Archive for August 15, 2015

Twentieth Sunday in Ordinary Time

Posted: August 15, 2015 by CatholicJules in Sunday Reflections

Wisdom’s Feast:
Scott Hahn Reflects on the Twentieth Sunday in Ordinary Time

Readings:
Proverbs 9:1-6
Psalm 34:2-3, 10-15
Ephesians 5:15-20
John 6:51-58

The Wisdom of God has prepared a feast, we hear in today’s First Reading.

We must become like children (see Matthew 18:3-4) to hear and accept this invitation. For in every Eucharist, it is the folly of the cross that is represented and renewed.

To the world, it is foolishness to believe that the crucified Jesus rose from the dead. And for many, as for the crowds in today’s Gospel, it is foolishness — maybe even madness — to believe that Jesus can give us His flesh to eat.

Yet Jesus repeats himself with gathering intensity in the Gospel today. Notice the repetition of the words “eat” and “drink,” and “my flesh” and “my blood.” To heighten the unbelievable realism of what Jesus asks us to believe, John in these verses uses, not the ordinary Greek word for eating, but a cruder term, once reserved to describe the “munching” of feeding animals.

The foolishness of God is wiser than human wisdom (see 1 Corinthians 1:18-25). In His foolish love, He chooses to save those who believe that His flesh is true food, His blood, true drink.

Fear of the Lord, the desire to live by His will, is the beginning of true wisdom, Paul says in today’s Epistle (see Proverbs 9:10). And as we sing in today’s Psalm, those who fear Him shall not want for any good thing.

Again today in the liturgy, we are called to renew our faith in the Eucharist, to forsake the foolishness of believing only what we can see with our eyes.

We approach, then, not only an altar prepared with bread and wine, but the feast of Wisdom, the banquet of heaven — in which God our savior renews His everlasting covenant and promises to destroy death forever (see Isaiah 25:6-9).

Let us make the most of our days, as Paul says, always, in the Eucharist, giving thanks to God

Thank you Blessed Mother

Posted: August 15, 2015 by CatholicJules in Life's Journeys

Thank you Blessed Mother!

For a years now I’ve been praying for my other half to grow in her relationship with Christ.  And it was through the intercession of our Blessed Mother that her heart was changed gradually.  Just a few months back she was drawn to pray the rosary and so she requested I join her.  And so together we did,  from once a week to three times a week.  Then in July she registered for ‘Burning Bush’ a long and tough discipleship program which is still on going.  But today it just dawned on me that while it is the first day of two in which she registered and is attending her first ever retreat (separate from ‘Burning Bush’) it falls on the feast day of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary!

Glory to You O Lord!

On Today’s Gospel

Posted: August 15, 2015 by CatholicJules in Personal Thoughts & Reflections

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Loving mother give me your faith so that I will always say yes to our loving Father in heaven.

Mother dear oh pray for me!

Loving mother teach me humility and how to love others so that I too may bring the joy of Christ to others as you did with your visitation of Elizabeth.

Mother dear oh pray for me!

Loving mother help open my eyes and heart to the needs of others. That I may care and intercede for them always pointing them to the love of Your Son Jesus.

Mother dear oh pray for me!
Loving mother as St John embraced you as his mother at the foot of the cross of your Son Jesus. I too embrace you as my mother and I entrust myself fully into your loving care. May your Son take away anything and everything that is not worthy of you for whatever is not worthy of you is not worthy of Him. Purify my every thought and action so that I may serve my Lord with the same love you did. Through your Son Jesus Christ my Lord. Amen

Mother dear oh pray for me!

(Assumption of The Blessed Virgin Mary )
First reading
Apocalypse 11:19,12:1-6,10

The sanctuary of God in heaven opened and the ark of the covenant could be seen inside it. Then came flashes of lightning, peals of thunder and an earthquake, and violent hail.
  Now a great sign appeared in heaven: a woman, adorned with the sun, standing on the moon, and with the twelve stars on her head for a crown. She was pregnant, and in labour, crying aloud in the pangs of childbirth. Then a second sign appeared in the sky, a huge red dragon which had seven heads and ten horns, and each of the seven heads crowned with a coronet. Its tail dragged a third of the stars from the sky and dropped them to the earth, and the dragon stopped in front of the woman as she was having the child, so that he could eat it as soon as it was born from its mother. The woman brought a male child into the world, the son who was to rule all the nations with an iron sceptre, and the child was taken straight up to God and to his throne, while the woman escaped into the desert, where God had made a place of safety ready, for her to be looked after in the twelve hundred and sixty days.
  Then I heard a voice shout from heaven, ‘Victory and power and empire for ever have been won by our God, and all authority for his Christ, now that the persecutor, who accused our brothers day and night before our God, has been brought down.’

Second reading
1 Corinthians 15:20-26

Christ has been raised from the dead, the first-fruits of all who have fallen asleep. Death came through one man and in the same way the resurrection of the dead has come through one man. Just as all men die in Adam, so all men will be brought to life in Christ; but all of them in their proper order: Christ as the first-fruits and then, after the coming of Christ, those who belong to him. After that will come the end, when he hands over the kingdom to God the Father, having done away with every sovereignty, authority and power. For he must be king until he has put all his enemies under his feet and the last of the enemies to be destroyed is death, for everything is to be put under his feet.

Gospel Luke 1:39-56

Mary set out and went as quickly as she could to a town in the hill country of Judah. She went into Zechariah’s house and greeted Elizabeth. Now as soon as Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting, the child leapt in her womb and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit. She gave a loud cry and said, ‘Of all women you are the most blessed, and blessed is the fruit of your womb. Why should I be honoured with a visit from the mother of my Lord? For the moment your greeting reached my ears, the child in my womb leapt for joy. Yes, blessed is she who believed that the promise made her by the Lord would be fulfilled.’
  And Mary said:
‘My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord
and my spirit exults in God my saviour;
because he has looked upon his lowly handmaid.
Yes, from this day forward all generations will call me blessed,
for the Almighty has done great things for me.
Holy is his name,
and his mercy reaches from age to age for those who fear him.
He has shown the power of his arm,
he has routed the proud of heart.
He has pulled down princes from their thrones and exalted the lowly.
The hungry he has filled with good things, the rich sent empty away.
He has come to the help of Israel his servant, mindful of his mercy
– according to the promise he made to our ancestors –
of his mercy to Abraham and to his descendants for ever.’
Mary stayed with Elizabeth about three months and then went back home.