about mainining "an esteem for humble beginnings"
TO WOMEN (read by Leon Cardinal Duval of Algiers, Algeria, assisted by Julius Cardinal Doepfner of Munich, Germany, and Raul Cardinal Siloa of Santiago, Chile.)
And now it is to you that we address ourselves, women of all states—girls, wives, mothers and widows, to you also, consecrated virgins and women living alone—you constitute half of the immense human family.
As you know, the Church is proud to have glorified and liberated woman, and in the course of the centuries, in diversity of characters, to have brought into relief her basic equality with man. But the hour is coming, in fact has come, when the vocation of woman is being achieved in its fullness, the hour in which woman acquires in the world an influence, an effect and a power never hitherto achieved. That is why, at this moment when the human race is under-going so deep a transformation, women impregnated with the spirit of the Gospel can do so much to aid mankind in not falling.
You women have always had as your lot the protection of the home, the love of beginnings and an understanding of cradles. You are present in the mystery of a life beginning. You offer consolation in the departure of death. Our technology runs the risk of becoming inhuman. Reconcile men with life and above all, we beseech you, watch carefully over the future of our race. Hold back the hand of man who, in a moment of folly, might attempt to destroy human civilization.
Wives, mothers of families, the first educators of the human race in the intimacy of the family circle, pass on to your sons and your daughters the traditions of your fathers at the same time that you prepare them for an unsearchable future. Always remember that by her children a mother belongs to that future which perhaps she will not see.
And you, women living alone, realize what you can accomplish through your dedicated vocation. Society is appealing to you on all sides. Not even families can live without the help of those who have no families. Especially you, consecrated virgins, in a world where egoism and the search for pleasure would become law, be the guardians of purity, unselfishness and piety. Jesus who has given to conjugal love all its plenitudes, has also exalted the renouncement of human love when this is for the sake of divine love and for the service of all.
Lastly, women in trial, who stand upright at the foot of the cross like Mary, you who so often in history have given to men the strength to battle unto the very end and to give witness to the point of martyrdom, aid them now still once more to retain courage in their great undertakings, while at the same time maintaining patience and an esteem for humble beginnings.
Women, you do know how to make truth sweet, tender and accessible, make it your task to bring the spirit of this council into institutions, schools, homes and daily life. Women of the entire universe, whether Christian or non-believing, you to whom life is entrusted at this grave moment in history, it is for you to save the peace of the world.
--------------------
Gosh! the Church's call to women is for us "to save the peace of the world"! Wow! I gotta take that to prayer, I love the comment about mainining "an esteem for humble beginnings"
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