St John of the Cross Feast Day

Where there is no love, bring love.

John accepted all this without complaint. In July of that year, he had written to Mother Mary of the Incarnation, Prioress of the Segovia convent, who was distressed at the treatment he was receiving: '....do not let what is happening to me, my daughter, cause you any grief, for it does not cause me any....Men do not do these things, but God, who knows what is suitable for us and arranges things for our good. Think nothing else but that God ordains all, and where there is no love, put love, and you will draw out love...' Even more now, when he was being treated with such little love, he responded only with love and forgiveness. 'At the evening of life' , said John of the Cross, 'we will be judged by love.' John was approaching the evening of his life. Love was his response to everything. He refused to say an ill word of those who hated him. He received letters telling him of Fr Diego's campaign against him, which were kept in a bag at the bottom of his bed. He ordered them to be burnt, so that they would not damage the Order after his death. He had no word of complaint of his treatment, seeing everything as a permitted by God for his good. Perhaps alluding to the nun's concerns about Doria's governance, but surely applicable to his own situation, he wrote to Mother Anne of St Albert, 'you already know, daughter, the trials they are now suffering. God permits it to try his elect. In silence and in hope shall our strength be.'
'Have a great love for those who contradict and fail to love you,' he wrote to another nun, 'for in this way love is begotten in a heart that has no love. God so acts with us, for He loves us that we might love by means of the very love He bears toward us.' It worked, because at John's deathbed, the Prior knelt in tears and asked his forgiveness.

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Christ the King Solemnity

On one occasion when I was in prayer I had a vision in which I saw how all things are seen in God. I cannot explain what I saw, but what I saw remains to this day deeply imprinted on my soul. It was a great act of grace in God to give me that vision. It puts me to unspeakable confusion, shame, and horror whenever I recall that magnificent sight, and then think of my sin. I believe that had the Lord been pleased to send me that great revelation of Himself earlier in my life, it would have kept me back from much sin. The vision was so delicate, so subtle, and so spiritual, that my hard understanding cannot, at this distance of time, close with it; but, to make use of an illustration, it was something like this. Suppose the Godhead to be a vast globe of light, a globe larger than the whole world, and that all our actions are seen in that all-embracing globe. It was something like that I saw. For I saw all my most filthy actions gathered up and reflected back upon me from that World of light. I tell you it was a piteous and a dreadful thing to see. I knew not where to hide myself, for that shining light, in which was no darkness at all, held the whole world within it, and all worlds. You will see that I could not flee from its presence. Oh that they could be made to see this who commit deeds of darkness!  Oh that they but saw that there is no place secret from God: but that all they do is done before Him, and in Him!  Oh the madness of committing sin in the immediate presence of a Majesty so great, and to whose holiness all our sin is so hateful.  In this also I saw His great mercifulness in that He suffers such a sinner as I am still to live. (Santa Teresa an Appreciation: On the Godhead). 

The picture of 'Christ Blessing' painting was taken in El Greco Museum in Toledo, Spain

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Happy Feast of St Teresa of Jesus to all who care and visit this blog sometimes! - click for link

Quote for this wonderful day: Teresa knew well the continued presence and value of suffering (physical illness, opposition to reform, difficulties in prayer), but she grew to be able to embrace suffering, even desire it: "Lord, either to suffer or to die." Toward the end of her life she exclaimed: "Oh, my Lord! How true it is that whoever works for you is paid in troubles! And what a precious price to those who love you if we understand its value."

(after Saint of the Day)

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St Albert Trapani, Carmelite and Confessor

He shone in his days as the morning sun in the midst of a cloud, and as the moon at the full. And as the sun when he shineth, so did he shine in the temple of God. (Ecclus 50)

Albert, the Carmelite, was born of noble parents in Sicily, of Benedict Adaltibo and Joanna of Mt Trapani. His parents has been married for twenty-six years and were childless. Therefore, they made a vow to the Blessed Mary, ever Virgin, binding themselves, in case she would obtain for them a son, to consecrate him to her in the Carmelite monastery which stood near to Mt Trapani. Their prayer was heard, and in their sleep they saw a torch which came forth from the mother's womb. On account of this vision the latter foretold to her husband that the boy would be great before God, and this hath been proven by the event. For while, as a boy, he was being trained in liberal sciences, the blessing of God fell upon him, and he entered the monastery of Trapani at the age of eight years. Rejoicing in the rudeness of the life, as well as in the strict discipline of the Rule, his progress was such that he soon showed himself an example of virtue to the rest.

Prayer of St Albert [composed during a famine in Messina]
O my God! Was it not said that by You and Your ineffable power You have created mankind? Is it not as a result of Your clemency that You call us to partake of Your glory and the happiness of eternal life? When original sin condemned us to suffer death, did it not please your goodness to repurchase us through the blood of Your Son, to unite us to You through our faith and Your great mercy? You have repurchased us from the shame of original sin; You have covered our dishonour with a fragment of Your glory. And now here is this difficult work built by You, this work with which You soften the limbs and joints, with which You have ennobled the destiny of the immortal soul with sublime beauty, and Satan's attacks! the father of hatred, pride, with the introduction of his jealousy, in order to wound this body which You have created. Deign therefore, Lord, to rebuilt Your work! Deign to cure this blindness, so that Your power may be glorified and that the malice of the enemy may be confounded. [repeated three times by St Albert while praying over a sick child]

Text adopted from "Saints of Carmel" and "Drink of the Stream". The painting "Mary Presenting the Child Jesus to St. Albert" from Carmelite Monastery - Straubing, Germany.

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Blessed Titus Brandsma, Priest and Martyr

Bl Titus Brandsma - for more CLICK HERE

   You hear it said that we live in a wonderful time, a time of great mem and women. It would probably be better to say that we live in an era of decadence in which many, however, feel the need to react and to defend what is most precious and sacred. The desire for the emergence of a strong, capable leader is understandable. But we want such a leader to fight for a holy cause, for and ideal based on divine design and not merely on human might.
   Neo-paganism cosiders the whole of nature as an emanation of the divine: this is what it holds about various races and peoples of the earth. But as star differs from star by reason of its light and brightness, so it considers one race more noble and pure than another, to the extent that this one race is held to embody more light within itself, it has a duty of making that life shine and enlighten the world.....From this nation derives the cult of race ad blood, the cult of the heroes of one's own people.
    From such erroenous starting-point, this view can lead to fatal errors! It is said to see how much enthusiasm and effort are placed at the service of such an erroneous and baseless idea! However, we can learn from our enemy; from his erroneous philosophy we can learn how to purify and better oue own ideal; we can learn how to foster a great love for it; how to arouse great enthusiasm. even willingness to live and die for it; how to build up the courage to incarnate it in ourselves and in others.
   We too profess our descendence form God.
   We too want what he wants.
   But we do not accept the idea of emanation from the divine; we do not DIVINISE ourselves. We admit descdendence in dependence. When we speak of and pray for the coming of the kingdom, it is not a prayer for a kingdom based on differences of race and blood but on universal brotherhood. In union with him who makes the sun rise on the good and on the evil, all men are our brothers - even those who hate us and fight us....From Discalced Carmelites Proper Offices, Fragments from the Sermon of Titus Brandsma, October 1936.

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Bl Maria Pilar and Companions, Virign Martyrs of the Spanish Civil War, who offered their lives for the Church when they were martyred in Guadalajara on July 24th, 1936.

We shall weave these garlands flowering in your love and bound with one hair of mine.
This verse most appropriately refers to Christ and the Church, for in it, the Church, the Bride of Christ, addresses him saying: let us weave garlands (understanding by garlands all the holy souls engendered by Christ in the Church). Each holy soul is like a garland adorned with the flowers of virtues and gifts, and all of them together forms a garland for the head of Christ, the Bridegroom....And bound with one hair of mine - this hair is her will and the love sha has for the Beloved. This love assumes the task od the thread in a garland.
From 'Discalced Carmelite Proper Offices', the Office of Reading, Spiritual Canticle (Strophe 30, 7-8)
To read more CLICK HERE

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Corpus Christi Solemnity and Reflections

 "The eternal tide flows hid in living bread. That with its heavenly life to be fed" (St John of the Cross 'Poems'). 

"O eternal Father, I ask to be permitted to receive the heavenly Bread with such dispositions that, if I have not the happiness of contemplating Jesus with the eyes of my body. I may at least contemplate Him with the eyes of my soul. This is Bread which contains all sweetness and delight, and sustains our life." 

(St Teresa 'Way of Perfection') 

"All graces are contained in You, O Jesus in the Eucharist, our celestial Food! What more can a soul wish when it has within itself the One who contains everything? If I wish for charity, then I have within me Him who is perfect charity, I possess the perfection of charity. The same is true of faith, hope, purity, patience, humility and meekness, for You form all virtues in our soul, o Christ, when You give us the grace of this Food. What more can I want or desire, if all the virtues, graces, and gifts for which I long, are found in You, O Lord, who are as truly present under the sacramental spieces as You are in heaven, at the right hand of the Father? Because I have and possess this great wonder, I do not long for, or desire, any other!" (St Mary Magdalen dei Pazzi)

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The Most Sacred Heart of Jesus Novena starts today, May 30th

To pray Novena CLICK HERE

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Good Shepherd Sunday

Great was the desire of the Bridegroom to free and ransom his bride completely from the hands of sensuality and the devil. Like the good shepherd rejoicing and holding on his shoulder the lost sheep for which he has searched along many winding paths (Lk 15:4-5), and like the woman who, having lit the candle and hunted through her whole house for the lost drachma, holding it up in her hands with gladness and calling her friends and neighbours to come and celebrate saying, rejoice with me, and so no (Lk 15:8-9), now, too, that the soul is liberated this loving Shepherd and Bridegroom rejoices. And it is wonderful to see his pleasure in carrying the rescued, perfected soul on hos shoulders, held there by his hands in this desired union. Not only he himself rejoice, but also makes the angels and saintly souls share in his gladness, saying in the words of the Songs of Song; Go forth, daughters od Zion, and behold king Solomon in the crown with which his mother crowned him on the day of his espousal and on the day of the joy in his heart (Sg 3:11). By these words he calls the soul his crown, his bride, and the joy of his heart, and he takes her now in his arms and goes forth with her as the bridegroom from his bridal chamber (Ps 19:5) He refers to all this in the following stanza: The bride has entered the sweet garden of her desire, and she rests in delight, laying on her neck on the gentle arms of her Beloved. (St John of the Cross, Stanza 22)

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New Blog

EFFICATIOUS PRAYER  AND NOVENA TO OUR LADY OF MOUNT CARMEL

available on my new blog

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