Feast of Lucy, Martyr at Syracuse, 304 Commemoration of Samuel Johnson, Writer, Moralist, 1784 Why should men love the Church? Why should they love her laws? She tells them of Life and Death, and of all they would forget. She is tender where they would be hard, and hard where they like to be soft. She tells them of Evil and Sin, and other unpleasant facts. They constantly try to escape from the darkness outside and within By dreaming of systems so perfect that no one will need to be good.
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Commemoration of John Mason Neale, Priest, Poet, 1866 The word "carnal" is ambiguous. "Flesh" means sin and corruption, and read more
Commemoration of John Mason Neale, Priest, Poet, 1866 The word "carnal" is ambiguous. "Flesh" means sin and corruption, and is opposed to the Spirit; but embodiment, outward manifestation, concrete form, is not opposed to the Spirit. "Carnal" means sinful and hostile to God; the evil spirits, who we suppose possess no bodies, are carnal, but the Son of God became man, the Word was made flesh, He took upon Him a human body as well as a reasonable soul. God's ways and thoughts are not ours. While the abstract and ethereal imaginations of human reason create a god, who is not spirit, and whom they do not worship in spirit and truth, the God of the Bible is God manifest in the flesh -- Emmanuel... Did not Jesus, after His resurrection, eat before His disciples, who gave Him a piece of a broiled fish and honey? Is not the earth to be the scene of God's triumph and manifestation? Whatever is revealed in spiritual, whatever man imagines is carnal; the end of the ways of God is embodiment.
Feast of Antony of Egypt, Abbot, 356 Commemoration of Charles Gore, Bishop, Teacher, Founder of the Community of the Resurrection, read more
Feast of Antony of Egypt, Abbot, 356 Commemoration of Charles Gore, Bishop, Teacher, Founder of the Community of the Resurrection, 1932 In the pure soul, whether it sing or pray, The Christ is born anew from day to day. The life that knoweth Him shall bide apart And keep eternal Christmas in the heart.
Feast of the Holy Cross When you hear someone saying unworthy and hard words of you, then it is read more
Feast of the Holy Cross When you hear someone saying unworthy and hard words of you, then it is given to you to drink medicine for your soul from the cup of the Lord.
Feast of Hilary, Bishop of Poitiers, Teacher, 367 Commemoration of Kentigern (Mungo), Missionary Bishop in Strathclyde & Cumbria, 603 read more
Feast of Hilary, Bishop of Poitiers, Teacher, 367 Commemoration of Kentigern (Mungo), Missionary Bishop in Strathclyde & Cumbria, 603 Do not pray for tasks equal to your powers. Pray for powers equal to your tasks. Then the doing of your work shall be no miracle, but you yourself shall be the miracle.
The old pagans had to choose between a brilliant, jangling, irresponsible universe, alive with lawless powers, and the serene and read more
The old pagans had to choose between a brilliant, jangling, irresponsible universe, alive with lawless powers, and the serene and ordered universe of God and law. We modern pagans have to choose between that divine order, and the grey, dead, irresponsible, chaotic universe of atheism. And the tragedy is that we may make that choice without knowing it -- not by clear conviction but by vague drifting, by losing interest in Him. A nominal deist will say: "Yes, of course there must be some sort of Force that created the galaxy. But it's childish to imagine that It has any personal relation to me!" In that belief atheism exists as an undiagnosed disease. The man who says, "One God," and does not care, is an atheist in his heart. The man who speaks of God and will not recognize him in the burning bush -- that man is an atheist, though he speak with the tongues of men or angels, and appear in his pew every Sunday, and make large contributions to the church.
Verily, we know not what an evil it is to indulge ourselves, and to make an idol of our will... read more
Verily, we know not what an evil it is to indulge ourselves, and to make an idol of our will... Once I would make much ado, if I saw not the world carved and set in order to my liking; now I am silent, when I see God... is fattening and feeding the children of perdition. I pray God, I may never find my will again.
Commemoration of Rose of Lima, Contemplative, 1617 Fallacies about Christianity must always be faced as deterrents to right read more
Commemoration of Rose of Lima, Contemplative, 1617 Fallacies about Christianity must always be faced as deterrents to right living, and not merely as mistakes in the mind, for it is the effect they have on our actions which matters most. So soon as we abstract them from our lives and think of them only as faults in our mental machinery, we tend to embrace the greatest fallacy of all -- which is to think of Christianity as a way of looking at life instead of a way of changing it.
Once you make up your mind never to stand waiting and hesitating when your conscience tells you what you ought read more
Once you make up your mind never to stand waiting and hesitating when your conscience tells you what you ought to do, and you have got the key to every blessing that a sinner can reasonably hope for.
Feast of Hildegard, Abbess of Bingen, Visionary, 1179 Reading is good, hearing is good, conversation and meditation are read more
Feast of Hildegard, Abbess of Bingen, Visionary, 1179 Reading is good, hearing is good, conversation and meditation are good; but then, they are only good at times and occasions, in a certain degree, and must be used and governed with such caution as we eat and drink and refresh ourselves, or they will bring forth in us the fruits of intemperance. But the spirit of prayer is for all times and occasions; it is a lamp that is to be always burning, a light to be ever shining: everything calls for it; everything is to be done in it and governed by it, because it is and means and wills nothing else but the totality of the soul -- not doing this or that, but wholly ... given up to God to be where and what and how He pleases.
