Notes from the celebrate Homily and weekends Gospel.

-

In the Gospel today we have  today is one of those that we think we know back to front. When we see the first question that we come across he comes to Jesus and says what must I do to inherit enteral life. He quotes the book of Deuteronomy of what it means to love God.

“You must love the Lord your God with all your heart with all your soul with all your strength and with your mind and your neighbour as yourself.”

Maybe it's worth going through each of these. 

With all your heart: We constantly strive to open our hearts to the love of God. We come and praise his name by this we are opening our hearts to his love. We may extend our hearts that our body show the extent of this love of God. We are on our knees we stand we extend our hands in prayer we love God because he is love and loves us.

With all your soul. So when our hearts are open then its the soul cries out in love of the Lord look at the sound of Mary it states that that my soul cries out proclaims what he has done for us. So our hearts and souls are one. 

Now this is something that we strive for and so we use all our strength we fill our minds with good things we learn we experience we come to know who he is and what God is for us. We as a nation spend millions of pounds on our Body image but yet we do not spend the same amount of time and money on our minds. We can fill our minds with the love of the Father and his good things.  But surely we are all on this journey that we are striving for this state it is a process of going deeper.

But Jesus in the Gospel recognises that this man is trying to do this. After all he is doing what the law requires. But for Jesus this is just the starting point. He almost says to us ok you have done this but is this enough. And he tells us that it is not it must go deeper it must change who we are and others around us. It means that like the Good Samaritan we do things and pay the cost of being a disciple we take risks. The Samaritan said that he would pay the rest of the money that was owed when he comes back that way. He does not know how much it will be but he will take that risk of love and pay what is needed. 

He loved this man as himself he did not know him he saw him as a fellow human being and loved him back to health. IT is what we must do as well.

But there is a problem there always is. Its the last phrase that we may have greatest difficulty with. Love your neighbour as yourself. We can love our neighbour but loving ourself is harder than anything. In my ministry this is the constant battle that I have with myself and others. We come across that we cannot truly accept that we are loved and we certainly find it difficult to accept that love of self.  This love gives us joy it gives us life it makes us smile and show the love of God to others. This love of self by knowing we are loved by God is s real journey and one that we are on for the whole of our lives. It is also. The way in which we can do the first part of the law because we are free. 


So what are we free from. We are free from the ego the self the thing that bars us from really loving God with all our heart and soul. Our lives journey is to get rid of the self the I and allow ourselves to be over come by God’s love and his holy Spirit. To legit penetrate and take over every part of who we are. To let Go and let God. 



Prophecy for Celebrate the dream I had

 Roof was off and the glory of heaven. Shining down over this place and rays of light penetrating hearts and souls of everyone here. hearts are on fire God is sending you out glowing and ready for what we are sent to do to be in this world don’t be afraid be ready it will be hard  but you are a child of God and  he love you  so be loved have  space to grow to hear to be understood stand firm it will be ok  

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

A Year of Service

-
Image
  This last weekend I was able to look back with friends at the wonderful year I had with the Vincentian Volunteers. Looking back I can see that there are many elements to this year that have remained always with me. These I can now see and after reflection have shaped my life since this most formative year. From this year I went on to train for the priesthood and became a priest. After 16 years I left ministry and now try my best to live my Christian values and life in the world. In a recent upgrade to my CV I realised that my whole adult life has been in some sort of service to others and usually to the most vulnerable and those on the fringes of society. From working in Top Shop to ministry to the Hospital to the work I now do in education. This all stems from this year I had with the community and putting Love in action. Yes I have made mistakes on the way and my human frailty has been evident but this life was never going to easy and straight forward.  When I look back on that yea
Read more

Easter

-
Image
  Over the last few years I have had major issues with the Catholic Church. I think that my issue is the authority of the Church and how many clergy, not all, use and abuse their power and class the laity as stupid idiots. I can say this as for 16 years I was a priest and caught up in the system. When you're in the middle of it you can't aways see what is going on around you. I could not see what the Church as a structure was doing to peoples lives. Until I was out I realised that the Church and Im talking about the Catholic Church here is full up of repressed men who are scared of change scared of themselves and scared of the laity. Those who speak out especially clergy who want significant change are laughed at by others and classed as trouble makers. This includes Pope Francis himself who wants change but sometimes can't get it because of what he has inherited. It is an issue that has gone on your centuries.  This does not allow for a healthy functioning Church. There ne
Read more

What have we learnt? Covid and the last year.

-
Image
Over the last year since the start of the Covid pandemic there has been much in the press about the affects on society. We have seen that there are many people who are anxious, feel alone and worried about the future. So I looked on the Internet for the Christian response to the Pandemic. I was not surprised to see that there were many articles to suggest that the Christian Church as a whole has failed in this time.  In the first Lockdown the Churches were asked to close and there was no public worship. As the infection rate went down the Churches could open for private prayer. In the recent lockdown many places of worship have remained open although the infection rate being a lot higher. I have maybe been a thorn in peoples sides by asking why. I even wrote to the Cardinal  to ask him why. I argued that they should be left shut because of the demographic that tend to go. I got a standard reply back. When I looked in newsletters I read many times about how to give your collection and t
Read more