knitternun

Sunday, January 28, 2007

28/01////7 Epiphany 4

[Please remember this is a sort of "menu" from which to select. No one has to pray it all]

Collect

Almighty and everlasting God, you govern all things both in heaven and on earth: Mercifully hear the supplications of your people, and in our time grant us your peace; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
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Today's Scripture
http://www.satucket.com/lectionary/

Psalm 71:1-17; or 71:1-6,15-17
Jeremiah 1:4-10; 1 Corinthians 14:12b-20; Luke 4:21-32
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From Forward Day by Day: http://www.forwardmovement.org/todaysreading.cfm

1 Corinthians 14:12b-20. I will pray with the spirit, but I will pray with the mind also.

Years ago, when I was a relatively new rector in a parish near several major universities, I led a class for new members of the church. I always love leading inquirers' classes for adults. Adults come to classes like this not because they have to but because they want to, and they often ask questions that force me to reexamine facets of belief that I have always taken for granted. I remember that early class because of a comment one of its members made to me toward the end of one particularly lively and wide-ranging session. "I like coming to church here," he said, "because no one forces you to check your brain at the door." That comment makes me think of this passage in Paul, who must have led pretty raucous inquirers' classes in his Corinthian congregations. Both Paul and the congregations he led had a strong reputation for what we might today call charismatic behaviors--testifying, prophesying, speaking in tongues. Gathering with believers in Corinth must have been a highly emotional experience. Paul prized such enthusiasm, but he also knew its dangers. Religious maturity in Corinth, he insisted, was as much a matter of the head as of the heart. I wish that more church people today, who often shy away from rigorous theological reflection, would take Paul at his word.
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Today we remember: http://satucket.com/lectionary/Calendar.htm

THOMAS AQUINAS, PRIEST, FRIAR, AND THEOLOGIAN

Psalm 37:3-6,32-33 or 119:97-104
Wisdom 7:7-14
Matthew 13:47-52

Almighty God, you have enriched your Church with the singular learning and holiness of your servant Thomas Aquinas: Enlighten us more and more, we pray, by the disciplined thinking and teaching of Christian scholars, and deepen our devotion by the example of saintly lives; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
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Today in the Anglican Cycle of Prayer we pray for the Diocese of Makurdi (Prov. III, Nigeria)
http://www.anglicancommunion.org/acp/index.cfm
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Carmelite.com: Reflections http://www.carmelite.com/spirituality/reflection.php

The loveliest masterpiece of the heart of God is the heart of a mother.
St Therese of the Child Jesus
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Reading from the Desert Christians
http://www.cin.org/dsrtftin.html

On Obedience:

They said that abba Sylvanus had a disciple in Scetis, named Mark, who possessed in great measure the virtue of obedience. He was a copyist of old manuscripts, and the old man loved him for his obedience. He had eleven other disciples who were aggrieved that he loved more than them.

When the old men nearby heard that he loved Mark above the others, they took it ill. One day they visited him and abba Sylvanus took them with him and, going out of his cell, began to knock on the door of each of his disciples, saying, "Brother, come out, I have work for you." And noe old men, "Where are the other brothers?", and he went into Mark's cell and found the book in which he had been writing and he was making the letter O; and when he heard the old man's voice, he had not finished the line of the O. And the old men said, "Truly, abba, we also love the one whom you love; for God loves him, too."
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Daily Meditation (Henri Nouwen) http://www.henrinouwen.org/home/free_eletters/

Forgiving in the Name of God

We are all wounded people. Who wounds us? Often those whom we love and those who love us. When we feel rejected, abandoned, abused, manipulated, or violated, it is mostly by people very close to us: our parents, our friends, our spouses, our lovers, our children, our neighbors, our teachers, our pastors. Those who love us wound us too. That's the tragedy of our lives. This is what makes forgiveness from the heart so difficult. It is precisely our hearts that are wounded. We cry out, "You, who I expected to be there for me, you have abandoned me. How can I ever forgive you for that?"

Forgiveness often seems impossible, but nothing is impossible for God. The God who lives within us will give us the grace to go beyond our wounded selves and say, "In the Name of God you are forgiven." Let's pray for that grace.

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From the Principles of the Third Society of St. Francis:

(28) We as Tertiaries, rejoicing in the Lord always, show in our lives
the grace and beauty of divine joy. We remember that we follow the Son
of Man, who came eating and drinking, Who loved the birds and the
flowers, Who blessed little children, Who was a friend to tax collectors
and sinners and Who sat at the tables of both the rich and the poor. We
delight in fun and laughter, rejoicing in God's world, its beauty and
its living creatures, calling nothing common or unclean. We mix freely
with all people, ready to bind up the broken-hearted and to bring joy
into the lives of others. We carry within us an inner peace and
happiness which others may perceive, even if they do not know its
source.


Almighty God, Your love led Francis and Clare to establish our three
orders: draw us into Your love that we may grow in love towards all
those we know, for the sake of Your Son, Jesus Christ, who gives Himself
in love to all. Amen.
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Richard Rohr's Daily Reflection
http://cacradicalgrace.org/getconnected/getconnected_index.html

"Honor the Sabbath"

We see in the Third Commandment a very basic understanding of the relationship between God and humanity. The Hebrews said, on the seventh day, the Sabbath, they would rest. Everything would stop. "This is the day the Lord has made. Let us rejoice in God and be glad," sings the psalmist. The Lord says: "I have to teach these people that I'm their power, that I'm their lover and that I'm their life. So just one day a week, a seventh of your time, stop proving yourselves, stop achieving, stop accomplishing. Stop doing anything that is task oriented. Let me do the saving, the loving, the liberating." That was the meaning of the sabbath rest: to wait upon the Lord, to rest in the Lord. And in order to allow the Lord to prove himself, they would not sow their fields every seventh year. We find our that it is not we who are doing the loving. Someone is loving through us.

from The Great Themes of Scripture
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From John E. Rotelle, O.S.A., Tradition Day by Day: Readings from Church Writers. Augustinian Press. Villanova, PA, 1994.
http://www.artsci.villanova.edu/dsteelman/tradition/sources.html

The cross exemplifies every virtue

Why did the Son of God have to suffer for us? There was a great need, and it can be considered in a twofold way: in the first place, as a remedy for sin, and secondly, as an example of how to act.

It is a remedy, for, in the face of all the evils which we incur on the account of our sins, we have found relief through the passion of Christ. Yet, it is no less an example, for the passion of Christ completely suffices to fashion our lives. Whoever wishes to live perfectly should do nothing but disdain what Christ disdained on the cross and desire what he desired, for the cross exemplifies every virtue.

If you seek the example of love: Greater love than this no man has, than to lay down his life for his friends. Such a man was Christ on the cross. And if he gave his life for us, then it should not be difficult to bear whatever hardships arise for his sake.

Thomas Aquinas, O.P., (1225 - 1274), a Dominican friar, wrote the monumental work Summa Theologiae. Although his philosophy took its shape from Aristotle, at a deeper level Saint Thomas continued to uphold many fundamental Platonist doctrines which he received from Saint Augustine and Dionysius of Areopagite.
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Today's reading from the Rule of St. Benedict
http://www.osb.org/rb/

Chapter 7: On Humility

As for self-will,
we are forbidden to do our own will
by the Scripture, which says to us,
"Turn away from your own will" (Eccles. 18:30),
and likewise by the prayer in which we ask God
that His will be done in us.
And rightly are we taught not to do our own will
when we take heed to the warning of Scripture:
"There are ways which seem right,
but the ends of them plunge into the depths of hell" (Prov. 16:25);
and also when we tremble at what is said of the careless:
"They are corrupt and have become abominable in their will."

And as for the desires of the flesh,
let us believe with the Prophet that God is ever present to us,
when he says to the Lord,
"Every desire of mine is before You" (Ps. 37:10).



Selections above from Saint Benedict's Rule for Monasteries, translated from the Latin by Leonard J. Doyle OblSB, of Saint John's Abbey, (© Copyright 1948, 2001, by the Order of Saint Benedict, Collegeville, MN 56321). Adapted for use here with the division into sense lines of the first edition that was republished in 2001 to mark the 75th anniversary of Liturgical Press. Doyle's translation is available in both hardcover and paperback editions.
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