You can Change the World.
Pray for Grace, it is all you got. Just ask God !
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May 14th: Feast of Saint Matthias, Apostle
Gospel text (Jn 15:9-17): Jesus said to his disciples: “As the Father loves me, so I also love you. Remain in my love. If you keep my commandments, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and remain in his love.
“I have told you this so that my joy might be in you and your joy might be complete. This is my commandment: love one another as I love you. No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. You are my friends if you do what I command you. I no longer call you slaves, because a slave does not know what his master is doing. I have called you friends, because I have told you everything I have heard from my Father. It was not you who chose me, but I who chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit that will remain, so that whatever you ask the Father in my name he may give you. This I command you: love one another.”
“I have told you this so that my joy might be in you and your joy might be complete”
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Thoughts on Today's Gospel
“Starting from the realities that it knows, the divine discourse secretly puts in its heart a love that it did not know." (Saint Gregory the Great)
“The Christian vocation is this: to remain in the love of God. The love relationship between Him and the Father is the love relationship between Him and us.” (Francis)
“Jesus makes charity the new commandment (cf. Jn 13:34). By loving his own ‘to the end,’ (Jn 13:1), he makes manifest the Father's love which he receives. By loving one another, the disciples imitate the love of Jesus which they themselves receive. Whence Jesus says: ‘As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you; abide in my love.’ (Jn 15:9). And again: ‘This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you.’ (Jn 15:12)” (Catechism of the Catholic Church, No. 1823)
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Armed resistance to oppression by political authority is not legitimate, unless all the following conditions are met: 1) there is certain, grave, and prolonged violation of fundamental rights; 2) all other means of redress have been exhausted; 3) such resistance will not provoke worse disorders; 4) there is well-founded hope of success; and 5) it is impossible reasonably to foresee any better solution.
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Peace be with you!
Some of the most tangled knots that exist in the world are ones that come from discord in families, the dissolution of families, and a lack of understanding and compassion between family members.
Today, let's pray that the Blessed Virgin Mary will untie the knot of conflict within and between families. Let's pray for reconciliation and forgiveness.
Here are the prayers for today:
In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
Dearest Holy Mother, you are generous with all who seek you, have mercy on me. I entrust into your hands this knot which robs the peace of my heart, paralyzes my soul and keeps me from going to my Lord and serving Him with my life.
Mary, Undoer of Knots, pray for me.
Virgin Mary, Mother of fair love, Mother who never refuses to come to the aid of a child in need, Mother whose hands never cease to serve your beloved children because they are moved by the divine love and immense mercy that exist in your heart, cast your compassionate eyes upon me and see the snarl of knots that exists in my life. You know very well how desperate I am, my pain, and how I am bound by these knots. Mary, Mother to whom God entrusted the undoing of the knots in the lives of his children, I entrust into your hands the ribbon of my life. No one, not even the evil one himself, can take it away from your precious care. In your hands there is no knot that cannot be undone. Powerful Mother, by your grace and intercessory power with Your Son and My Liberator, Jesus, take into your hands today this knot.
[Mention your request here]
I beg you to undo it for the glory of God, once for all. You are my hope.
O my Lady, you are the only consolation God gives me, the fortification of my feeble strength, the enrichment of my destitution, and, with Christ, the freedom from my chains.
Hear my plea.
Keep me, guide me, protect me, o safe refuge!
Mary, Undoer of Knots, pray for me.
Amen.
In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
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Reflect
In the Gospel parable, what does it mean that the wise virgins can’t share their oil? If we remember the story of Elijah and the widow and the never emptying jars of oil and flour, then clearly this is not a story about supply and demand. Then what? Is Jesus telling us that there are some things in life that no one can do for us? Like faith or hope or love?
Pray
Jesus, you who were able to multiply the loaves and fishes,
and turn water into wine.
Open our eyes to the fullness and overflowing abundance
of your grace.
Act
Light a candle and slowly read Matthew 25:1-13 in your Bible. When you finish, let the words echo inside you as you observe the flickering light of the candle. P.S. Make sure to blow the candle out when you're finished.
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Saint Matthias’ Story
According to Acts 1:15-26, during the days after the Ascension Peter stood up in the midst of the brothers—about 120 of Jesus’ followers. Now that Judas had betrayed his ministry, it was necessary, Peter said, to fulfill the scriptural recommendation that another should take his office. “Therefore, it is necessary that one of the men who accompanied us the whole time the Lord Jesus came and went among us, beginning from the baptism of John until the day on which he was taken up from us, become with us a witness to his resurrection” (Acts 1:21-22).
They nominated two men: Joseph Barsabbas and Matthias. They prayed and drew lots. The choice fell upon Matthias, who was added to the Eleven.
Matthias is not mentioned by name anywhere else in the New Testament.
Reflection
What was the holiness of Matthias? Obviously, he was suited for apostleship by the experience of being with Jesus from his baptism to his ascension. He must also have been suited personally, or he would not have been nominated for so great a responsibility. Must we not remind ourselves that the fundamental holiness of Matthias was his receiving gladly the relationship with the Father offered him by Jesus and completed by the Holy Spirit? If the apostles are the foundations of our faith by their witness, they must also be reminders, if only implicitly, that holiness is entirely a matter of God’s giving, and it is offered to all, in the everyday circumstances of life. We receive, and even for this God supplies the power of freedom.
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How to Repay the Love of Christ
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My Morning Offering
O Jesus, through the Immaculate Heart of Mary, I offer you my prayers, works, joys, and sufferings of this day for all the intentions of your Sacred Heart, in union with the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass throughout the world, for the salvation of souls, the reparation of sins, the reunion of all Christians, and in particular for the intentions of the Holy Father this month. Amen.
Quote of the Day
"Occupy your mind with good thoughts, or the enemy will fill them with bad ones. Unoccupied, they cannot be."
–St. Thomas More
Today's Meditation
“Infinite grief I wish from My creature in two ways: in one way, through her sorrow for her own sins, which she has committed against Me her Creator; in the other way, through her sorrow for the sins which she sees her neighbors commit against Me. Of such as these, inasmuch as they have infinite desire, that is, are joined to Me by an affection of love, and therefore grieve when they offend Me, or see Me offended, their every pain, whether spiritual or corporeal, from wherever it may come, receives infinite merit, and satisfies for a guilt which deserved an infinite penalty, although their works are finite and done in finite time; but, inasmuch as they possess the virtue of desire, and sustain their suffering with desire, and contrition, and infinite displeasure against their guilt, their pain is held worthy. Paul explained this when he said: If I had the tongues of angels, and if I knew the things of the future and gave my body to be burned, and have not love, it would be worth nothing to me. The glorious Apostle thus shows that finite works are not valid, either as punishment or recompense, without the condiment of the affection of love.”
—St. Catherine of Siena, p. 4
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Set and rest for a while and reflect on the many blessings God has placed in your life…..
Click for music to Reflect on,
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uiTrB-zA7bc
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Spend This Moment with God. |
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