Short Reflection for the Feast of the Epiphany of the Lord
2nd step: Let the text
remain always in on your lips and mind - RECITING the text silently as often as
possible...
3rd step: Be
attentive to the disclosure of the meaning/s of the text in your life.
Short Reflection for the Feast of the Holy Family (B)
Readings: Sirach 3: 2-7, 12-14; Colossians 3: 12-21; Luke 2: 22-40
Selected Passage: “Simon blessed them and said to Mary his mother, ‘behold, this child is destined for the fall and rise of many in Israel, and to be a sign that will be contradicted, and you yourself a sword will pierce so that the thoughts of many hearts may be revealed’.”(Luke 2: 34-35)
Meditation: It will NOT be all bed of roses for this child born in a manger wrapped in swaddling clothes… NO! This child is the NEW face of God destined for the fall and rise of many. He is the face of God that is MERCY and COMPASSION and by his words and deeds all hearts, thoughts and actions would be measured! Cuidate!
DHIKR SIMPLE METHOD
1st step: Write the text or Dhikr (the Arabic word for REMEMBRANCE) in your heart.
2nd step: Let the text remain always in on your lips and mind - RECITING the text silently as often as possible...
3rd step: Be attentive to the disclosure of the meaning/s of the text in your life.
Chastity needs to be properly understood. For too long we have had an overly narrow and mostly false concept of chastity. Chastity is too commonly identified with sexual abstinence and sexuality is then seen as something that in itself, militates against chastity and spirituality. But chastity is not the same thing as celibacy; indeed, it is not even, first and foremost, a sexual concept. Someone can be chaste but not celibate, just as someone can be celibate but not chaste. My parents were not celibate, they gave birth to a large family, but they were wonderfully chaste persons. The reverse can also be true. Someone can be celibate but far from chaste.
What is chastity? We are chaste when we stand before the world, others, and God in a way which allows them to be fully themselves without letting our own impatience, selfishness, or unwillingness to remain in tension violate their reality and their natural unfolding.
Here is an image to explain this.
In her book, Holy the Firm, Annie Dillard shares this story: One evening, alone in her cabin, she was watching a moth slowly emerge from its cocoon. The process was fascinating but interminably slow. At a point she lost patience and needed to get on to other things, so she picked up a candle and applied a little heat to the process. It worked. The added heat sped up the process and the moth emerged more quickly from its cocoon, but, since a natural process had been interfered with and unnaturally rushed, the moth emerged with ill-formed wings which didn’t allow it to fly properly. A fault in chastity led to stunted growth.
Chastity is the virtue that invites us to live in patience, to wait, to respect what’s other, and to carry tension long enough so that the other can truly be other and gift can unfold precisely as gift.
That is why the Messiah can only be born from a chaste womb and come to life fully only inside of a chaste heart. Christmas allows for no shortcuts.
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Short Reflection for the 4th Week of Advent (B)
Readings: 2 Samuel 7: 1-5. 8-12; Romans 16: 25-27; Luke 1: 26-38
Selected Gospel Passage: And the angel said to Mary in reply, "The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. Therefore the child to be born will be called Holy, the Son of God”. (Luke 1: 35)
Reflection: Jesus comes to us anew through the power of the Holy Spirit and like Mary, our mother, in events we least expect. What is important is our generosity and readiness to respond, like Mary, ‘I am the handmaid of the Lord. May it be done to me according to your Word’. Cf. www.badaliyya.blogspot.com
DHIKR SIMPLE METHOD...
Dhikr is an Arabic word for remembrance. In the “tariqa” (the way) movement, dhikr developed into a form of prayer… It is a prayer of the heart… following three simple steps:
1. Write in one’s heart a certain passage of the Holy Writ…
2. Make the same passage ever present in one’s lips.
3. Then wait for God’s disclosure on the meaning of the passage…that interprets one’s life NOW…!
It takes a week of remembering (dhikr)…or even more days to relish the beauty of this method…
MAKE SPACE FOR CHRIST
The story doesn’t suggest that the innkeeper was malicious or inhospitable. It says only that “there was no room in the inn.” In short, the man was booked up, full, there was no room for further guests, he already had all he could handle.
No room! No place for more guests! Booked up! No space for hospitality!
In these expressions, I see the reason why there is so little of Christ left in Christmas. It is not so much, I believe, our excesses in shopping, decorating, or partying that deprive Christ of a place, as it is our busyness, preoccupations, hurriedness, and agenda which fill the inn and leave no place for him. Our hearts and lives are too full for Christ to have a place.
That sounds like a harsh judgment, and it is. Looked at from the outside, our lives often do look selfish, inhospitable, idiosyncratic, and un-Christian. However, we are not bad people, nor are we, deep down, inhospitable. Beneath all the hurry, pressure, and preoccupations, our hearts are warm, unselfish and welcoming.
Then why aren’t we warmer and more hospitable? In brief, because we haven’t the time. There is not enough space within our lives for Christ.
Love and hospitality are not abstract. To have Christ in our lives involves something much more than creating time for him, time for the poor, time for hospitality, time for celebration, time for prayer, time for the itinerant couple who show up unannounced on a busy night.
We must create some room in the inn!
(Fr. Ron Rolheiser, OMI()
Short Reflection for the 2nd Sunday of Advent (B)
Readings - Isaiah 40:1-5, 9-11; 2 Peter 3:8-14; Mark 1:1-8
Selected Gospel Passage: A voice of one crying out in the desert: 'Prepare the way of the Lord, make straight his paths.'" John (the) Baptist appeared in the desert proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. (Mark 1: 3-4)
Reflection: Like John the Baptizer we prepare for the coming of the Lord. He comes in events and moments we least expect. And how do we prepare for his coming into our lives? We celebrate Advent through good deeds and actions on behalf of the poor and the needy. By these good deeds our many sins are forgiven. Visit www.badaliyya.blogspot.com
DHIKR SIMPLE METHOD...
Dhikr is an Arabic word for remembrance. In the “tariqa” (the way) movement, dhikr developed into a form of prayer… It is a prayer of the heart… following three simple steps:
1. Write in one’s heart a certain passage of the Holy Writ…
2. Make the same passage ever present in one’s lips.
3. Then wait for God’s disclosure on the meaning of the passage…that interprets one’s life NOW…!
It takes a week of remembering (dhikr)…or even more days to relish the beauty of this method…
Short
Reflection for the 1st Sunday of Advent (B)
Readings:
Isaiah 63: 16-17. 19. 64: 2-7; 1 Corinthians 1:
3-9; Mark 13: 33-37
Selected
Gospel Passage: “Be watchful! Be alert!
You do not know when the time will come.
And I say to you: WATCH!” (Mk. 13: 33 & 37)
Reflection: Take heed… Jesus comes in moments and
at events we least expect.
Vigilance is NOT doing anything or looking out at
the sky but DOING our task and role well and conscientiously. The Lord comes to
us in a very ordinary way and often in little things, Thus we need to be watchful for his coming …
The Pope’s commentary on each point was rather lengthy, and I will risk synthesizing his central point in my own words.
1. Proceed calmly.
Move with kindness, humility, and calm. These are the antithesis of anxiety and distress. Calm never causes high blood pressure. We need to make conscious efforts to never let the moment cause panic and excessive hurry. Rather be late than stressed.
2. Respect and take care of nature.
The air we breathe out is the air we will re-inhale. This is true spiritually, psychologically, and ecologically. We can’t be whole and happy when Mother Earth is being stripped of her wholeness. Christ came to save the world, not just the people in the world. Our salvation, like our happiness, is tied to the way we treat the earth. It is immoral to slap another person in the face and so it is immoral too to throw our garbage into the face of Mother Earth.
3. Stop being negative.
Needing to talk badly about others indicates low self-esteem. Negative thoughts feed unhappiness and a bad self-image. Positive thoughts feed happiness and healthy self-esteem.
4. Respect others’ beliefs.
What we cherish and put our faith into grows “by attraction, not by proselytizing.” Beauty is the one thing that no one can argue with. Cherish your values, but always act towards others with graciousness, charity, and respect.
5. Work for peace.
Peace is more than the absence of war and working for peace means more than not causing disharmony. Peace, like war, must be waged actively by working for justice, equality, and an ever wider inclusivity in terms of what makes up our family. Waging peace is the perennial struggle to stretch hearts, our own and others, to accept that in God’s house there are many rooms and that all faiths, not least our own, are meant to be a house of prayer for all peoples.
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Short Reflection on the Solemnity of Christ the King (A)
Readings: Ezekiel 14: 11-12; 15-17; 1 Corinthians 15: 20-26; Matthew 25: 31-46
Gospel Passage: “Lord, when did we see you hungry and fee you, or thirsty and give you drink? And when did we see you stranger and welcome you or naked and clothe you? And when did we see you sick or in prison and visit you? And the king will say to them in reply, 'Amen, I say to you, whatever you did for one of these least brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.'” (Matthew 25: 37-40)
Meditation: In the end, the real test of discipleship is ‘believing and attending to the needs of the people I need, that is, caring for and ministering to people, especially the least of our brothers and sisters. The real fellowship at the table of the Lord is when we are able to break bread with the poor. The true image of Christ the King is NOT Jesus with Crown and scepter and sitting on his throne! That is the Constantinian King! The true image of Christ the King is Jesus with a crown of thorns before Pilate or Jesus Crucified with INRI label – the sentence for his claim!www.badaliyya.blogspot.com
DHIKR SIMPLE METHOD
Dhikr is an Arabic word which means REMEMBRANCE.
1st step: Write the text in your heart.
2nd step: Let the text remain always in on your lips and mind - RECITING the text silently as often as possible...
3rd step: Be attentive to the disclosure of the meaning/s of the text in your life.
That might sound abstract, but what it means concretely is that sometimes we can have all the right answers and still be wrong. How? If we are acting in truth how can we be wrong?
The first pitfall is this: We may be acting out of truth and, in fact, doing all the right things, but our energy can be wrong. T.S. Eliot once famously said: “The last temptation is the greatest treason: To do the right deed for the wrong reason.”
We can see this looking at the older brother of the prodigal son. On the surface his devotion to his father lacks nothing. He rightly attests that his life is blameless and a paradigm of filial devotion. He has kept all the commandments, has never left his father’s house, and has done all the required work. The irony is that he fails to notice that he is not in fact inside his father’s house but is standing outside of it and is being gently invited in by his father.
What is keeping him outside since after all he is doing everything correctly? Bitterness and anger. His actions are correct, but his heart is wrong. Bitterness and anger are not the right energy to fuel truth. We can be scrupulously faithful and still find ourselves standing outside of God’s house and outside the circle of community and celebration because of a bitter heart. Gratitude is the energy that ultimately needs to fuel the truth.
Like the older brother of the prodigal son, we can be doing everything right and still, somehow, be wrong. And where this is particularly important in terms of a challenge is in our efforts, both as individuals and as churches, to offer the truth, the right answers, to those around us, be that our own children who no longer go to church or society as a whole. If, inside of our speaking the truth, there are elements of elitism, arrogance, anger, lack of respect, lack of understanding, or worse still, embittered moralizing, our truth will not be heard, not because our truth is wrong but because our energy is.
Truth is not a sledgehammer; it is an invitation that we must respectfully offer others.
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hort Reflection for the 33rd Sunday of the Ordinary Time (A)
Readings: Proverbs 31: 10-13, 19-20, 30-31; 1 Thessalonians 5: 1-6; Matthew 25: 14-30
The Parable of the Talents (Matthew 25: 14-30)
Selected Passage: “For to everyone who has, more will be given and he will grow rich; but from the one who has not, even what he has will be taken away.” (Matthew 25: 29)
Meditation: Every gift we receive from God has corresponding responsibility. It must bear fruit in plenty so that others may also share in the blessing. Each one receives gives according to the measure one is capable. We become responsible and accountable for that gift else we become half-hearted servants. . The Parable of the Talents is a warning to those who do not produce anything. It is a kind of stripping (recalling) of anything that is left in an unproductive person.
Pope Francis reminds us that “only one whose gaze is fixed on that which is truly essential can renew his yes to the gift received.” Cf. www.badaliyya.blogspot.com
DHIKR SIMPLE METHOD
Dhikr is an Arabic word which means REMEMBRANCE.
1st step: Write the text in your heart.
2nd step: Let the text remain always in on your lips and mind - RECITING the text silently as often as possible...
3rd step: Be attentive to the disclosure of the meaning/s of the text in your life.
Short Reflection for the 32nd Sunday of the Ordinary Time (A)
Readings: Wisdom 6: 12-16; 1 Thessalonians 4: 13-14; Matthew 25: 1-13
Selected Passage “While they went off to buy it, the bridegroom came and those who were ready went into the wedding feast with him. Then the door was locked. Afterwards the other virgins came and said, 'Lord, Lord, open the door for us!' But he said in reply, 'Amen, I say to you, I do not know you.' Therefore, stay awake, for you know neither the day nor the hour.” (Mt. 25: 10-13)
Meditation: The parable tells the wise and the foolish virgins. Both groups went out to meet the bridegroom that took time in arriving. The wise ones went out to meet the bridegroom bringing flasks of oil, as well, while the foolish ones did not. And when the bridegroom arrived, the foolish ones were not around and they missed him.
We must, then, imitate the wise virgins who take things seriously, who are prepared to meet the Lord, anytime when he comes. They are prepared at anytime and they don’t scramble for things, when it is time to act. We cannot make God and others wait for us and let us stop being foolish! www.badaliyya.blogspot.com
DHIKR SIMPLE METHOD
Dhikr is an Arabic word which means REMEMBRANCE.
1st step: Write the text in your heart.
2nd step: Let the text remain always in on your lips and mind - RECITING the text silently as often as possible...
3rd step: Be attentive to the disclosure of the meaning/s of the text in your life.
Perhaps we had hurt that person, or he or she had hurt us, and it was never fully reconciled. Or we feel guilt, because while that person was alive, we should have given more of ourselves to him or her but were too busy with our own lives to reach out.
Worse still, perhaps someone has died for whom we had felt hatred and we should have made some gesture of reconciliation and we never did. Now it’s too late! Death has separated us, and some painful bitterness now lies irrevocably unresolved and we live with the guilt, wishing we had done something before it was too late.
But it’s not too late. It’s never too late if we take seriously the Christian doctrine of the communion of saints. To believe in the communion of saints is to believe that those who have died are still alive and are linked to us in such a way that we can continue to talk with them, that our relationship with them can continue to grow, and that the reconciliation that wasn’t possible before their deaths can now occur.
“Today you will be with me in paradise!” Jesus speaks those words to the good thief on the cross and they’re meant for every one of us who dies without yet fully being a saint and without having had the time and opportunity to make all the amends and speak all the apologies that we owe to others. There is still time after death, on both sides, for reconciliation and healing to happen because inside the communion of saints we have privileged access to each other and there we can finally speak all of those words that we couldn’t speak before. We can reach across death’s divide.
It can be a great consolation to die a happy death, snug and reconciled in the arms of love, with no unfinished business. But, happily, there’s time still after death for this to happen for those of us who aren’t so lucky and who end up dying with some bitterness, anger, wound, and frustration still gnawing away.
To read more click here or copy this address into your browser http://ronrolheiser.com/the-
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God of stillness and of quiet …
• Still my anxiety, my heartaches, my worries, and stop me from always being outside the present moment. Give me the grace to know that you have pronounced my name in love, that my name is written in heaven, that I am free to live without anxiety.
• Still my unrelenting need to be busy all the time, to occupy myself, to be always planning for tomorrow, to fill every minute with some activity, to seek distraction rather than quiet. Give me the grace to accept what circumstance and failure have dealt me.
• Still in me the fear I feel in the face of the powerful, dark forces that unconsciously threaten me. Give me the courage to face my darkness as well as my luminosity. Give me the grace to not be fearful before my own complexity.
• Still in me the congenital fear that I’m unloved, that I’m unlovable, that love has to be earned, that I need to be more worthy. Give me the grace to know that I’m a beloved child of a God whose love need not be earned.
• Still in me my false fear of you, my need to treat you like a distant and feared dignitary rather than as a warm friend. Give me the grace to relate to you in a robust way, as a trusted friend with whom I can jest, wrestle, and relate to in humor and intimacy.
• Still in me my doubts, my anxieties about your existence, about your concern, and about your fidelity. Give me the grace to trust, even in darkness and doubt, that you will give me immortality.
Still my heart so that I may know that you are God, that I may know that you create and sustain my every breath, that everyone, myself no less than everyone else, is your beloved. Nothing falls outside of your love and care, and that everything and everybody is safe in your gentle, caring hands, in this world and the next.
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Short Reflection for the Feast of All Saints
Readings: Revelations 7: 2-4, 9-14; 1 John 3: 1-3; Matthew 5: 1-12a
The Beatitudes: “Blessed are the poor; Blessed are they who mourn; Blessed are the meek; Blessed are they who hunger and thirst for righteousness; Blessed are the merciful; Blessed are the clean of heart; Blessed are the peacemakers; and Blessed are they who are persecuted for the sake of righteousness…” (Matthew 5: 7-9)
Meditation: The Beatitudes remain the daunting challenges for every disciple of Jesus Christ. They are the keys to true happiness and true HOLINESS that we all seek as sons and daughters of God. www.badaliyya.blogspot.com
DHIKR SIMPLE METHOD...
Dhikr is an Arabic word for remembrance. In the “tariqa” (the way) movement, dhikr developed into a form of prayer… It is a prayer of the heart… following three simple steps:
1. Write in one’s heart a certain passage of the Holy Writ…
2. Make the same passage ever present in one’s lips.
3. Then wait for God’s disclosure on the meaning of the passage…that interprets one’s life NOW…!
It takes a week of remembering (dhikr)…or even more days to relish the beauty of this method…
Short Reflection for the 31st Sunday of the Ordinary Time (A)
Readings: Malachi 1: 14b – 2:2b; 1Thessalonians 2: b – 9; Matthew 23: 1-12
Selected Passage: “They tie up heavy burdens (hard to carry) and lay them on people's shoulders, but they will not lift a finger to move them. (Matthew 23: 4)
Meditation: Three things to remember: Never put a heavy burden on people; Never ask people to do something that we never bother lift a finger to do it; and Never judge others that we shall not be judged! Beware of the yeast of the Pharisees. www.badaliyya.blogspot.com
DHIKR SIMPLE METHOD
Dhikr is an Arabic word which means REMEMBRANCE.
1st step: Write the text in your heart.
2nd step: Let the text remain always in on your lips and mind - RECITING the text silently as often as possible...
3rd step: Be attentive to the disclosure of the meaning/s of the text in your life.
Looking at how Mary gave birth to Christ, we see that it’s not something that’s done in an instant. Faith, like biology, also relies on a process that has a number of distinct, organic moments. What is the process by which we give birth to faith in the world?
First, like Mary, we need to get pregnant by the Holy Spirit. We need to let the word take such root in us that it begins to become part of our actual flesh.
Then, we have to lovingly gestate, nurture, and protect what is growing inside us until it’s sufficiently strong so that it can live on its own, outside us. Eventually, what we have nurtured and grown inside of us, when it is ready, must be given birth outside.
However, birth is only the beginning of motherhood. Mary gave birth to a baby, but she spent years nurturing, coaxing, and cajoling that infant into adulthood. The infant in the crib at Bethlehem is not yet the Christ who preaches, heals, and dies for us.
Finally, motherhood has still one more phase. As her child grows, matures, and takes on a personality and destiny of its own, the mother then must let herself be painfully stretched in understanding, and in letting go.
All of this is what Mary went through to give Christ to the world: Pregnancy by the Holy Spirit; gestation of that into a child inside of her; excruciating pain in birthing that to the outside; nurturing that new life into adulthood; and pondering, painfully letting go so that this new life can be its own, not hers.
Our task too is to give birth to Christ. From Mary we get the pattern: Let the word of God take root and make you pregnant; gestate that by giving it the nourishing sustenance of your own life; submit to the pain that is demanded for it to be born to the outside; then spend years coaxing it from infancy to adulthood; and finally, during and after all of this, do some pondering, accept the pain of not understanding and of letting go.
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Short Reflection
for the 28th Sunday of the Ordinary Time (A)
DHIKR SIMPLE METHOD
Dhikr is an Arabic
word which means REMEMBRANCE.
1st step: Write
the text in your heart.
2nd step: Let the
text remain always in on your lips and mind - RECITING the text silently as
often as possible...
3rd step: Be
attentive to the disclosure of the meaning/s of the text in your life.
Some were old, some were young; some were prepared, some were not; some welcomed it, some met it with bitter resistance; some died from natural causes, some died through violence; some died surrounded by love and loved ones, some died alone without any human love whatsoever surrounding them; some died peacefully, some died crying out in fear; some died at a ripe old age, some died in the prime of their youth or even before that; some suffered for years from seemingly meaningless dementia with those around them wondering why God and nature seemed to cruelly keep them alive; others in robust physical health with seemingly everything to live for took their own lives; some died full of faith and hope, and some died feeling only darkness and despair; some died breathing out gratitude, and some died breathing out resentment; some died in the embrace of religion and their churches, some died completely outside of that embrace.
Every one of them somehow managed it, the great unknown, the greatest of all unknowns.
Most people, I suspect, have the same experience that I do when I think about the dead, particularly about persons I have known who died. The initial grief and sadness of their loss eventually wears off and is replaced by an inchoate sense that it’s alright, that they are alright, and that death has in some strange way washed things clean.
In the end, we have a pretty good feeling about our dead loved ones and about the dead in general, even if their departure from this earth was far from ideal, as for instance if they died angry, or through immaturity, or because they committed a crime, or by suicide. Somehow it eventually all washes clean and what remains is the inchoate sense, a solid intuition, that wherever they are they are now in better and safer hands than our own.
Our faith tells us that, given the benevolence of the God we believe in, happiness awaits us.
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