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ugh

Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner.

i'm up in the woods i'm down on my mind i'm building a still to slow down the time

#i'm up in the woods #i'm down on my mind #i'm building a still #to slow down the time

Livestream of the ordination of the soon-to-be new bishop of the diocese of Tulsa, taking place on the campus of TU.

http://www.bishopkonderlaordination.com/#!live-video/x3p68

On Tuesday, Fr. James Martin, the Jesuit journalist and editor-at-large of America, posted a video on Facebook about the recent massacre in Orlando. In his video, Fr. Martin expresses his dismay over the responses of the American Catholic bishops, not because the bishops failed to express sorrow, outrage, and solidarity with those suffering, but because they did not direct their condolences explicitly to the LGBT community.

“Fr. Martin says that gay people are ‘invisible’ in the Church. To an extent, he is right—the Church, like Christ, refuses to mistake the mirage of sin and ideology for the reality of the people it encounters. What it sees is only each child of God: suffering, waiting, longing for absolution, created for the possibility of eternal union with God.”

Spiritual Desolation

The time of spiritual desolation is also a time for being resigned. When a soul begins to cultivate the spiritual life, God usually showers his consolations upon her to wean her away from the world; but when he sees her making solid progress, he withdraws his hand to test her and to see if she will love and serve him without the reward of sensible consolations. “In this life,” as St. Teresa used to say, “our lot is not to enjoy God, but to do his holy will.” And again, “Love of God does not consist in experiencing his tendernesses, but in serving him with resolution and humility.” And in yet another place, “God’s true lovers are discovered in times of aridity and temptation.”

Let the soul thank God when she experiences his loving endearments, but let her not repine when she finds herself left in desolation. It is important to lay great stress on this point, because some souls, beginners in the spiritual life, finding themselves in spiritual aridity, think God has abandoned them, or that the spiritual life is not for them; thus they give up the practice of prayer and lose what they have previously gained. The time of aridity is the best time to practice resignation to God’s holy will. I do not say you will feel no pain in seeing yourself deprived of the sensible presence of God; it is impossible for the soul not to feel it and lament over it, when even our Lord cried out on the cross: “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” In her sufferings, however, the soul should always be resigned to God’s will.

The saints have all experienced desolations and abandonment of soul. “How impervious to things spiritual, my heart!” cries a St. Bernard. “No savor in pious reading, no pleasure in meditation nor in prayer!” For the most part it has been the common lot of the saints to encounter aridities; sensible consolations were the exceptions. Such things are rare occurrences granted to untried souls so that they may not halt on the road to sanctity; the real delights and happiness that will constitute their reward are reserved for heaven. This earth is a place of merit which is acquired by suffering; heaven is a place of reward and happiness. Hence, in this life the saints neither desired nor sought the joys of sensible fervor, but rather the fervor of the spirit toughened in the crucible of suffering. “O how much better it is,” says St. John of Avila, “to endure aridity and temptation by God’s will than to be raised to the heights of contemplation without God’s will!”

But you say you would gladly endure desolation if you were certain that it comes from God, but you are tortured by the anxiety that your desolation comes by your own fault and is a punishment for your tepidity. Very well, let us suppose you are right; then get rid of your tepidity and exercise more diligence in the affairs of your soul. But because you are possibly experiencing spiritual darkness, are you going to get all wrought up, give up prayer, and thus make things twice as bad as they are?

Let us assume that this aridity is a punishment for your tepidity. Was it not God who sent it? Accept your desolation, as your just desserts and unite yourself to God’s holy will. Did you not say that you merited hell? And now you are complaining? Perhaps you think God should send you consolations! Away with such ideas and be patient under God’s hand. Take up your prayers again and continue to walk in the way you have entered upon; for the future, fear lest such laments come from too little humility and too little resignation to the will of God. Therefore be resigned and say: “Lord, I accept this punishment from thy hands, and I accept it for as long as it pleases thee; if it be thy will that I should be thus afflicted for all eternity, I am satisfied.” Such a prayer, though hard to make, will be far more advantageous to you than the sweetest sensible consolations. It is well to remember, however, that aridity is not always a chastisement; at times it is a disposition of divine providence for our greater spiritual profit and to keep us humble. Lest St. Paul become vain on account of the spiritual gifts he had received, the Lord permitted him to be tempted to impurity: “And lest the greatness of the revelations should exalt me, there was given me a sting of my flesh, an angel of Satan to buffet me.”

Prayer made amid sensible devotion is not much of an achievement: “There is a friend, a companion at the table, and he will not abide in the day of distress.” You would not consider the casual guest at your table a friend, but only him who assists you in your need without thought of benefit to himself. When God sends spiritual darkness and desolation, his true friends are known.

Palladius, the author of the “Lives of the Fathers of the Desert,” experiencing great disgust in prayer, went seeking advice from the abbot Macarius. The saintly abbot gave him this counsel: “When you are tempted in times of dryness to give up praying because you seem to be wasting your time, say: ‘Since I cannot pray, I will be satisfied just to remain on watch here in my cell for the love of Jesus Christ!’ “Devout soul, you do the same when you are tempted to give up prayer just because you seem to be getting nowhere. Say: “I am going to stay here just to please God.” St. Francis de Sales used to say that if we do nothing else but banish distractions and temptations in our prayers, the prayer is well made. Tauler states that persevering prayer in time of dryness will receive greater grace than prayer made amid great sensible devotion. Rodriguez cites the case of a person who persevered forty years in prayer despite aridity, and experienced great spiritual strength as a result of it; on occasion, when through aridity he would omit meditation he felt spiritually weak and incapable of good deeds. St. Bonaventure and Gerson both say that persons who do not experience the recollection they would like to have in their meditations, often serve God better than they would do if they did have it; the reason is that lack of recollection keeps them more diligent and humble; otherwise they would become puffed up with spiritual pride and grow tepid, vainly believing they had reached the summit of sanctity.

What has been said of dryness holds true of temptations also. Certainly we should strive to avoid temptations; but if God wishes that we be tempted against faith, purity, or any other virtue, we should not give in to discouraging lamentations, but submit ourselves with resignation to God’s holy will. St. Paul asked to be freed from temptations to impurity and our Lord answered him, saying: “My grace is sufficient for thee.” So should we act when we find ourselves victims of unrelenting temptations and God seemingly deaf to our prayers. Let us then say: “Lord, do with me, let happen to me what thou wilt; thy grace is sufficient for me. Only never let me lose this grace.” Consent to temptation, not temptation of itself, can make us lose the grace of God. Temptation resisted keeps us humble, brings us greater merit, makes us have frequent recourse to God, thus preserving us from offending him and unites us more closely to him in the bonds of his holy love.

Uniformity With God’s Will St. Alphonsus de Ligouri

http://www.goodcatholicbooks.org/alphonsus/uniformity-with-god%27s-will.html

#desolation

Reddit: “What is the most crushing thing anyone has said to you?”

I reached out to several people today and forgave--some had caused me major injury, others minor. Two of whom come nearly always to mind when I pray the words “as we forgive those who trespass against us”--two people who have hurt me very deeply, and whom I have likewise hurt.

I feared wrath in response. I feared silence. I feared “okay, thanks” or some other variant--fearing that they would feel justified in themselves through my act of forgiveness and humility.

But such a mentality makes it no longer an act of humility, but of pride--pride that I might feel right, the pride of expecting an apology in return. The pride of feeling like a holy martyr of detachment and mercy in the face of potential wrath.

God saw all humanity at once, all sin, all corruption, and embraced it all the more.

God sees my future sins each time I flee to confession, and forgives wholeheartedly.

Christ forgave those mocking Him, even as they continued to spit.

His charity demanded change, but such was not a condition for forgiveness.

Let me be as bare, as wounded, as vulnerable, as humiliated as You were.

The anger must end.

A great part of me wanted to launch into detail as to why I forgave--what specifically they’d done to me that merited such an act, just how much it stretched and strained me to set aside all things, all things, and forgive. For them to see what they’d done, and just how great a sacrifice it is to forgive.

Forgiveness with the expectation that the other will realize what they’d done, apologize, and beg forgiveness is no forgiveness at all.

The one who responded did so initially with suspicion, which turned into gratitude and surprise. It was positive, and forgiveness was extended to me as well. But it wasn’t long, it wasn’t involved, it wasn’t, as some might say, “juicy” or “satisfactory”. It was, to this person, a pleasant surprise. And that was that.

But how often do I go to confession, take freely of the forgiveness offered me, and not realize what all was behind said forgiveness--how much effort, how much pain, the context of my sin within the perfection of God? How often is my recognition of the Cross obscured by how frequently and freely such forgiveness is offered to me? How often do I just say within my soul, “Huh. Mercy. I’ll take it,” and not recognize the weight of the cross carried for me? Being on the giving end of such a dynamic is not a nice feeling, I’m learning.

I did not feel the weight lifted off my shoulders, I did not feel that all was suddenly well--the continual forgiveness seventy-seven times seven times is a load I am still carrying. But it is a load I refuse to set down.

Teach me to be generous, to serve as You deserve: to give and not to count the cost, to fight and not to heed the wounds, to toil and not to seek for rest, to labor and not to ask for reward, save that of knowing I am doing Your will.

I miss Ash Wednesday, the Western liturgical churches’ entry into Lent. The ashes on the forehead in the shape of the Cross, the . . . .

"Lent calls us to spiritual perfection, which is impossible without love and forgiveness. Thus before Lent begins, we are called to forgive all who have wronged us. Only then can we hope to attain perfection, which is the likeness of God.”

Archimandrite Vassilios Papavassiliou, Meditations for Great Lent

Mercy is not a cool, casual idea of forgiveness. It is not a condescending 'looking down' upon these imperfect companions of ours and agreeing we should put up with these things. This already indicates that we have placed ourselves on a higher plane and we simply 'put up' with these people. This is not compassion, com-pati, 'to suffer with'. Compassion is to take the person as she is into the embrace of our love and our spirit. It is to enter into her imperfections and her sufferings. This is what mercy really is. If we do not have this kind of love for one another, we cannot have compassion for our Divine Spouse in His sufferings.

Mother Mary Francis, “A Time of Renewal: Daily Reflections for the Lenten Season”

Awake, my soul; awake, lyre and harp! I will wake the dawn.

Psalm 57

ternionbpd

does anyone else have Some Thing that happened a while back that they get really upset/angry about and as far as that other person knows, that matter is ‘settled’. but thats not how it feels to you, it doesnt feel settled, that wasnt enough, and every so often you get severely depressed or a bout of rage over it and you want to Start Shit again.

Absolute apathy and coldness from someone who used to be one of your best and dearest friends is the worst feeling I’ve ever felt, and I’ve felt it too often this past year. I don’t wish that feeling upon my worst enemy.

bagelbitesofficial

katholikos

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When the truth is that the bubble burst

It came back to haunt me that I passed you by

I’ve gotta tell you in my loudest tones that I’m tired and started looking for your open arms.

medlei-deactivated20160729

—— ★ t h e g r e a t s e a (wind waker)

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