Thursday, January 30 : Saint John Henry Newman

Year passes after year silently; Christ’s coming is ever nearer than it was. O that, as He comes nearer earth, we may approach nearer heaven! O, my brethren, pray Him to give you the heart to seek Him in sincerity. Pray Him to make you in earnest… Pray Him to give you what Scripture calls “an honest and good heart,” or “a perfect heart” (Lk 8,15; Ps 101[100],2), and, without waiting, begin at once to obey Him with the best heart you have. Any obedience is better than none… You have to seek His face (Ps 28[27],8); obedience is the only way of seeking Him. All your duties are obediences… To do what He bids is to obey Him, and to obey Him is to approach Him. Every act of obedience is an approach,—an approach to Him who is not far off, though He seems so, but close behind this visible screen of things which hides Him from us. He is behind this material framework; earth and sky are but a veil going between Him and us; the day will come when He will rend that veil, and show Himself to us. And then, according as we have waited for Him, will He recompense us. If we have forgotten Him, He will not know us; but “blessed are those servants whom the Lord, when He cometh, shall find watching» (Lk 12,37)… May this be the portion of every one of us! It is hard to attain it; but it is woeful to fail. Life is short; death is certain; and the world to come is everlasting.

Roman Extraordinary (Tridentine) Daily Readings – rosary,team