The Lord who is to come.

My friend in Christ, during these weeks of Advent we open the morning Liturgy of the Hours with the Invitatory antiphon which says, "Come, let us worship the Lord, the King who is to come." During this season of waiting for the Lord that leads us into the Christmas Celebration of the Birth of the Christ Child, the Church officially proclaims Her faith in Christ the Lord who is to come. How beautiful it is to pray with joy to Him who promised us His coming, when all evil will be banished from this beautiful planet and all creation will be restored to it's full glory with the freedom of the sons of God. This advent season is a time of joy, when all God's faithful children prepare for the coming of His Divine Son. G.K. Chesterton once said that peace and joy constitutes the greatest secret of Christianity. Those in whom the Lord dwells are filled with peace and joy in the knowledge that with every passing day the Church, the people of God, draws ever nearer to that Glorious day when God's promise will be fulfilled. These are the words of St. Peter in 2Peter 3:13. "But according to his promise we are waiting for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells." Let us enter into the spirit of the season and await with joyful hope the coming of the Lord, the Prince of peace.

The Jew Who Died For Me.

Dear friend, let us reflect in silence on this Good Friday, on the God who dared to die for us. He became flesh and did not spare His own life, but gave it up for the benefit of us all.
Let us look at Him crucified and weep in gratitude for what He has done for us.

Who is this man I see,
Covered in blood and sorrow,
Crowned with a crown of thorns,
That I may live tomorrow.

Why has He been condemned,
Scourged, mocked,
And crucified.
Weeping for love,
So cruelly denied.

He is the Christ, the Son of Mary,
He is the Lord I see,
The God made Man.
The Jew who died for me.

Lent, a time to weep with God.

My dear friend, Christ died for you and me because of His great love for us. This is a mystery and a gift that we can hardly comprehend. During this holy time of Lent we start the morning Divine Office with the great antiphon; "Come let us worship Christ the Lord, who for our sake endured temptation and suffering." then we read in the accompanying psalm, (psalm 95) "He made the sea, it belongs to Him, the dry land too, for it was formed by His hands." The One who owns the sea and the whole planet, and every star and planet in the whole universe, He who made all these things, and who by His providence guides the universe and all that is in it every moment, even as I write, and as you read at this very moment. He who is Almighty and All Knowing, has endured temptation and suffering for our sake. My friend, love can only be repaid by love. He does not necessarily expect big things from us, for He knows how small we are, but He expects small acts of great love from us, for He has put in us the capacity to love, to will to obey Him, to adore Him by everything we do at every moment of our lives. What an awesome way to live, to spend every moment of our lives in His presence and in His friendship, knowing that after these few short years of suffering in this earthly life, He has promised us endless days with Him in eternal, infinity glory, beholding Him who has no beginning and no end. Eternal incomprehensible beauty. St. Paul says "no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the human heart conceived, what God has prepared for those who love him" (1Cor. 2:9)
And so let us make good use of this period of Lent, who knows, it may be our last. God is inviting us to share in His weeping and the weeping of the Most Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of His Mother, who suffered so much with Him. We do not have to look very hard to see many things in this world that cause His Sacred Heart to weep. And so we weep and suffer now by accepting all that God sends us, silently singing in our hearts, "Jesus, remember me when You come into Your Kingdom."