Each day until Divine Mercy Sunday on April 7th, I will email you one thought from that day’s brief reading from Fr. Michael Gaitley’s fine book, 33 Days to Merciful Love. I render full credit for these thoughts, respecting copyright laws, to Fr. Gaitley. Each reading ends with a prayer, which I ask you to pray with me for this intention: the conversion of our parish.
Day Twenty
Today, March 25, we normally celebrate the Solemnity of the Annunciation. Because it is Holy Week, the feast is pushed back this year to April 8. Still, we give a thought this day to a poor Jewish girl who completely trusted God with her life. That had never happened before in human history, nor has it happened since. We pray the Angelus with particular fervor today.
Our Lady’s complete trust in God has never been repeated, but St. Therese got close. Today’s reading begins the text of her “Offering to Merciful Love,” written in 1895. I’ve always thought John Paul II named Therese a “Doctor of the Church” more out of sweet devotion than intellectual rigor. She wrote only one book, considered by most as more saccharine piety than serious theology. But in this text I begin to see the depth of her thought, clearly inspired by the same Spirit that informed the biblical writers.
In paragraph 1, she balances sanctity (“desire to accomplish Your will perfectly”) with her “helplessness,” thus resolving the thousand-year controversy between Augustine and Luther over “justification:” Be Yourself my Sanctity, she writes. In paragraphs 3 & 4, she defines her “certainty” that God will remain in her “as a tabernacle,” resolving the theological controversy over “righteousness.” Your Divine Glace will cleanse my soul immediately of unrighteousness, she writes.
People come to the Church to be healed (in the sacrament of confession) and to be fed (in the sacrament of the Eucharist). The rest of the Church’s activity is window dressing. Therese shows us how to satisfy these fundamental human needs simply by desiring them. God will do the rest, because that is what He desires as well.
Prayer
Come, Holy Spirit, fire of mercy. Purify my intentions that I may do everything solely to please and glorify God.
Day Twenty
Today, March 25, we normally celebrate the Solemnity of the Annunciation. Because it is Holy Week, the feast is pushed back this year to April 8. Still, we give a thought this day to a poor Jewish girl who completely trusted God with her life. That had never happened before in human history, nor has it happened since. We pray the Angelus with particular fervor today.
Our Lady’s complete trust in God has never been repeated, but St. Therese got close. Today’s reading begins the text of her “Offering to Merciful Love,” written in 1895. I’ve always thought John Paul II named Therese a “Doctor of the Church” more out of sweet devotion than intellectual rigor. She wrote only one book, considered by most as more saccharine piety than serious theology. But in this text I begin to see the depth of her thought, clearly inspired by the same Spirit that informed the biblical writers.
In paragraph 1, she balances sanctity (“desire to accomplish Your will perfectly”) with her “helplessness,” thus resolving the thousand-year controversy between Augustine and Luther over “justification:” Be Yourself my Sanctity, she writes. In paragraphs 3 & 4, she defines her “certainty” that God will remain in her “as a tabernacle,” resolving the theological controversy over “righteousness.” Your Divine Glace will cleanse my soul immediately of unrighteousness, she writes.
People come to the Church to be healed (in the sacrament of confession) and to be fed (in the sacrament of the Eucharist). The rest of the Church’s activity is window dressing. Therese shows us how to satisfy these fundamental human needs simply by desiring them. God will do the rest, because that is what He desires as well.
Prayer
Come, Holy Spirit, fire of mercy. Purify my intentions that I may do everything solely to please and glorify God.
Feeding the poor in San Francisco yesterday. They hunger for God--to be known and loved--more than for sandwiches and hot chocolate.
RSS Feed