Category Archives: Religion

Living Lexio Divina

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Living with a charged bit of Holy Scripture playing in the background of my day sets me up for some animated discussions in my car, at the sink, wherever my day may take me.  Occasionally the conversation turns to Presence.  How we hunger for this Presence, this awareness of God, even though we may be flying in all directions.  Perhaps, the more the activity, the more the hunger.  It’s akin to searching for the car keys.  We begin thinking we know where to find them.  As they remain hidden, our pursuit turns to frustration and then to frenzy.  Relief comes only when we hold the keys in our hot little hands.

What does searching for car keys have to do with Lexio Divina, ruminating on Holy Scripture?  It’s simply that we are always on the go.  Getting to our destination depends on something as ordinary and necessary as the car keys.  Holy Scripture is such a key, however,  it is not inanimate but living and active.  When the Word, Lexio, comes to fruition, it is the listener who becomes the Word, in essence, and so reaches his destination.

Appointment with a King

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Hurrying off to work?  Hurrying to classes?  In a hurry to feed the baby?  That’s how days begin, in a hurry.  Why the rush?  Who waits for you?

If you only knew who waits for you.  The Fathers of the Church knew.  He waited upon them.  They learned of Him from those who walked with the King of Kings in all His humanity and divinity.  These, the Pillar of the Early Church, left for us their understanding of how,  and Who gives Himself and waits.

Ignatius of Antioch- writing  A.D. 110

“I have no taste for corruptible food nor for the pleasures of this life. I desire the bread of God, which is the flesh of Jesus Christ, who was of the seed of David; and for drink I desire his blood, which is love incorruptible” (Letter to the Romans 7:3 [A.D. 110]).

Justin Martyr- writing  A.D. 151

“We call this food Eucharist,…. not as common bread nor common drink do we receive these; but since Jesus Christ our Savior was made incarnate by the word of God and had both flesh and blood for our salvation, so too, as we have been taught, the food which has been made into the Eucharist by the Eucharistic prayer set down by him, and by the change of which our blood and flesh is nurtured, is both the flesh and the blood of that incarnated Jesus” ( Justin Martyr: First Apology 66 [A.D. 151]).

Irenaeus-writing A.D. 189

“He has declared the cup, a part of creation, to be his own blood, from which he causes our blood to flow; and the bread, a part of creation, he has established as his own body, from which he gives increase unto our bodies. When, therefore, the mixed cup [wine and water] and the baked bread receives the Word of God and becomes the Eucharist, the body of Christ, and from these the substance of our flesh is increased and supported, how can they say that the flesh is not capable of receiving the gift of God, which is eternal life—flesh which is nourished by the body and blood of the Lord, and is in fact a member of him?” (Against Heresies , 5:2).

So off with you to work or class or family!  Turn, though, for an instant.  Throw a kiss from the heart to the One who waits.  His delight is to return your simply regard with abundant life and love.

I’m out of  here.  I have an appointment with the King.

The Incorruptible

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Today is the feast day of  Our Lady of Lourdes.  Lourdes, the shrine of healing, will be forever linked to the weak and the humble.  The miracles that happen are often those of the soul.  It should be noted the Bernadette Soubirous to whom Our Lady appeared, had a tuberculous tumor on her knee and was never herself healed.  In life, she knew great suffering.  The miracle that did happen to her body,, though, is ongoing.  After her death,  her body proved to be in corrupt.

Old school Catholics are very familiar with the injunction, “Offer it up!”  St. Paul, you will recall, made an outrageous claim.  He said, ” Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I do my share on behalf of His body, which is the church, in filling up what is lacking in Christ’s afflictions.” Col. 1:24

Rev.  Jeffrey Whorton, now, a Catholic priest, coming to us from Episcopal fields,  offers this in his inimitable fashion.  He found the Catholic concept of “Offer it up!” astonishing.  That our warts and wrinkles,  our far from perfect acts and sufferings, could ever be more than the sad effects of the Fall, seemed far too good to be imagined.  He did find something to which he, and, perhaps, we, could relate.  He said for us to think of our 401Ks and an employer who offers to match any funds that we contributed to our account.  Now,  God the Father, in his magnanimity,  goes far beyond matching funds.  He turns our humble dross into pure and eternal gold by clothing it in the sufferings of  His Son.  The thing, Fr. Jeff says we must  remember is:  “No funds, no matching fund!”   So “Offer it up!”  The corruptible can become incorruptible.

The Anchoress has more and more and more on St. Bernadette

How Can I Keep from Singing?

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DivineOffice.org started my day off singingly.  Their Morning Prayer includes a hymn that will probably be with me throughout today.

No storm can shake my inmost calm

While to that refuge clinging;

Since Christ is Lord of Heav’n and earth

How can I keep from singing?

Good Morning, Everybody!

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It’s wonderful to know that while I was asleep,  the Church was still at prayer  joined by a  “Cloud of  Witnesses”.   To my Cloud of  Witnesses, I say, “Good morning, Everybody!”

Therefore, since we have so great a cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us also lay aside every encumbrance and the sin which so easily entangles us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us. Hebrews 12: 1

I guess you all are now a part of my cloud.

Love Works Wonders!

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Valentine’s Day with cards and roses is fast approaching.  They’ll be proclamations of love: undying love, puppy love, romantic love and”so called” love.  Here’s a charming story of real love from the Dialogue of Pope St. Gregory the Great:

Scholastica, the sister of Saint Benedict, had been consecrated to God from her earliest years. She was accustomed to visiting her brother once a year. He would come down to meet her at a place on the monastery property, not far outside the gate.
One day she came as usual and her saintly brother went with some of his disciples; they spent the whole day praising God and talking of sacred things. As night fell they had supper together. Their spiritual conversation went on and the hour grew late. The holy nun said to her brother: “Please do not leave me tonight; let us go on until morning talking about the delights of the spiritual life.” “Sister,” he replied, “what are you saying? I simply cannot stay outside my cell.”

When she heard her brother refuse her request, the holy woman joined her hands on the table, laid her head on them and began to pray. As she raised her head from the table, there were such brilliant flashes of lightning, such great peals of thunder and such a heavy downpour of rain that neither Benedict nor his brethren could stir across the threshold of the place where they had been seated. Sadly he began to complain: “May God forgive you, sister. What have you done?” “Well,” she answered, “I asked you and you would not listen; so I asked my God and he did listen. So now go off, if you can, leave me and return to your monastery.”
Reluctant as he was to stay of his own will, he remained against his will. So it came about that they stayed awake the whole night, engrossed in their conversation about the spiritual life.

You may wonder why I call this “real love.”  I guess it’s because all love worthy of the name is God’s Love.  You may think Scholastica was praying for trifles.  The story, however, is about what God thinks.  Gregory saw it this way:  “It is not surprising that she was more effective than he, since as John says, ‘God is love.’  It was absolutely right that she could do more, as she loved more.”

With Abba Father,  nothing is too small or trivial.  We are His children.  It is as though everything that we refer to our Father He receives as a gift that He happily, lovingly, and joyfully, sticks on His heavenly version of the refrigerator.   A little soul doesn’t differentiate between great and small.  Everything comes from God’s gracious hand.