From the Word of the Day

 From within the man, from his heart, come evil thoughts…

                                                  Mark 7: 21

 How should we live this Word

 Jesus continues His discourse about traditions, considering the rules concerning the purity or impurity of certain foods.  He makes them see that in themselves, these usages have no power over human behavior.  “Everything that goes into a person from outside cannot defile, since it enters not the heart but the stomach…”  Jesus struggles against these customs because they betray the real meaning of God’s Word. 

 When the disciples ask for further explanation, Jesus replies that it is from the heart that evil thoughts come and lead to sin.  There are no pure or impure foods.  Food is not the problem!  Instead, we need to be attentive to what comes out of the heart!  Jesus then lists twelve vices, a Biblical number, that embrace all the evils of which humans are capable of committing.

 Today as I pause for silent contemplation, I will look within my own heart.  Do I harbor rancor, revenge, brooding?  These contaminate me!

 Lord, font of all good and light that illumines hearts, accompany me on my journey, so I will not succumb to uncertainty.  Heal my deafness that I may discern the Truth of Your Word within my heart.

 The voice of Meister Eckhart, Mystic

 Willingly love God in poverty as in wealth.  Love Him in illness as in health.  Love Him when you are tempted.  Love Him when you suffer and when you do not suffer.

From the Word of the Day

 Why do your disciples not follow the tradition of the elders…?

                                                Mark 7: 5

 How should we live this Word

 Today, Jesus’ teaching takes the form of the difference between traditions and God’s Word.  Through the years, the doctors of the Law had established a series of rules of conduct for every existential situation.  In Jesus’ times, these traditions formed the basis of rabbinical teaching.  This is the source of the question of the Pharisees and some Scribes.

Jesus cites Isaiah who said, “In vain do they worship me, teaching as doctrines human precepts.”  In this way, He makes them see their deep error in emptying and betraying God’s Word.  They reduce it to precepts!  In addition, using the example of ‘qorban’ He shows them that they are acting against God’s commandment to love one’s parents.  Justifying themselves with their legalistic observance of tradition, annuls God’s Word and closes their heart and mind to the search for truth.  They become manipulators, “You nullify the word of God in favor of your tradition.”

 Today as I pause for silent contemplation, I will reflect on Jesus’ words, “And you do many such things.”  Am I aware of the many habits learned from others or that I myself have fabricated that can be an obstacle to  me when I listen to God’s Word?

 Lord, free my heart so that I may receive Your Word even when it is uncomfortable.  I trust You, Lord of my life!

 The voice of Anselm Grun, Spiritual Author

 The encounter with Jesus opens up a new road on which our life can succeed.  Our encounter with Jesus frees us from the sins of our life history and fills us with the Holy Spirit.  The Holy Spirit makes us capable of living differently, of living as Jesus lived.

From the Word of the Day

 They begged him that they might touch only the tassel on his cloak; and as many as touched it were healed.

                                                    Mark 6: 56

 How should we live this Word

 Today’s Gospel helps us to understand the deepest meaning of real contact with Jesus.  The Apostles who lived with Him, were slow to know Him intimately.  Not even the multiplication of the bread and His walking toward them on the water of the lake were sufficient to open their eyes to His Person.  They were surprised by the mystery of the events without however being moved to go beyond the facts, where faith puts us in contact with the Risen One, the living God.

 On the contrary, today’s crowd recognizes Him.  Wrapped in their suffering and illness, they present their miseryto Him and, almost like children, they wait for Him to do something.  They have intuited that Jesus can heal them and thus ‘They scurried about the surrounding country and began to bring in the sick on mats to wherever they heard he was”.  It was important to have personal contact with Him, “as many as touched Him were healed.”

 Perhaps we too sometimes find ourselves in similar situations, seeking logical human explanations rather that training our spirit to go to the level of faith!

 Today as I pause for silent contemplation, I will place myself in direct contact with Jesus.  He meets me in the personal situations of my life, in the truth of who I am.  I will let myself be met and I will remain in His presence.

 You, O Jesus, are the font of grace and beauty.  Come into my heart.  You know me in my depths.  You know my weakness and my desire to be healed.  Come Lord, I trust in You!

 The voice of St. Theresa of Lisieux

 In order to belong to Jesus, we must be tiny like a drop of dew.  How few are the people who desire to be so small.

From the Word of the Day

 When Simon Peter saw this, he fell at the knees of Jesus and said, “Depart from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man.”  For astonishment at the catch of fish they had made seized him and all those with him.

                                                 Luke 5: 8-9

 How should we live this Word

 Simon Peter had made a complete journey of faith toward his Lord!  All had happened as today’s Gospel recounts.  They had caught nothing that night, but Jesus’ certainty challenges the passion of Peter and he decides, “At your command I will lower the nets.” 

 This accepted challenge will catapult him and all his impetuous personality into the life of God.  Little by little, Jesus leads him to savor His Word and this Word will gradually transform the life of Peter.  In his fascination for Jesus, Peter will follow Him to the very end! 

God has a unique way of acting.  He does not coerce, but attracts.  He does not force, but fascinates.  He does not oblige, but stupefies, enchants, seduces, using the images of Jeremiah and Isaiah.  ‘You have seduced me Lord and I let myself be seduced.  You used Your power and You have prevailed.”  “I saw the Lord sitting on a high, elevated throne.  The hem of His mantle filled the Temple…the doorposts of the Temple vibrated at the sound of His voice.  There was an ardent fire in my heart, enclosed in my bones.  I tried to hold it in but I could not.  I heard the voice of the Lord saying, ‘Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?’  And I answered, ‘Here I am.  Send me’.”

 These are not words of one who is forced but of one who is drawn from within.  This is how God acts.  He fascinates Peter as He did Isaiah and Jeremiah and He fascinates each one of us as well!

 Today as I pause for silent contemplation, I will recall the day and the moment I was grasped by the Lord.  I will let my heart sing out its humble and joyful praise!

 Lord You have seduced me and I let myself be seduced.  You have overpowered me and You have prevailed.”

 The voice of St. Augustine, Theologian and Poet

 You have made us for Yourself Lord and our heart is restless until it rests in You.

From the Word of the Day

 Come away by yourselves to a deserted place and rest a while.

                                                    Mark 6: 31

 How should we live this Word

 In today’s Gospel emerge Jesus’ tender love for His own and His care for them and Himself.  They can no longer escape from the crowds that follow them in the desire to hear the Teacher, to be cured by Him.  Something must be done!  Jesus does it, proposing a period of solitude and a time of rest.  However, when the people find a way to reach Him, drawn by the urgency in their heart, Jesus does not resist them.  Mark uses the same verb that we often meet in the Bible and that is attributed to God, “His heart was moved with pity.”

 The broadening of Jesus’ compassion for the people ‘like sheep without a shepherd’ brings Him among them again.  Yet, this experience of a balanced rhythm of prayer, work, and rest was both proposed by Jesus and experienced by Him for Himself and His own.

 Today as I pause for silent contemplation, I will ask the Lord to keep me from being dragged into the vortex of things to do that is so typical of our society.  I will give my body and my nervous system their indispensable pauses for tranquility.  I will give my heart time for intimacy with Jesus.  I will live all this in view of a ‘recharging’ that makes me joyful and refreshed in my self – gift to others.

 Here I am Lord, in Your presence.  Grant that I may breathe You, Your beauty and Your tenderness.

 The voice of Kahlil Gibran, Poet

 Give me times of silence, spaces of solitude and I will dare the night.

From the Word of the Day

 The king was deeply distressed, but because of his oaths and the guests he did not wish to break his word to her.

                                            Mark 6: 26

 How should we live this Word

 Herod really had something to be sad about!  Herodias’ daughter performs a delightful dance and Herod promises her whatever she asks for in return.  She asks for the head of John the Baptist on a tray.  Herodias’ was living in sin as the king’s concubine and she hated the man of God who preached uprightness and penance.  Herod participates in the crime because He fears the reaction of his guests more than he fears God.  What will they say if he reneges on his promise?  Yet a promise is sacred to God only when it is in view of the good and not of evil!

 The guests wait to see if the king will keep his word.  In this case, the only thing that should have imposed itself on the king’s conscience was the courage to oppose what is evil before God.

 Today as I pause for silent contemplation, I will let the sacred Word question me.  Does my conscience act according to a holy fear of God or do I often slip into the fear of what others will think of me?  Do I seek to please God even when it will not bring me the applause of others?

 Lord, grant that I may seek You with rectitude and authenticity.  All the rest is vanity!

 The voice of John Climaco, Church Father

 Those who do not fear God end up by fearing their own shadow.

From the Word of the Day

 Jesus summoned the Twelve and began to send them out two by two and gave them authority over unclean spirits.  He instructed them to take nothing for the journey but a walking stick – no food, no sack, no money in their belts.  They were, however, to wear sandals but not a second tunic.

                                            Mark 6: 7-9

 How should we live this Word

 The Lord sends out His own to bring the Good News of the Gospel, the treasure for real life that is one of deep peace in God.  Jesus’ style even here is opposed to a worldly mentality.  It is under the sign of interior freedom, and even of serene ‘thoughtlessness’.  If we are to take a trip or be away from home for a long while, we make a list of all that we think we will need.  Jesus does just the opposite.  He lists all the things we can do without, not two bags or two sticks, no food provisions, no money, only one pair of sandals, not a spare tunic.

 If we read this passage in depth and concretely, we can say that Jesus is suggesting the way to get rid of the chain of needs.  We have but to think of how the economic interests of our times induce ‘needs’ in this society of avid consumption, to grasp the joyful message that today’s Gospel offers us.

 Today as I pause for silent contemplation, I will make a little interior revision.  Am I a free person?  Or rather, am I conditioned by the many, too many needs that enslave me?  With Jesus’ help, I will embark on an itinerary of simplification and moderation in my food, my clothing, the use of things and of money.

 Lord Jesus, grant me a heart that is simple and poor, that I may seek You and love You freely along the roads of time.

 The voice of Michel Schooyans, Philosopher

 Precisely with our body, we are not only open to freedom, but called to freedom.  Therefore we cannot build our future on letting ourselves be dragged by our elemental pulsations in obedience to the fabrication of needs.  Only by dominating them can we open a space for the hope that tomorrow will be better for everyone.

From the Word of the Day

 Where did this man get all this?  What kind of wisdom has been given him?  What mighty deeds are wrought by his hands!  Is he not the carpenter, the son of Mary, and the brother of James and Joseph and Judas and Simon?  Are not his sisters here with us?  And they took offense at him.

                                               Mark 6: 2-3

 How should we live this Word

 This is an important passage because it shows us that faith is not something to take for granted or to be mixed with the banality of our own acquired habits.  Here in the city of Nazareth, Jesus personally experiences the rejection and refusal of the people because they cannot escape their earthly logic.  Substantially, they turn their back on Him and they war against the true good!

 The Nazarenes are firm in the image they have held of Jesus for years.  They know His mother and all His relatives.  They know He works in Joseph’s carpenter shop.  What has been must continue in the same way, within the same schemes.  They can’t even dream of opening themselves to the newness of One who reveals God’s mystery.  Rather, they take offense at Him.  He is sadly stupefied by their incredulity.  He is blocked and cannot accomplish any works of salvation among them!

 Today as I pause for silent contemplation, I will contemplate Jesus’ face resplendent with God’s power and tenderness for human beings.  I will seriously ask myself if in the context of the weak faith of these times, in the fog of coercive materialism, is my life open to the continual newness of God who works according to the measure of my belief, my prayer, and my trust.  Or do I take refuge in a banal faith, suffocated by myopic reasoning and without true trust in hope beyond hope?

 You are the Christ, Lord Jesus!  I believe in You and I follow You with my whole heart!

 The voice of an Armenian Prayer

 From You, Lord and Father, come all will and power and life to act.  In You, song renders all things beautiful and is renewed from age to age.  The power of this truth in which I believe can be the soil from which all my actions blossom.

From the Word of the Day

There was also a prophetess, Anna, the daughter of Phanuel, of the tribe of Asher.  She never left the temple, but worshipped night and day with fasting and prayer.

                                          Luke 2: 36-37

 How should we live this Word

 Forty days have passed since the feast of Christmas when in the cave of Bethlehem we contemplated the birth of the Baby who has been given to us for our salvation.  We are His people and He saves us from our sins.  Now this Baby is introduced into God’s house; presented, offered, and consecrated to Him.  Today He officially begins to occupy Himself ‘with the things of the Father, an occupation will gradually become His whole life to the point that He will say, ‘My food is to do the will of my Father’.

 Today’s Gospel presents two elderly saints, Simeon and Anna.  They are truly precursors of every disciple.  They are the first, after Mary and Joseph, to recognize the Baby Jesus as the Lord and glory of the people of Israel.  They are the first to praise Him and to witness to Him.  But how do they recognize Him?  Above all, it happened thanks to their perseverance in waiting for salvation.  Their uninterrupted interior vigilance, their endless dedication, their ablative service of God full of faith and self donation, all this enables them to prophesy, to speak in God’s stead, about Jesus.  They anticipate all those who awaited the redemption of Jerusalem by recognizing the salvific identity of that Baby.

 Today as I pause for silent contemplation, I will nourish this trustful waiting in prayer and I will ask God to be like the prophetess Anna, remaining constantly in His Presence in all things so that Jesus may present Himself to me and be received by me as my life’s salvation.

 Here I am Lord Jesus!  Speak to me because Your servant is listening.

 The voice of Macario the Great, Desert Father

 The entire soul must be involved with all its powers, gathering all its thoughts, and consecrating everything to awaiting Christ.  We must await Him with a sober and vigilant heart so that God may come and visit the soul.

From the Word of the Day

 The King replied, “What business is it of mine or of yours, sons of Zeruiah, that he curses?  Suppose the Lord has told him to curse David; who then will dare to say, ‘Why are you doing this?’”

                                                 2 Samuel 16: 9

 How should we live this Word

 King David is living a dramatic moment of his life.  His son Absalom has turned against him.  He has lost the favor of his people to the point that there are those who dare to curse him and say to him, “Away, away, you murderous and wicked man!”  Abishai reacts.  Not only does he deplore that the king should be insulted, he proposes that justice be done immediately by killing the one who insults him.

David’s behavior is a great lesson for us.  From the depths of his faith vision, flows the decision for humble and meek endurance.  Remembering that he had his general Uriah killed after he had taken his wife, he says with a contrite heart, “Let him alone, and let him curse, for the Lord has told him to.  Perhaps the Lord will look upon my affliction and make it up to me with benefits for the curses he is uttering this day.”

 What emerges is the fact that God has first place with David.  God counts more that everything and everyone.  David reads his life in God and realizes it is his sin that is being cursed.  It is to God that David entrusts himself with humble confidence.

 Today as I pause for silent contemplation, I will think of the moments when I have been wronged, offended.  Did I know how to connect these with the injustice and offense toward God and others that I have done?  It is possible and beautiful to be patient and to refrain from giving offense.

 Lord, only if I rely on you can I do this.  Renew Your will in me.  Bless me and make me new in You!

 The voice of Lanza del Vasto, witness

 Do not let condescension be the measure of your forgiveness of one who has wronged you.  Run to him.  Raise him up.  Embrace him.  Through God’s power, love him.