love

Gather me into your loving arms, O Lord

/ Eric Mathews / Leave a comment
 
 
Dear Father: How it must crush you when I turn my back on you and walk away.
How you must weep when you see me disappear over a far horizon
    to squander my life in a distant country.
Thank you that although I have sometimes left home,
    I have never left your heart.
Though I have forgotten about you,
    you have never forgotten about me.
Thank you for the financial crisis or the famine or the pigsty
    or whatever it took to bring me to my senses.
And thank you that even though what brought me home 
    were pangs of hunger instead of pangs of conscience,
    yet still, even on those terms, you welcome me back.
Thank you for the forgiveness and the restoration you have lavished on me –
    me, the one who needed them most but deserved them least.
 
I confess that there is inside me not only the prodigal son,
    but also a critical older brother.
How dutiful I have sometimes been, 
    and yet so proud of the duties I have done.
How generous I have been in my opinion of myself,
    and yet so judgmental in my opinion of others.
How often I have entered into criticism,
    and yet how seldom I have entered into your joy.
 
Gather both the prodigal part of myself and the critical part of myself
    in your loving arms, O Lord.  And bring them home.
 
Ken Gire, American author and speaker
 
_____________________________
 
 
‘For this son of mine was dead and is alive again; 
    he was lost and is found.’ 
So they began to celebrate.

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desiring you with my whole heart

/ Eric Mathews / Leave a comment
 
 
Give me grace, O my Father,
    to be utterly ashamed of my own reluctance.
Rouse me from sloth and coldness,
    and make me desire you with my whole heart.
Teach me to love 
    meditation, sacred reading and prayer.
Teach me to love 
    that which must engage my mind 
         for all eternity.
 
John Henry Newman, 1801-1890, English Catholic priest and poet
 
_________________________
 
 
You will seek me and find me, 
    when you seek me with all your heart.

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The Church should be a verb

/ Eric Mathews / Leave a comment
Photo by Claudio Schwarz on Unsplash
 
Granted, it’s a tough assignment, the original assignment. I get that. 
Love – Lord help us, could we not have been assigned something easier,
    like astrophysics or quantum mechanics?
But no – love those you cannot love.
Love those who are poor and broken and fouled and dirty 
    and sick with sores.
Love those who wish to strike you on both cheeks.
Love the blowhard, the pompous ass, the arrogant liar.
Find the Christ in each heart, even those.
Preach the Gospel and only if necessary talk about it.
Be the Word.
It is easy to advise and pronounce and counsel
    and suggest and lecture;
  it is not easy to do what must be done 
    without sometimes shrieking.
Bring love like a bright weapon against the dark.
The Rabbi did not say build churches, or retreat houses, 
    or secure a fleet of cars for general use, or convene conferences,
    or issue position papers.
He was pretty blunt about the hungry and the naked and the sick.
He was not reasonable; we forget this.
The Church is not a reasonable idea.
The Church should be a verb.
When it is only a noun it is not what the Founder asked of us.
Let us pray that we are ever after dissolving 
    the formal officious arrogant thing that wants to rise,
 and ever fomenting the contradictory revolutionary
    countercultural thing that could change life on this planet.
It could, you know.
Let’s try again today.
And so: Amen.
 
Brian Doyle, 1956 – 2017, Catholic author from Oregon
____________________________
 
 
God has put all things under the authority of Christ 
    and has made him head over all things for the benefit of the church. 
And the church is his body; it is made full and complete by Christ, 
    who fills all things everywhere with himself.

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teach us the unity of Thy family

/ Eric Mathews / Leave a comment
 
O God, who has made man in thine own likeness,
    And who loves all whom Thou hast made,
  suffer us not because of difference of race, color, or condition
    to separate ourselves from others
    and thereby from Thee;
  but teach us the unity of Thy family
    and universality of Thy Love.
As Thou Savior, as a Son, was born of a Hebrew mother,
    who had the blood of many nations in her veins;
    and ministered first to Thy brethren of the Israelites,
    but rejoiced in the faith of a Syro-Phoenician woman and of a Roman soldier,
    and suffered your cross to be carried by an Ethiopian;
  teach us, also, while loving and serving our own,
    to enter into the communion of the whole family;
  and forbid that from pride of birth, color, achievement and hardness of heart,
    we should despise any for who Christ died,
    or injure or grieve any in whom He lives.
We pray in Jesus’ precious name. AMEN.
 
Robert C. Lawson, 1883-1961, 20th-century African American clergyman
 
_______________________
 
 
I appeal to you, dear brothers and sisters,
    by the authority of our Lord Jesus Christ, 
    to live in harmony with each other. 
Let there be no divisions in the church. 
Rather, be of one mind, united in thought and purpose.

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You became human, really human.

/ Eric Mathews / Leave a comment
Te tamari no atua, Paul Gauguin, CC BY-SA 4.0 via Wikimedia Commons
 
 
You became human, really human.
While we endeavor to grow out of our humanity,
    to leave our human nature behind us,
    You became human,
    and we must recognize that You want us also to be human – 
    really human.
Whereas we distinguish between the godly and the godless,
    the good and the evil, the noble and the common,
    You love real human beings without distinction. . . .
    You take the side of real human beings and the real world
        against all their accusers. . . .
 
But it’s not enough to say that You take care of human beings.
This sentence rests on something
    infinitely deeper and more impenetrable, 
    namely, that in the conception and birth of Jesus Christ, 
    You took on humanity in bodily fashion.
You raised your love for human beings 
    above every reproach of falsehood and doubt and uncertainty
    by yourself entering into the life of human beings as a human being,
    by bodily taking upon yourself 
    and bearing the nature, essence, guilt, and suffering of human beings.
 
Out of love for human beings, You became a human being.
You do not seek out the most perfect human being
    in order to unite with that person.
Rather, You take on human nature as it is.
 
after Dietrich Bonhoeffer, 1906 – 1945, German  theologian and martyr
 
________________________
 
 
Look! The virgin will conceive a child!
    She will give birth to a son,
and they will call him Immanuel,
    which means ‘God is with us.’

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how do I worship in spirit?

/ Eric Mathews / Leave a comment
image / pixabay
 
O God, what is Spirit?
How do I worship in spirit and in truth?
I am such a solid, earthly creature,
    my feet planted firmly on the ground,
    my life based upon material things.
I like to touch and feel and see before I believe.
I am accustomed to dealing with houses, land, and money,
    with bread, meat and potatoes,
    with objects handled, weighed, and valued
    by my own standards.
I am uncomfortable with what cannot be analyzed
    or dissected or given a market value.
What is Spirit?
 
Yet, O Lord, the very things I handle and see
    lose meaning when they become ends in themselves.
They are all given meaning by the things of the spirit,
    by love and hope and faith.
I know when I come down to it,
    if I have all kinds of earthly goods
         and have not love,
    I have nothing.
I need the mystery beyond the tangible.
I need the things of the spirit
    to give meaning to the material things I prize.
I cannot divide life up,
    you have made it whole.
If I avoid love, diminish hope, deny faith,
    my appreciation of my house and land,
    my meat and potatoes, shrinks,
And I become a little man
     with little aims and little power.
 
Kenneth Phifer
 
————————————
 
 
But the time is coming—indeed it’s here now—
when true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and in truth. 
The Father is looking for those who will worship him that way. 
For God is Spirit, so those who worship him must worship in spirit and in truth.
 

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I pray for the children

/ Eric Mathews / 1 Comment
Photo by Andrae Ricketts on Unsplash
 
This morning, Lord, I’m praying for many people,
    just a day after Dobbs v. Jackson…
 
I’m praying for those 
    disappointed and angry,
who believe their rights have been trampled and crushed:
    their choice and autonomy wrenched from their grasp…
 
And I’m praying for those 
    now claiming a victory,
who believe that justice has finally prevailed:
    the right to life, refreshed and reclaimed…
 
I pray for our country, 
    torn apart and embittered,
where the battle for rights will continue to rage,
    dividing our nation, body and soul…
 
I pray for the Church 
    to preach with compassion
the gospel of life as the wisdom for choosing
    what’s loving and true, what’s generous and good…
 
And I pray for the Church 
    to faithfully serve
with shelter, support, understanding and help
     people and life in all shapes and all forms…
 
And last, but not least, Lord, 
I pray for the children conceived every day:
    planned or unplanned, welcome or not,
    impaired or healthy, ill-timed or convenient,
        each one made in your image divine,
        each one named by your love and your grace,
        each one, your own, entrusted to us…
 
Many to pray for, many to hold
    in our arms, in our care, in our love.
Help us to welcome the gift of new life
    with its challenges, burdens and blessings, 
        with the strength and help of your grace…
 
Amen.
 
Fr. Austin Fleming, Roman Catholic Priest serving near Boston, MA  
Concord Pastor
 
______________________________
 
 
And the word of the Lord came to Zechariah, saying, 
“Thus says the Lord of hosts, 
Render true judgments, show kindness and mercy to one another, 
do not oppress the widow, the fatherless, the sojourner, or the poor, 
and let none of you devise evil against another in your heart.”

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Make me always busy in your service

/ Eric Mathews / Leave a comment
Les femmes saintes, James Tissot, via Wikimedia Commons
 
Lord, I make you a present of myself.
    I do not know what to do with myself.
So let me make this exchange:
    I will place myself entirely in your hands,
    if you will cover my ugliness with your beauty,
    and tame my unruliness with your love.
Put out the flames of false passion in my heart,
    since these flames destroy all that is true within me.
Make me always busy in your service.
Lord, I want no special signs from you,
    nor am I looking for intense emotions in response to your love.
I would rather be free of all emotion,
    than to run the danger of falling victim once again to false passion.
Let my love for you be naked, without any emotional clothing.

St Catherine of Genoa, 1447-1510, Italian Catholic mystic
 
___________________________
 
 
Soon afterward Jesus began a tour of the nearby towns and villages, 
preaching and announcing the Good News about the Kingdom of God. 
He took his twelve disciples with him, 
along with some women who had been cured of evil spirits and diseases. 
Among them were Mary Magdalene, from whom he had cast out seven demons; 
Joanna, the wife of Chuza, Herod’s business manager; Susanna; and many others 
who were contributing from their own resources to support Jesus and his disciples.

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What can I say to you, my God?

/ Eric Mathews / Leave a comment
Holy Trinity, Lawrence OP, CC BY-NC-ND 2.0
 
What can I say to you, my God?
 
Shall I collect together all the words
    that praise your holy Name?
 
Shall I give you all the names of this world
    —you, the Unnameable?
 
Shall I call you
    “God of my life,
    meaning of my existence,
    hallowing of my acts,
    my journey’s end,
    bitterness of my bitter hours,
    home of my loneliness,
    you my most treasured happiness”?

Shall I say:
    “Creator, Sustainer, Pardoner,
    Near One, Distant One, Incomprehensible One,
    God both of flowers and stars,
    God of the gentle wind and of terrible battles,
    Wisdom, Power, Loyalty, and Truthfulness,
    Eternity and Infinity, you the All-merciful,
    you the Just One,
    you  – Love itself?”
 
Karl Rahner, 1904 – 1984, German Jesuit Priest
 
__________________________
 
 
Then Moses said to God, 
“If I come to the people of Israel and say to them, 
    ‘The God of your fathers has sent me to you,’ 
and they ask me, ‘What is his name?’ 
what shall I say to them?
 

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let me reflect your love

/ Eric Mathews / Leave a comment
image / James Tissot / Wikimedia Commons
 
Thank you, dear Lord, for your love and care for me
    evidenced in so many ways.
Thank you for pardoning the sins I have committed this day;
    thank you for the opportunities to show love well used this day;
    thank you also for sins avoided on account  of your guidance and restraint.
Let it be my single ambition, my God, to honor you 
    in every thought, word, and deed;
    and make me bold to invite all people around me to honor and love you as well.
Your love toward me is so patient, so tender, 
    even when I provoke you with my disobedience.
Give me such an appreciation of your love for me
    that I show the same patient and tender love to my neighbor,
    especially when he or she opposed me.
Sit us within me a zeal to do all in my power,
    whether in prayer or deed, 
    to promote the safety and happiness of my neighbor;
    make me active to comfort and relieve all those whom you entrust to my care
    by bringing me into contact with them.
Lord, help me to be peaceful rather than argumentative;
    help me to be quick to forget an injury and be reconciled to my neighbor,
    mindful of how many times you have forgiven my provocations.
After your own example, make me glad to give good in return for evil,
    and thus share in the triumph of your love.
In all my dealings with my fellow human beings,
    let me reflect your love, your generous spirit,
    your desire to do good both to the just and the unjust.
You have so valued each person that you sent your Son for each and every one.
Implant, therefore, such a compassion in my heart for people.
    that I will eagerly seek out how I may win them to your love.
 
David A. de Silva, Methodist professor
 
_____________________
 
 
We know how much God loves us, and we have put our trust in his love.
God is love, and all who live in love live in God, and God lives in them.

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