Feast of Timothy and Titus, Companions of Paul Commemoration of Dorothy Kerin, Founder of the Burrswood Healing Community, 1963 Social enthusiasms have such power today, they raise people so effectively to the supreme degree of heroism in suffering and death, that I think it is as well that a few sheep should remain outside the fold in order to bear witness that the love of Christ is essentially something different.
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Feast of Dominic, Priest, Founder of the Order of Preachers, 1221 Continuing a short series of verse on Christ: If read more
Feast of Dominic, Priest, Founder of the Order of Preachers, 1221 Continuing a short series of verse on Christ: If it be all for naught, for nothingness At last, why does God make the world so fair? Why spill this golden splendor out across The western hills, and light the silver lamp Of eve? Why give me eyes to see, and soul To love so strong and deep? Then, with a pang This brightness stabs me through, and wakes within Rebellious voice to cry against all death? Why set this hunger for eternity To gnaw my heartstrings through, if death ends all? If death ends all, then evil must be good, Wrong must be right, and beauty ugliness. God is a Judas who betrays His Son, And with a kiss, damns all the world to hell, -- If Christ rose not again. ... Unknown soldier, killed in World War I August 9, 2002 Feast of Mary Sumner, Founder of the Mothers' Union, 1921 Concluding a short series of verse on Christ: With this ambiguous earth his dealings have been told us. These abide: The signal to a maid, the human birth, The lesson, and the young Man crucified. But not a star of all the innumerable host of stars has heard How he administered this terrestrial ball. Our race has kept their Lord's entrusted Word. Of his earth-visiting feet none knows the secret, cherished, perilous, The terrible, shamefast, frightened, whispered, sweet, Heart-shattering secret of his way with us. No planet knows that this, our wayside planet, carrying land and wave, Love and life multiplied, and pain and bliss, Bears, as its chief treasure, one forsaken grave. Nor, in our little day, may his devices with the heavens be guessed, His pilgrimage to thread the Milky Way Or his bestowal there be manifest. But in the eternities, doubtless we shall compare Together, hear a million alien Gospels, in what guise He trod the Pleiades, the Lyre, and the Bear. O, be prepared, my soul! To read the inconceivable, to scan The million forms of God those stars unroll When, in our turn, we show to them a Man.
Millions of hells of sinners cannot come near to exhaust infinite grace.
Millions of hells of sinners cannot come near to exhaust infinite grace.
He that asks me what heaven is, means not to hear me, but to silence me; He knows I cannot read more
He that asks me what heaven is, means not to hear me, but to silence me; He knows I cannot tell him. When I meet him there, I shall be able to tell him, and then he will be as able to tell me; yet then we shall be but able to tell one another. This, this that we enjoy is heaven, but the tongues of Angels, the tongues of glorified Saints, shall not be able to express what that heaven is; for, even in heaven our faculties shall be finite.
The Christian ideal has not been tried and found wanting. It has been found difficult; and left untried.
The Christian ideal has not been tried and found wanting. It has been found difficult; and left untried.
Feast of George Herbert, Priest, Poet, 1633 Come, my Way, my Truth, my Life : Such a Way, as gives read more
Feast of George Herbert, Priest, Poet, 1633 Come, my Way, my Truth, my Life : Such a Way, as gives us breath : Such a Truth, as ends all strife : And such a Life as killeth death. Come, my Light, my Feast, my Strength : Such a Light, as shows a feast : Such a Feast, as mends in length : Such a Strength, as makes his guest. Come, my Joy, my Love, my Heart : Such a Joy, as none can move : Such a Love, as none can part : Such a Heart, as joyes in love.
Feast of Christina Rossetti, Poet, 1894 A Better Resurrection I have no wit, no words, no tears; My heart read more
Feast of Christina Rossetti, Poet, 1894 A Better Resurrection I have no wit, no words, no tears; My heart within me like a stone Is numbed too much for hopes or fears. Look right, look left, I dwell alone; I lift mine eyes, but dimmed with grief No everlasting hills I see; My life is in the falling leaf: O Jesus, quicken me. My life is like a faded leaf, My harvest dwindled to a husk: Truly my life is void and brief And tedious in the barren dusk; My life is like a frozen thing, No bud nor greenness can I see: Yet rise it shall--the sap of spring; O Jesus, rise in me. My life is like a broken bowl, A broken bowl that cannot hold One drop of water for my soul Or cordial in the searching cold; Cast in the fire the perished thing; Melt and remould it, till it be A royal cup for Him, my King: O Jesus, drink of me.
Feast of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Teacher, Martyr, 1945 It is not experience of life but experience of the Cross that read more
Feast of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Teacher, Martyr, 1945 It is not experience of life but experience of the Cross that makes one a worthy hearer of confessions. The most experienced psychologist or observer of human nature knows infinitely less of the human heart than the simplest Christian who lives beneath the Cross of Jesus. The greatest psychological insight, ability, and experience cannot grasp this one thing: what sin is. Worldly wisdom knows what distress and weakness and failure are, but it does not know the godlessness of men. And so it also does not know that man is destroyed only by his sin and can be healed only by forgiveness. Only the Christian knows this. In the presence of a psychiatrist I can only be a sick man; in the presence of a Christian brother, I can dare to be a sinner.
Continuing a series on the person of Jesus: When Christ was in the world, He was despised by men; read more
Continuing a series on the person of Jesus: When Christ was in the world, He was despised by men; in the hour of need He was forsaken by acquaintances and left by friends to the depths of scorn. He was willing to suffer and to be despised; do you dare to complain of anything? He had enemies and defamers; do you want everyone to be your friend, your benefactor? How can your patience be rewarded if no adversity tests it? How can you be a friend of Christ if you are not willing to suffer any hardship? Suffer with Christ and for Christ if you wish to reign with Him. Had you but once entered into perfect communion with Jesus or tasted a little of His ardent love, you would care nothing at all for your own comfort or discomfort but would rejoice in the reproach you suffer; for love of Him makes a man despise himself. ... Thomas à Kempis, Of the Imitation of Christ May 11, 2000 Concluding a series on the person of Jesus: Jesus' good news, then, was that the Kingdom of God had come, and that he, Jesus, was its herald and expounder to men. More than that, in some special and mysterious was, he was the kingdom.
Commemoration of Sundar Singh of India, Sadhu, Evangelist, Teacher, 1929 From time immemorial men have quenched their thirst with read more
Commemoration of Sundar Singh of India, Sadhu, Evangelist, Teacher, 1929 From time immemorial men have quenched their thirst with water without knowing anything about its chemical constituents. In like manner we do not need to be instructed in all the mysteries of doctrine, but we do need to receive the Living Water which Jesus Christ will give us and which alone can satisfy our souls.
