- “Time spent faithfully every day in mental prayer that is poor arid, distracted, and relatively short is worth more, and will be infinitely more fruitful for our progress, than long, ardent spells of mental prayer from time to time, when circumstances make it easy.” (Fr. Jacques Philippe)
Author: Sr. Dorcee, beloved
I am the one whom Jesus loves.
Baseball and hope
If you’re a fan of baseball at all, you’ll appreciate this piece by Elizabeth Scalia:
It was 2003. Eight innings into yet-another nail-biter of a series between the Boston Red Sox and the New York Yankees, there came a guttural wail from the stands at Fenway Park.
“For the love of God . . . ”
It was one lone voice; a man—whose sound was remarkably reminiscent of the late Chris Farley at his most passionately unhinged—was seated close enough to the announcer’s booth that his agony was picked up and broadcast in New York.
It was one lone voice; a man—whose sound was remarkably reminiscent of the late Chris Farley at his most passionately unhinged—was seated close enough to the announcer’s booth that his agony was picked up and broadcast in New York.
“For the love of God . . . ” he cried, again and again, as one Bosox batter after another swung and missed, and looming before him was a ninth inning full of Mariano Rivera at his peak.
Watching at home, my son and I heard a hated rival’s naked pain, and we hooted in what might be called cruel appreciation.
Baseball fans understand each other’s afflictions. We could laugh in that moment, because our team was winning, but we recognized all too well the sound of anguish emanating from Beantown; we had felt it enough, in the Bronx. When the umpire called “strike three” at the third out, the single voice dissolved into a bellow of incoherent angst and three hundred miles away we knew the man had slumped into his chair with his head in his hand, and his heart full of hate; not for the Yankees—that was a given—but for his own team, and for the game of baseball, itself, of which the late commissioner A. Bartlett Giammati once wrote, “it breaks your heart. It is designed to break your heart.”
The heartbreak is what makes it great, and the source of the heartbreak is the clutch—that period of time (and it can last for a moment or for years) when everything meaningful in your life fades into a peripheral nothingness until an outcome is known. In the clutch, love is balancing—one foot, en pointe—along a thin wire of hope, and still determining if, or when, the next foot might be safely employed.
Read the rest right here.
Lead, kindly light
Lead, kindly Light, amid the encircling gloom,
Lead thou me on!
The night is dark, and I am far from home,–
Lead thou me on!
Keep thou my feet; I do not ask to see
The distant scene,–one step enough for me.
I was not ever thus, nor prayed that thou
Shouldst lead me on:
I loved to choose and see my path, but now
Lead thou me on!
I loved the garish days, and, spite of fears,
Pride ruled my will: remember not past years.
So long thy power hath blessed me, sure it still
Will lead me on;
O’er moor and fen, o’er crag and torrent, till
The night is gone;
And with the morn those angel faces smile
Which I have loved long since, and lost awhile.
John Henry Newman
Here is a lovely adaptation by Audrey Assad:
Bright sadness
Sometimes it helps to look at things with a new perspective. Here is the Orthodox perspective on Lent.
“The Lenten season is meant to kindle a ‘bright sadness’ within our hearts. Its aim is precisely the remembrance of Christ, a longing for a relationship with God that has been lost. Lent offers the time and place for recovery of this relationship. The darkness of Lent allows the flame of the Holy Spirit to burn within our hearts until we are led to the brilliance of the Resurrection.” (Alexander Schmemann)
Ponder that one today and may you long for your relationship with God in any ways that it may be lost.
He thirsts for our thirst
From the beginning of , Amazing Nearness, by the author of The Gift of Faith, Fr. Tadeusz Dajczer:
In my daily life, I am constantly getting lost. Yet that means He can constantly find me. The more I need Him, the closer He is. I can ceaselessly discover that in weariness He sought me. This means loving until weary. Because of Original Sin He constantly searches for us to the point of weariness and exhaustion, humanly speaking.
In the Eucharistic encounter, Jesus regularly finds me quite lost. Yet, I am normally lost, needing to be found. So no need for regrets. If I am lost I can only be found in Eucharistic love. He can only find me when I am lost and beginning to search for Him. Love needs two. It is a grace always given to me to seek Him through faith, hope, and love.
Fr. Dajczer is here making a reference to the story of Jesus and the Samaritan woman in John 4. “Jesus, wearied as he was with his journey, sat down beside the well.” Augustine points out that Jesus is weary because He is on a journey to seek us each out. He is thirsty for our faith. He knows that we are lost and constantly sets out to find us. If you feel lost today, take heart that He is seeking you and looking for you. Let yourself be found by Him.
Thy Mercy Free
Out of the depths we cry to thee.
Lord, hear us, we implore thee.
Bend down thy gracious ear to us.
Let our prayer come before thee!
On our misdeeds in mercy look
O deign to blot them from thy book,
And let us come before thee.
Thy sov’reign grace and boundless love
Show thee, O Lord, forgiving.
Our purest thoughts and deeds but prove
Sin in our hearts is living.
None guiltless in thy sight appear.
All who approach thy throne must fear,
And humbly trust thy mercy.
Thou canst be merciful while just.
This is our hope’s foundation.
In thy redeeming grace we trust.
O grant us thy salvation.
Upheld by thee we stand secure.
Thy word is firm, thy promise sure,
And we rely upon thee.
Like those who watch for midnight’s hour
To hail the dawning morrow,
We wait for thee, we trust thy pow’r,
Unmoved by doubt or sorrow.
So let thy people hope in thee,
And they shall find thy mercy free,
And thy redemption plenteous.
Martin Luther
God is holding on to you
Friday: from the archives
Do you have times when you feel that no matter how well-intentioned you are, you still blow it? Here are St. Francis de Sales’ thoughts on the matter:
You should be like a little child who while it knows that its mother is holding its sleeve walks boldly and runs all round without being distressed at a little fall or stumble; after all, it is a s yet rather unsteady on its legs. In the same way, as long as you realize that God is holding on to you by your will and resolution to serve him, go on boldly and do not be upset by your little set-backs and falls; there is no need to be put out by this provided you throw yourselves into his arms from time to time and kiss him with the kiss of charity. Go on joyfully and with your heart as open and…
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When you fail
“When you fail to measure up to your Christian privilege, be not discouraged for discouragement is a form of pride. The reason you are sad is because you looked to yourself and not to God; to your failings not to His love. You will shake off your faults more readily when you love God than when you criticize yourself. God is more lenient than you because he is perfectly good and therefore loves you more. Be bold enough then to believe that God is on your side, even when you forget to be on His.” ~ Archbishop Fulton Sheen (Preface to Religion)
Courage
Light and darkness
“God is both light and darkness to each one as he sees fit. If he is darkness to you, seek nothing else.” (Saint Jane Frances de Chantal)
Witnesses to Hope 