Food for the journey (Vol 8)

Prayer of the week
A prayer against worry

O God, you are the God of Peace, and I am a worrier.
Take away my worry and give me some of your peace.
Help me not to waste my time worrying about
things that nothing can be done about.
Help me to accept them, and to overcome them.
Lord, grant me a quiet mind and peaceful heart.
Amen.

From the Saints
The Lord often reveals what is best to the youngest
– St. Benedict (Rule of St. Benedict 3:1-3)

Quote of the week
Words which do not give the light of Christ increase the darkness.
- Blessed Teresa of Calcutta

Scripture of the week
Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.
- Philippians 4:6-7 (New International Version)

From the Catechism
"Our bread":
The Father who gives us life cannot not but give us the nourishment life requires - all appropriate goods and blessings, both material and spiritual. In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus insists on the filial trust that cooperates with our Father's providence. He is not inviting us to idleness, but wants to relieve us from nagging worry and preoccupation. Such is the filial surrender of the children of God:

To those who seek the kingdom of God and his righteousness, he has promised to give all else besides. Since everything indeed belongs to God, he who possesses God wants for nothing, if he himself is not found wanting before God.
CCC- 2830


One more thought
If we can believe that the bread, water, and wine, physical things, are being transformed into Jesus' body and blood, why then is it so difficult for us to believe that God can take our own flesh, our own blood, and transform it into Him as well?

We ARE the body of Christ.

Food for the journey (Vol 7)

After a brief hiatus due to travel and visitors, Food for the journey has returned. I pray that just one of these thoughts can touch your heart and awaken it to God's mighty love.


Prayer of the week

I am bending my knee
In the eye of the Father who created me,
In the eye of the Son who died for me,
In the eye of the Spirit who cleansed me,
In love and desire.

Pour down upon us from heaven
The rich blessing of Your forgiveness;
Be patient with us.

Grant to us, Saviour of Glory,
The fear of God, the love of God, and His affection,
And the will of God to do on earth at all times
As angels and saints do in heaven;

Each day and night give us Your peace.
Each day and night give us Your peace.
-Scottish prayer translated from Gaelic and the King's English.


From the saints
We can see neither our own dignity nor the defects which spoil the beauty of our soul, unless we look at ourselves in the peaceful sea of God's being in which we are imagined.
- St. Catherine of Sienna

Quote of the week
To hate someone won't change anything, but to love someone will.
-Mother Antonia

Scripture of the week
Beloved, we are God's children now, what we shall be has not yet been revealed. Everyone who has this hope based on him makes himself pure as he is pure
-1 John 3:2-3

From the Catechism of the Catholic Church
The grace of Christ is the gratuitous gift that God makes to us of his own life, infused by the Holy Spirit into our soul to heal it of sin and to sanctify it. It is the sanctifying or deifying grace received in Baptism. It is in us the source of the work of sanctification:

Therefore if any one is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has passed away, behold, the new has come. All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself. (2 Cor 5:17-18.)
-CCC 1999

One more thought
The cross is God's way of saying, “I don't hold anything against you.”

Food for the journey (vol 6)

Check out Conversion Diary, host of seven quick takes!






Prayer of the Week
Have mercy on me, Lord, for I am in distress
My sight is blurred because of my tears.
My body and soul are withering away.
I am dying from grief, my years are shortened by sadness.
Misery has drained my strength, I am wasting away from within.

But I am trusting in you, O Lord, saying "You are my God"
My future is in your hands.
Rescue me from those who hung me down relentlessly.
Let your favor shine on your servant.
In your unfailing love, save me.
-Psalm 31: 9-10, 14-16


From the Saints
"There is very little unusual about the outward life of the Blessed Virgin, or at least the Gospels do not record it. They show her life as very simple and ordinary. What she did and endured might have been done and endured by anyone in her station of life. She visited her cousin Elizabeth just as her other relatives did. Like all her neighbors, she went to Bethlehem to be registered. Because she was poor, she sheltered in a stable. The persecution of Herod drove her from Nazareth, but she returned and lived there with Jesus and Joseph, who worked to earn their daily bread. But what was the bread that nourished the faith of Mary and Joseph? It was the sacrament of the moment -"
-St. Jean-Pierre de Caussade, Abandonment to Divine Providence

From the Catechism
2828 "Give us": The trust of children who look to their Father for everything is beautiful. "He makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust." He gives to all the living "their food in due season." Jesus teaches us this petition, because it glorifies our Father by acknowledging how good he is, beyond all goodness.

Quote of the Week
Being Christian is not the result of an ethical choice or a lofty idea, but the encounter with an event, a person, which gives life a new horizon and a decisive direction.
-Pope Benedict XVI, Deus Caritas Est

Truth
If Christ does not make a difference in your life, you can't make a difference in anyone else's.

Scripture of the Week
Cast your bread upon the waters after a long time you may find it again. Make seven or eight portions, you know not what misfortune may come upon the earth – Ecc 11:1-2

From the Mass
"GO IN PEACE TO LOVE AND SERVE THE LORD."

Food for the journey (vol 3)

Prayer of the Week

A prayer for our Church

I plead with you for the world.
Power of the eternal Father, help me!
Wisdom of the Son, enlighten my eye of understanding!
Tender clemency of the Holy Spirit inflame my heat and unite it to yourself!
I proclaim, eternal God that your power is powerful and strong enough
to free your church and your people
to snatch us from the devil's hand
to stop the persecution of the Holy Church
and to give me strength
and victory over my own enemies.
I proclaim that the wisdom of your Son who is one with you
can enlighten the eye of my understanding and that of your people
and can relieve the darkness of your secret bride.
And I proclaim, eternal gentle goodness of God,
that the clemency of the Holy Spirit, your blazing charity
wants to inflame my heart and everyone's and unite them with yourself.”

-St. Catherine of Sienna

From the Saints
Nothing is so inconsistent with the life of a Christian as overindulgence
– Rule of St. Benedict Ch 39

Quote of the Week
If we have no peace, it is because we have forgotten that we belong to each other.
-Blessed Teresa of Calcutta

Scripture
For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us.
-Romans 8:18

Mass
Deliver us, Lord, from every evil, and grant us peace in our day. In your mercy keep us free from sin and protect us from all anxiety as we wait in joyful hope for the coming of our Savior, Jesus Christ.
-The prayer between the Our Father and the "end" of the Our Father.

From the Catechism
Faith is a supernatural gift from God. In order to believe, man needs the interior helps of the Holy Spirit.
-Catechism of the Catholic Church: CCC 179

Final though
Give God the glory.