MEDITATIONS
PRAYERS

Keep this in mind: religion is more about God loving us than us loving God, or loving others, or loving ourselves. The first thing we have to catch is that God loves us, now, as we are. Before doing anything else, we need simply to let ourselves be on the receiving end of the goodness of the Lord.

Bishop Ken Untener

Let us then labor for an inward stillness,
An inward stillness and an inward healing;
That perfect silence where the lips and heart
Are still, and we no longer entertain
Our own imperfect thoughts and vain opinions,
But God alone speaks in us, and we wait
In singleness of heart, that we may know
God's will, and in the silence of our spirit,
That we may do God's will and do that only.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, The Christus

Let all mortal flesh keep silence,
And with fear and trembling stand;
Ponder nothing earthly minded,
For with blessing in His hand,
Christ our God to earth descendeth,
Our full homage to demand.

King of kings, yet born of Mary,
As of old on earth He stood,
Lord of lords, in human vesture,
In the body and the blood;
He will give to all the faithful
His own self for heavenly food.

Rank on rank the host of heaven
Spreads its vanguard on the way,
As the Light of light descendeth
From the realms of endless day,
That the powers of hell may vanish
As the darkness clears away.

At His feet the six wingèd seraph,
Cherubim with sleepless eye,
Veil their faces to the presence,
As with ceaseless voice they cry:
Alleluia, Alleluia
Alleluia, Lord Most High!

Liturgy of Saint James, 4th century
translation by Gerard Moultrie, 1864

More than ever I find myself in the hands of God.
This is what I have wanted all my life from my youth.
But now there is a difference;
the initiative is entirely with God.
It is indeed a profound spiritual experience to know and feel myself so totally in God's hands.

Pedro Arrupe, SJ
after suffering a stroke, the effects of which he patiently endured for the last ten years of his life

Nothing is more practical than finding God, that is, falling in love in a quite absolute, final way. What you are in love with, what seizes your imagination, will affect everything. It will decide what will get you out of bed in the morning, what you will do with your evenings, how you will spend your weekends, what you read, who you know, what breaks your heart, and what amazes you with joy and gratitude. Fall in love, stay in love, and it will decide everything.

attributed to Pedro Arrupe, SJ

Spirituality consists not in becoming more and more responsible in the fulfillment of a duty, but in becoming more and more faithful in a love relationship.

K. M. Dyckman and L. P. Carroll, Inviting the Mystic