Advent Meditations: Thursday 14 December
| Thu Dec 14 |
am: 37:1-18 pm: 37:19-42 |
Amos 9:1-10 | Rev 2:8-17 | Matt 23:13-26 |
THURSDAY OF ADVENT II
NOTES ON THE LITURGICAL CALENDAR: Feast of St John of the Cross – Mystic and Teacher of the Faith, 1591 – born in 1542 as Juan de Yepes Álvarez, he was a Spanish mystic, Catholic saint, Carmelite friar and priest, born at Fontiveros, Old Castile. Saint John of the Cross was a reformer of the Carmelite Order and is considered, along with Saint Teresa of Ávila, as a founder of the Discalced Carmelites. In reforming the Order, he came to experience the price of reform: increasing opposition, misunderstanding, persecution, imprisonment. This could have produced a bitter cynic. Instead it gave birth to a compassionate mystic, who left us many books of practical advice on spiritual growth and prayer that are just as relevant today as they were then. These books include: Ascent of Mount Carmel, Dark Night of the Soul and A Spiritual Canticle of the Soul.
SCRIPTURAL MEDITATION: – In the lesson from Revelation for we again an important reflection on the state of the church, which we could easily dismiss as an historical reference, but it is not!
Rather we have an insight of a church in trouble. The Church in Smyrna 9 (which means “myrrh) was being crushed through persecution. It was tough to be a Christian in Smyrna because they had to live constantly between two extremes. There was within the church a rich and loving fellowship which must have greatly warmed their hearts and strengthened their faith, but outside, in the city, they faced continuous persistent hostility. The Christians of Smyrna lived within these two extremes not unlike many Christians today around the world. While Smyrna was enduring persecution; Pergamum was faced with enticement and corruption. The options to flee the faith then and now are still the same persecution and intimidation or enticement and temptation. It is either the violence of a roaring lion or the corruption of an angel of light. We in this Advent journey run the same risk. If we live the power of Advent we risk persecution of the secularist who are either against any holy day or the secularist who seek to do persecute any symbols of the faith in this season. The temptation is to live into the materialist message like Pegamum. This passage highlights well for us the polemics we face.
PRAYER: O Gracious Lord, give me the ability to see good things in unexpected places
and talents in unexpected people; and give, O Lord, the grace to tell them so. Amen.
(Prayer of St. Teresa of Avila)
Spiritual Discipline/Activity – Read Chapter IV from Dark Night of Soul by St. John of the Cross http://www.ccel.org/ccel/john_cross/dark_nightl In this chapter, St. John discusses the imperfections which we are apt to have with luxury. An Important message in this season of consumerism.
ANCIENT WISDOM/PRESENT GRACE: “This soul is so near to God that it is transformed in the flames of love, wherein Father, Son and Holy Spirit communicate themselves to it. The effect of the living flames is to make the soul live spiritually in God, and experience the life of God. — St. John of the Cross, Living Flame of Love (Stanza 1: #6 and #8).
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