Vincentian Reflections

Vincentian Reflections2019-02-19T18:29:31+00:00
1411, 2023

November 19 – Thirty-third Sunday in Ordinary Time

From the Deacon’s Desk:  Prayer and Inspirational Thoughts

Through our Baptism God gives to each of us a share in His kingdom and graces us with gifts to share in bringing that kingdom forward.  Some choose to use the gifts given them to enhance and shed light on God’s glory.  Others choose to just get by – or to hold their gifts to share for another time – when they have time.  The problem is, we don’t know what time it is!  Paul warns us though that our Lord is much more 9be like the ‘worthy wife’ working with a passion to protect our relationship to God.  She is industrious, charitable and prayerful.  But she goes beyond the basics of her family because she has a dedication to the Lord.  She extends herself to the poor and represents truly virtuous work. We the Church, are the bride of Christ – the worthy wife.

Our gospel tells us that work is a part of our service to the Lord.  But work that reaches for its full potential.  Our work is an important aspect of our response to God’s offer of grace and salvation to us.  When we respond with virtuous work, we find ourselves living in consistency with our faith life.  Paul tells us that living in light – living in faith – is how preparation for the end time impacts our life right now.  For we recognize that Christ is in our midst now, in the heart and soul of each believer – in the worth and dignity of each human being.  Every human encounter we experience is an opportunity to experience Christ.  We are graced by His presence, prepared by His presence, and live in His presence.

As Vincentians, we extend ourselves to the poor daily that we might have those intimate encounters with Christ.  It is virtuous work that we do when we do it with charity, prayerfully, extending ourselves to the fullness of our potential given to us by Christ’s presence.  God has called us to be trusted servants using our talents to serve one another and His kingdom as good stewards of His grace.  He looks for us to do so with trust in Him and passion for His people.   Do I take the gifts God graces me with and share them fully, using them to encounter Him ever more deeply in the poor?  Am I willing to extend myself for others as Christ extended himself for me?

Father, give me the courage to love as you loved.  Allow me to use all the gifts you have given to me, humbly realizing that they are your gifts given freely that I might encounter you through their use. Grace me with the ability to trust in your Providence as I minister in your name.  Help me to engage fully with others, prayerfully considering how to extend fully in charity and love.  Let me see your face that I may know your love.   I pray all of this in your Son’s name.  Amen

Deacon Mike

711, 2023

November 12 – Thirty-second Sunday in Ordinary Time

From the Deacon’s Desk:  Prayer and Inspirational Thoughts

“Stay awake!  For you do not know the time or hour.”  Our readings this week provide us a clear warning to be prepared for the end time to come.  We should not wait, for we do not know the time or hour.  These readings harken back to the first gospel of the year which offered the same warning.   This is also an invitation as well.  An invitation to enter into a relationship with God, but we need to prepare and ’have our lamps properly trimmed.’  Between that first reading of the year and now, our readings have continued the narrative of how we enter fully into a relationship with God.  It is important that we listen and respond that we might not be surprised by His coming.

Our parable portrays Christ as the bridegroom and the virgins as Christians waiting for His return.  Some are vigilant and wise.  Others are foolish and ill prepared.  The Christians suffered for their faith much as we do today, and they were tempted to disappointment.  We wait for Jesus to come and wonder where He is. The parable calls us to vigilance, preparedness and watchfulness.  We must stay alert, remain awake and be prepared for His coming.  When we hear this, we think of His coming as the moment of death.  We should not limit ourselves though only to thinking of the time Jesus comes as that moment of death.

We need to be prepared in the here and now because, in many ways now is when heaven begins for us.  Christ comes into our life every day.  Do we stay alert to see Him, to hear Him, to respond to His presence?  He comes in the hungry, the thirsty, the sick and the imprisoned.  He comes in the homeless, the refugees and the oppressed.  We must not get distracted and fall asleep in the waiting, in the suffering, in the fear of tragedies.  We are called to respond with love and mercy – as He did on the cross.  We are called to wait in hope that what Jesus has promised will come to be.

What helps us to stay awake and alert to what is happening in our lives – to see the presence of Christ?  We must have patience as we wait for God.  Persistence and prayer – vigilant prayer – should form our foundation.  We must be prepared to respond with works of mercy, acts of justice and forgiveness, picking up our crosses to ‘come and follow Him!’ 

As Vincentians, this is what our vocation is about – staying engaged and staying awake.  Daily being aware of the presence of God, the suffering of others (and ourselves) and the grace of God’s mercy working in the midst of that suffering.  It is here – with the vulnerable and the poor – where Jesus took up residence.  It is here where we find holiness.  It is that holiness – on a daily basis – which we seek.  Am I fully invested in my ministry and vocation with SVdP?  Or do I only ‘do SVdP’ a day or two or three a week?   Do I fully embrace my ministry, making it a complete part of who I am or is it ‘an oil lamp’ not fully trimmed?

Father, Infuse my heart with a deep desire to always seek you and please you.  Help me to stay alert; help me to stay engaged; help me to make your constant love for the vulnerable and poor my love as well, that I might always gaze at your compassion and mercy.   Grace me with the virtues of zeal, selflessness and gentleness that I may continually give of myself with passion and kindness to those who are in need.   Connect my suffering to theirs and to yours that it may help me to stay continually awake to your eternal hope. I pray all of this in your Son’s name.  Amen

Deacon Mike

3110, 2023

November 5 – Thirty-first Sunday in Ordinary Time

From the Deacon’s Desk:  Prayer and Inspirational Thoughts

“Call no one on earth your Father; you have but one Father in heaven…you have but one master, the Christ!” Our readings this weekend go to the very heart of all the virtues – the virtue of humility.  Our motivation for all that we do and say counts – and our motivation should always be to love and serve God above all else.   We need to recognize there is but one Father – one source of truth.  Sometimes it can be easy to lose sight of what the liturgy is about.  We see in non-Catholic faiths – the phenomenon of ‘superstars.’  Billy Graham, Joel Osteen, Robert Schuller, Jerry Falwell, Jim Bakker, and so many others.  The service and their church become about the personality and the show.  But Jesus is telling us – do not allow the personality to become the focus.  Don’t allow our motivation to become the worship of some personality, our own glory, or anything other than to love and serve God above all else. When we do, then we feed our pride and allow that deadliest of sin into our lives.  It can happen in the Catholic Church just as well when the priest, the music, the décor or the socials become our focus.

When it comes to practicing our faith, and when it comes to the liturgy, God is and must be the show.  God is the sole reason we go to church.  Church is not about us.  It is not about how holy we are. It is not about what we get out of it – it is about what we put into it.   It is about God and giving him glory and honor.  It is about his son who sacrificed all for us and it is about being joined to him through the Eucharist that we might gain the strength to live out his word.  It is about coming to the banquet ready and willing to be fed.  And when we do that when we fully open ourselves to his love, he will grace us with goodness and love – he graces us with his son Jesus Christ, who dwells within us.  Through the Eucharist, he comes to us and dwells in us and gives us the ability to conquer those things within our lives that hold us back from living as he taught us.   It is not a single priest or personality who brings the liturgy before 1.3 billion Catholic people around the world that we might join together with one voice giving glory to God.  It is only through the one source of truth, the Father, and the sacrifice of the Son who humbled himself on the cross

God is calling us ever more to humility, to love of him and others, to obedience, to prayer and to service.  He calls us to be authentic – to take off our masks, to stop pretending, to acknowledge to ourselves and to God those obstacles which are holding us back, and to start redoubling our efforts to love and serve the Lord.  Through our liturgy we are fed that we might go out and feed others.  Recognizing the one source of truth, let us follow the path he has shown us that we might join in his eternal banquet.

As Vincentians, humility is our greatest virtue.  Vincent calls us to seek growth in holiness through service to the poor.  The motivation for that service to the poor needs to always be born out of our love for God and desire to serve him.  Our love of neighbor must first be about our love of God.  We must continually remind ourselves that everything we do is a grace from God and is for His glory.  Do we forget sometimes that it is only through God’s grace that we are able to do anything?

Father, bathe me in humility that I may never lose sight of your love for me and my love for you.  Help me always to focus only on serving and loving you.  Each day Father, a little more of you and a little less of me.  Let my pride diminish and your presence increase.   I pray all of this in your Son’s name.  Amen

Deacon Mike

2410, 2023

October 29 – Thirtieth Sunday in Ordinary Time

From the Deacon’s Desk:  Prayer and Inspirational Thoughts

Our first reading from Exodus speaks to the Covenant Code to which the Jewish people are called to live.  It deals specifically with the treatment that was to be given to the legally helpless and defenseless.   They are to be treated fairly.  Your position of power over them gives you no right to take advantage of them.  This would resonate with the Jewish people who had earlier been led out of Egypt and found themselves many times to be the oppressed and not the oppressor.  It is an issue that we still deal with today in the Middle East.  We should all take note that we are called to treat others fairly and avoid the temptation to abuse power.

Our commitment to God is not just a personal relationship but also links us to everyone else who shares in the faith.  We have to be willing to let others see and witness our faith lived out.  We cannot just love God part time, we have to love Him with everything we have. We cannot just be good to our neighbor sometimes, we have to treat our neighbors in the same way that we care for ourselves.

 “You shall love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.  This is the greatest and the first commandment.  The second is like it:  you shall love your neighbor as yourself.”  Who is your neighbor that Jesus is thinking about?  Is it the person you know and love, your arch nemesis who you despise or someone else?  Of course it is all of them, but our first reading gives us greater clarity about who Jesus is concerned with – “An alien, a widow or orphan, your poor neighbors.”  In short, it is those who you do not know, you do not think about, and who have no power.  They are legally helpless and defenseless.  We not only have a responsibility to love them; we are to care for them, treat them with respect, dignity and mercy – just as God treats us.  God gives the poor, the vulnerable, and the defenseless the right to cry out in their need – and He tasks those who are holy and blessed to respond to their cry.  This may actually be our biggest challenge – to care for those who provide no earthly benefit to us for having cared for them.  To love them first and foremost with and from our heart, then our soul, and lastly our mind.  They can do nothing for us – except help us to grow in holiness.

The heart of Christian morality is the desire to love God fully, completely, and to love others as unique reflections of God’s love.  Jesus is not calling us to be minimalists. He is calling us to love God and our neighbor completely, without counting the cost.  Our faith should be obvious by the choices we make day in and day out.  It is not about trying to make ourselves look good – or promoting ourselves, but it is all about promoting God.  We should trumpet the goodness of God to all we encounter that they may share in His love.

As Vincentians, we deal every day with those who are vulnerable, poor, and defenseless.  Do we embrace their pain and make it our own?  Do we help them so that we can feel better about ourselves – or so they can find a better place in life?  Do we seek only to give them charity, or do we seek justice for them as well?  Do we approach them with dignity and respect, offering them trust as we ask them to trust us?  Do we trust in God’s love for them and us, to bind us as brothers and sisters seeking to lift each other up?

Father, never let me take my eyes off of you!  You are my all – everything that I am and everything that I will ever be!  Strip me of my pride that I may be ever focused on your will only.  Through you and for you let me minister to those you bring before me.  Help me to see and embrace the vulnerable, the poor, and the defenseless who are crying out for help.  Help me to always remember to serve in humility with gentleness and kindness.  Let me always be a true reflection of your mercy and compassion made evident and available to others. I pray all of this in your Son’s name.  Amen

Deacon Mike

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