Whenever I hear today’s Gospel, I think Jesus is talking to someone other than me. However, our Church, filled with so many blessings, allows us to repeatedly listen to the words spoken by Our Savior and try to understand them more explicitly. Amid our Lenten season, we are invited to reconciliation with God and with our neighbors. Jesus, by His actions upon earth, clearly defines humility as a virtue that will draw us closer to Him.
This past summer to fall, I spent 85 days in a New York City hospital with my husband, sleeping on a cot at his bedside. I met numerous doctors, nurses, and medics daily, each unique in their way of living, thinking, and corresponding with patients. There was a common denominator of love that seemed to bridge forth an incredible respect for LIFE. I am grateful for the care; my heart expanded with compassion and gratitude in those days.
A few intense words from the notes of our spiritual father, Saint Peter Julian, “Woe to me! Shall I close my eyes on the abyss [of darkness], block my ears to the cries of alarm! Wait, yes, let the discussion end so as to go into battle, find rest in your future laurels, you still have time! Go forward, march into battle – and what does that mean? After your death you will work, won’t you; when you will be numbered among the useless servants in hell! And so! Let it be: ibo et pugnabo; but where are your weapons, do you think you can go with folded arms and seated in a beautiful carriage on your way to the battlefield among the brave ones… yes! and you will be ridiculed. Gird yourself with mortification, take up the sword of the cross, clothe yourself with the armor of universal renunciation, and march under the flag of faith, calceati pedes spei cælicæ, and nourished by prayer and contemplation; his signis vinces, there’s no other way.
Let Us Pray:
Our Lady of the Blessed Sacrament, pray with us, pray for us.
