NO CONDEMNATION

Sometime ago a friend gave me a book on Christian spirituality entitled: Everybody’s Normal Till You Get to Know Them. How true it is! Each of us has a history, has quirks and inconsistencies, faults and failings; each of us carries baggage.

There are times when we can be painfully aware of that baggage. Then the danger is that we hear the Word of God as condemnation, harshly telling us what we are not… rather than revealing what we can be, and as an invitation to respond more deeply to God’s liberating love.

God’s Word confronts and challenges me but never condemns me – there is always the promise of new beginnings. With Christ’s goodness every moment can be a fresh start.

Love draws, grace invites, mercy attracts…..

It is the knowledge that I am so loved and capable of much greater goodness that creates the desire in me to change. My own experience is that the more I believe in my inner storehouse of goodness, the more I want to become truly good.

Whatever spiritual practises you have committed yourself to this Lent, may they help heal the wounds shame and self-rejection inflict. 

May these days of grace open you more joyfully to a love no betrayal can destroy.

Advent - Making Room for Love

Diadochus of Photice was a fifth century bishop and mystic. In one of his sermons he said: "The measure of a person’s love for God depends upon how deeply aware that person is of God’s love for him or her.”

D0 you want to love the Lord more? Do you want this Advent-Christmastide period to be a time of  renewal in Christian discipleship? Then let God love you more!

In Advent we speak of making space within so that the Lord can find a welcome, an openness, and thus he "rebirths" in us. What forms that space, that welcome is the experience of a love that frees us to trust, to let go, to surrender.

Angela of Foligno, the Franciscan saint,  wife and mother, felt Christ say to her one day: "You create the capacity and I will make myself a torrent within you" - a torrent of light and love and joy. Our love for God will always be a response to a love eternally present.

The key is to let that love stretch the heart and increase our capacity for God's self-giving.

Then the gift of divine love can grow and the depth of our response can expand.

God loves all his lovers first.

Mary's Total Yes to Pure Gift

I want to share with you a reflection from Richard Rohr, OFM, on the giftedness in Mary's life.

"Mary is the archetype, the personification of the one who represents and sums up the entire mystery of received salvation. In her Immacualte Conception, before she had done anything right or wrong, she is chosen.

Look at the free election at the Annunciation; there is no mention of merit or worthiness. The Annunciation story is the crescendo point to Scripture’s theme of total grace and gift. Did you ever notice that Mary does not say she’s 'not worthy'? She only asks for clarification: 'How can this happen? I am a virgin'. She never asks if, whether, or why! That is quite extraordinary and reveals her ego-lessness. Mary becomes the archetype of perfect receptivity. It takes the entire Bible to work up to one perfect vessel that knows how to say an unquestioning yes to an utterly free gift

'Mary, do not be afraid, you have won God’s favour,' declares the angel Gabriel. The word favour doesn’t say anything about the recipient. Favour says something about the one who is doing the favouring. So it’s really not an evaluation of Mary. It’s saying something about God’s election of Mary. She is one who is the absolutely perfect receiver and refuses to play the 'Lord, I am not worthy' card that had become normative in most biblical theophanies. She simply states, 'Let it be done unto me.'

 She lets God do all the giving. Her job is to receive such perfect giving.

God does not love you because you are good; God loves you because God is good. God does not love you because you are good; you are good because God loves you."

Pope John Paul

Tomorrow Pope John Paul is to be beatified in Rome. Some believe it is too soon. Whatever you think about that there is no doubt this man, totally dedicated to the Christ, was used by the Lord to touch many, many lives.  Here's an example I came across recently.

'World Youth Day' saved my life", said the Canadian woman. 'I was 24 years old and had being living on the streets since I was 15. I had become an alocholic and a heroin addict.' Here she rolled up the sleeves of her blouse to reveal the scars of the needles. 'And I had become a prostitute to support my habit. I was dying, and I wanted to end it all.

The kids from a parish group who had always been nice to me, took me in, cleaned me up and invited me to come to Toronto with them to the World Youth Day. And there I met an old man who has changed my life. This old man told me he loved me. Oh, a lot of old men told me they loved me, for 15 minutes in the back seat of their cars. This old man meant it.

He told me God loved me, and that I'm actually God's work of art.

He told me that God who made the stars actually knows my name.

He told me God enjoys me so much he wants me to spend eternity with him, and that he sent his Son, Jesus, to help me get there.

This old man told me I actually share God's own life deep inside of me. This old man made sense. This old man got through to me. Now I want to live!'

That  'old man' was, of course, Pope John Paul. God's love was revealed though him and that poor young woman found new life in the divine goodness that liberates and gives us new beginnings.