maronite readings

The example of Saint Lawrence encourages us to give up our lives, set alight our faith, furbish our devotion. Not the flames of a scaffold but those of a living faith are what consume us. Our bodies are not burned for Jesus Christ’s sake but our souls are transported with the fervor of love for him…, our hearts burn with love for Jesus. Did not the Savior himself say of this sacred fire: “I have come to set the earth on fire, and how I wish it were already blazing!” (Lk 12,49). Cleopas and his companion experienced the effects of it when they said: “Were not our hearts burning within us while he spoke ot us on the way and opened the scriptures to us?” (Lk 24,32). It was also thanks to this interior burning that Saint Lawrence remained insensible to the flames of his martyrdom. He burned with desire to be with Jesus and did not feel the torture. The more the fervor of his faith grew within him, the less he suffered from the tortures… The power of the divine brasier alight in his heart calmed the flames of the gridiron kindled by the torturer

maronite readings – rosary,team

      Lord Jesus Christ our God, I do not have a heart which sets off resolutely in search of you, nor is filled with repentance or tenderness, nothing which brings children back to their inheritance. Master, I have no tears with which to pray to you. My spirit is darkened by the things of this life and has no strength to aim towards you in its pain. My heart is cold in its trials, and tears of love for you cannot warm it. But you, Lord Jesus Christ my God, treasure of all that is good, give me perfect contrition and a longing heart, so that with all my soul I can set out in search of you, for without you I shall be deprived of all good; oh good God, give me your grace. May the Father who, outside time, in eternity, begot you in his inner being renew in me the form of your image.       I abandoned you; do not abandon me. I went out of you; come out in search of me. Lead me to your pasture; count me among the flock of your elect. With your sheep feed me on the green grass of your divine mysteries, where the pure in heart dwell, that heart which bears in itself the splendor of your revelations, the consolation and the sweetness of those who have borne injury and insults for you. May we be worthy of such magnificence, through your grace and your love of mankind, you our Savior Jesus Christ, for ever and ever. Amen.

maronite readings – rosary,team

Christ does not ask you to carry the whole of his heavy cross during your life but only a small part of it, by accepting your suffering. You have nothing to fear. To the contrary, consider yourself happy to have been accounted worthy of taking your share in the sufferings of the Man-God. There is no question on the Lord’s part of either abandonment or punishment; quite the opposite – it bears witness to his love, his great love for you. You must offer God thanks and accept to drink the chalice of Gethsemane. Sometimes the Lord lets you feel the weight of the cross. This weight seems unbearable to you and yet you carry it because the Lord, who is full of love and mercy, holds out his hand to you and gives you the strength you need. Our Lord needs people who will suffer with him in the face of men’s lack of piety. That is why he leads me along the painful paths you speak of in your letter. Yet may he be blessed for ever since his love puts sweetness into what is bitter; he changes the passing suffering of this life into merit for eternity.

maronite readings – rosary,team

“Behold, I am coming like a thief. Blessed is the one who watches and keeps his clothes ready” says the Lord (Rv 16,15)… When, then, Christ said that his coming would be soon, yet by saying it would be sudden, he said that to us it would seem long… How it is that Christianity is always failing, yet always continuing? God only knows who wills it,—but so it is; and it is no paradox to say, on the one hand, that it has eighteen hundred years, that it may last many years more, and yet that it draws to an end, nay, is likely to end any day. And God would have us give our minds and hearts to the latter side of the alternative, to open them to impressions from this side, viz. that the end is coming;—it being a wholesome thing to live as if that will come in our day, which may come any day. It was different during the ages before Christ came. The Saviour was to come. He was to bring perfection, and religion was to grow towards that perfection. There was a system of successive revelations going on… Time was measured out for believing minds before Christ came, by the word of prophecy… The chosen people were not bidden to expect him at once; but after a sojourning in Canaan, and a captivity in Egypt, and a wandering in the wilderness, and judges, and kings, and prophets, at length seventy long weeks were determined to introduce him into the world. Thus his delay was, as I may say, recognized then; and, during his delay, other doctrines, other rules, were given to fill the interval. But when once the Christ had come, as the Son over his own house, and with his perfect Gospel, nothing remained but to gather in his saints. No higher Priest could come,—no truer doctrine. The Light and Life of men had appeared, and had suffered, and had risen again; and nothing more was left to do… It was the last time. And hence, though time intervene between Christ’s first and second coming, it is not recognized in the Gospel scheme… It runs, not towards the end, but along it, and on the brink of it; and is at all times equally near that great event, which, did it run towards, it would at once run into. Christ, then, is ever at our doors; as near eighteen hundred years ago as now, and not nearer now than then; and not nearer when he comes than now.

maronite readings – rosary,team

Jesus’ words “I thirst” (Jn 19,28), written on the wall of all our chapels, are not something from the past but are alive, here and now; they are spoken for you. Do you believe this? If you do, you will understand and feel his presence. Let him be as intimately within you as he is in me; that is the greatest joy you could give me. I will try and help you to understand this but Jesus himself is the only one who can say to you “I thirst!” Listen to your own name. And not just once. Every day. If you listen with your heart, you will hear, you will understand. Why did Jesus say: “I thirst”? What is its meaning? It is very difficult to explain it in words… Nevertheless, if you could grasp one, single thing from this letter, let it be this: “I thirst” is an even more profound word than if Jesus had simply said “I love you”. So long as you fail to realise, and in a deeply intimate way, that Jesus thirsts for you, you cannot possibly know what it is he wants to be for you, nor what he wants you to be for him. The heart and soul of the Missionaries of Charity consists entirely in this: the thirst of Jesus’ heart, hidden in the poor. This alone is at the origin of all that makes up our life. It sets before us both the goal … and the spirit of our Congregation. To quench the thirst of Jesus living among us is the entire justification for our existence and our exclusive goal. Is there anything more than this we could say about ourselves, namely, that this is our sole motive for living.

maronite readings – rosary,team