Tag: turn to God

• Psalm 51: Miserere

  
  

  Psalm 51: Miserere

  

  Tuesday, March 15, 2022

  The most famous of the lament psalms, often said during the Lenten season, is also called The Miserere and is frequently set to music.

  This week in an exploration of James, our study group is focusing on Chapter 2 in which James brings home the message that words without action are dead, empty, and barren.  Words with action are life, fullness and fruit bearing. This is the sacrifice our God requires of us. God does not look for our burnt offerings of first and best fruits. Nor does God delight in our willfulness; rather, God rejoices at our acknowledgment of our broken-heartedness and waywardness. And God certainly rejoices in our homecoming, wishing nothing more than to be with us fully and totally. In this relationship therefore, we can set aside no room saved for our own littleness of for tiny pettiness. We are created for bigness, for greatness. This is perhaps why we are always seeking something more than what we have and more than what we are.

  In today’s Gospel (John 3:14-21), Jesus describes to Nicodemus just how much God loves the world. Today we might make the best of this opportunity to turn to God to offer our lament or miserere. Psalm 51 is more than an internal and personal act of contrition; this prayer is a statement of our commitment to change and our willingness to witness to what this change has done for us.

  

  And so we pray . . .  Restore my joy in your salvation; sustain in me a willing spirit.  I will teach the wicked your ways, that sinners might return to you . . . Lord, open my lips; my mouth will proclaim your praise. 

   Lord, sustain us . . . Lord, open our lips . . . that we may show you our contrition . . . that we may sing our intentional and sincere miserere . . . that we may proclaim your praise.  Accept our offering of brokenness . . . and bring us home to you. 

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  Adapted from a reflection written on February 11, 2010.

  For a music link, visit: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IA88AS6Wy_4 

  Fra Angelica image from: http://radiomelasudas-beaumarchais.blogspot.com/2010/09/michel-richard-delalande-miserere-mei.html

  Scarlatti image from: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Francesco_Scarlatti_-_Miserere_mei_Deus._(BL_Add_MS_31608_f._8v).jpg

  Our next Lenten days we will take us on a journey through Psalms.

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  March 15, 2022

  broken-heartedness, John 3:14-21, turn to God, willfulness

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• Jeremiah 26:1-15: A Plot to Murder

  
  

  Saturday, August 21, 2021

  

  Jeremiah 26:1-15

  A Plot to Murder

  This confrontation between prophet and priests occurred in the year 609 B.C.E. at a time of tremendous political upheaval; the people in today’s reading were under tremendous political, spiritual, social and personal stress. Accusations of falsehood, of miss-reading and miss-interpreting the law are symptoms of a people and leaders who no longer trust one another or themselves. The message here, however, is as clear as the arguments: Judah’s fate has been sealed by her own actions.

  When we read these verses we understand why and how such a great people fell into exile.  The wayward priests and false prophets believe that if they silence Jeremiah, they will keep their secrets hidden, and they will be safe. Of course the opposite is actually the case and if those who are no longer faithful might only listen and heed this true prophet’s words they will be saved. This is not far from what also happened with Christ several hundred years later. This is also not far from what happens to the prophets among us today.

  We live in a world with robots and sustain ourselves with pre-packaged food, starving for honest reality and intimacy, looking for genuine nourishment. We can manipulate images, dub sounds, pay surgeons to re-arrange our bodies, and pop psychologists to sooth our minds. We have created a false world for ourselves in which we control and are all. And, like the priests of Jeremiah’s world, we have things wrong.

  Catherine of Siena recounts that God says to her: I am who am, you are she who is not.  This is an idea which we must do more than merely believe, we must feel it, act it, live it. We, like Jeremiah, live in a world which is too clever, too complicated and too overcome by itself.  But the faithful need not lament for there is always refuge, always a remedy.  When false priests and false prophets rage against us, the faithful must turn away from all the trappings, the trinkets, the overblown, the super sizes, the arguments and the words. We must turn and return to God.

  And so we pray . . . Good, gentle, all-encompassing Lord . . .

  Remind us that our greatness is in our smallness.

  Recount to us the infinite times you have shown us compassion.

  Recall for us the immeasurable ways you have measured out justice on our behalf.

  Revivify us with your presence.

  Hold us away from the false light of the finite. 

  Draw us toward the life-giving light of the eternal.

  Bring us home to you.  Amen.

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  Adapted from a reflection written on May 11, 2008.

  To learn more about Catherine of Siena, visit: http://www.americancatholic.org/features/saints/saint.aspx?id=1368

  For more quotes, visit: http://www.drawnbylove.com/Quotes.htm

  Image from: https://dwellingintheword.wordpress.com/tag/lamentations/ 

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  August 21, 2021

  false prophets, honesty, turn, turn to God

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• Mark 13:1-2: Foretold

  
  

  

  Sixth Sunday of Easter, May 9, 2021

  Mark 13:1-2

  Foretold

  As he was making his way out of the temple area one of his disciples said to him, “Look, teacher, what stones and what buildings!” Jesus said to him, “Do you see these great buildings? There will not be one stone left upon another that will not be thrown down”.

  The disciple in this story is not named but his words are recorded. Clearly the temple and surrounding buildings strike him with awe. This is what King Solomon foresaw when planning the temple complex.  It housed the Ark of the Covenant and was meant as a suitable abode for God on earth, a place where the faithful might come to offer sacrifice, to atone, to be in the presence of the Living God. The disciple in today’s story is walking and talking with Jesus – the Living God’s living presence – and yet he focuses on the old order and sees not the presence of God beside him but the stationary temple that no longer wanders with her pilgrim people. Jesus re-directs his disciple’s attention and he also reminds us that these stones, this temple cannot stand eternally.

  God says: You worry about your structures, your titles, your possessions and your awards. Turn from them and turn to me. Put aside the power you believe you have consolidated. Put down the tools you use to create your little empires and come to the living one who brings you eternal peace. There is no need for the status and goods you amass. They do not really protect you. They cannot really save you. I am the Living Presence among you. This has been foretold. Heed these words and show that you believe them in every waking moment of every day.

  Consider the stones of our thinking that weigh us down. Consider the great buildings to ourselves that will tumble in time. Consider the eternal rest and security that Jesus foretells.

  Tomorrow, a reflection on signs of the end. 

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  For more information on the Temple Mount in Jesus’ time, or to see the detail in the image above, click on the image or go to: https://www.esv.org/resources/esv-global-study-bible/illustration-41-temple-mount-in-jesus-time/

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  May 9, 2021

  Ark of the Covenant, King Solomon, The Jerusalem Temple, The Living God, turn to God

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