In the Easter Season we are closest to God’s promises that are fulfilled in the Resurrection…eternal life. May God bless those of us who need peace, who need happiness and a loving guide by our side..
May the glory
and the promise
of this joyous time of year
bring peace
and happiness to you
and those you hold most dear.
And may Christ,
Our Risen Saviour,
always be there by your side
to bless you
most abundantly a
and be your loving guide.
Amen
Our mind is a powerful source of what becomes our reality. Ultimately, the sum of our choices create our life. Through awareness of our weaknesses, we can take a sacred pause and do things differently rather than keep perpetuating the reactions that are ingrained deeply within. We can fast from our brokenness and feast on Gods goodness. The choice is ours, whether we fast or feast. During this easter season, let’s consciously choose to feast!
Fast from judging others;
Feast on Christ dwelling in them.
Fast from fear of illness;
Feast on the healing power of God.
Fast from words that pollute;
Feast on speech that purifies.
Fast from discontent;
Feast on gratitude.
Fast from anger;
Feast on patience.
Fast from pessimism;
Feast on hope.
Fast from negatives;
Feast on encouragement.
Fast from bitterness;
Feast on forgiveness.
Fast from self-concern;
Feast on compassion.
Fast from suspicion;
Feast on truth.
Fast from gossip;
Feast on purposeful silence.
Fast from problems that overwhelm;
Feast on prayer that sustains.
Fast from anxiety;
Feast on faith.
Author Unknown
In letting go, we welcome the reality of our life as it is. It doesn’t mean that we don’t want or need change or growth but it means that we accept what comes our way and invite God into it. We bring to God our needs, our desires, our thoughts, our emotions, and our circumstances. Instead of fighting these things and those around us, we welcome them and God so that we can be transformed as we consent to His presence in all areas of our lives.
To fight against our reality, to demand and to grasp onto our desires, is one way of denying that God alone is our Source of Life, that God is our Source for Love and Power. When we “cling” to our needs and our desires or demands that “what is” be different we are attempting to control. When we “let go” and meet God in our reality, then we actually do become free and experience His presence – which does heal, provide our needs, transform us….. If we grasp and control our lives we will inevitably create “substitutes” for a genuine resting in God and His provision.
What are your substitutes?
Welcome, welcome, welcome.
I welcome everything that comes to me today, because I know it’s for my healing.
I welcome all thoughts, feelings, emotions, persons, situations, and conditions.
I let go of my desire for power and control.
I let go of my desire for affection, esteem, approval, and pleasure.
I let go of my desire for survival and security.
I let go of my desire to change any situation, condition, person or myself.
I open to the love and presence of God and God’s action within. Amen
by Father Thomas Keating
HOLY – WHOLLY – HOLEY Three words that sound alike, are spelled differently, have their own distinct meaning and yet are connected one with the other.
The third is HOLEY – H-O-L-E-Y.
This holey is porous, permeable, spacious, expansive. I think of a donut hole. The hole of the donut offers a space, a spaciousness. Without its hole, it would be a different pastry. For us, the holey space is a place of being. It is not for doing, it has no form for doing. It is a space, which allows inner stillness that fosters authentic connection. I think of the womb, a spaciousness where a child becomes. In the silence and spaciousness of this holey space, a song, a poem, or this reflection is born.
Rabbi Mosche Gersht says, “It is in this inner spaciousness that we monitor our inner dialogue. From this spaciousness, the true power of who we are will shine the way it was meant to be. Everything seems to emanate from this space, there is a source of being in truth.” This space is that deep knowing that we experience. A knowing that seems to be filled with goodness, with God-ness inside, a place where our creator God is guiding, directing and moving the world toward the highest good. This kind of holey is a space inside us that allows creativity, connection and love to expand. It seems to me that it is the spaciousness of the tomb in which Jesus becomes the Christ of Resurrection.
Hafiz, the Sufi mystic and Persian poet, writes, “I am a hole in a flute that Christ’s breath moves through…..listen to the music.”
To become holey we rest and stay in silence where there is a space where we can authentically engage with the Divine. Perhaps, this prayer by Christin Lore Weber is ours to consciously consider: The world needs the hollowness of you. At times, this hollowness will be a passage that people will find their way through you. Or your hollowness will be a bowl and people will eat from you and not know hunger. Your hollowness will be a cup for those who thirst from suffering, they will find wisdom and love as they drink from you.
I believe from this spaciousness we may discover our sameness and oneness as the human race, with all creatures and all subatomic atoms. From this spaciousness, we will believe all are equal, all is one, and all is love. We will know there is a difference, but not separation, only connectivity.
HOLY – WHOLLY – HOLEY
Lord, Weave these three ways of being into one and allow us to become the manifestation Your glory…the Glory of God. Allow us to become radiant and who we are born to be. May our Easter Season and long beyond be holy, wholly and holey!
Excerpt from Easter Vigil Reflection March 30, 2024 Sister Marie Therese “MT” Summers, OSB, Prioress, Benet Hill Monastery
HOLY – WHOLLY – HOLEY Three words that sound alike, are spelled differently, have their own distinct meaning and yet are connected one with the other.
The second WHOLLY – W-H-O-L-L-Y. This wholly means complete, total, altogether. It is this wholeness that is a journey of the undivided life, living a full life. Thomas Merton says it is about living with the grace and integrity of being your whole self, your true self. He writes, “there is in all things … a hidden wholeness.” Other spiritual writers down through the ages say wholeness is holiness. Wholeness and holiness are connected, intertwined into one. This is why when we have a direct experience of our wholeness, it tends to feel like a mystical experience of gratitude, love, and abounding energy.
Lord, draw me to wholeness and holiness today. Created in Your image, I grant You permission to heal me and shine your light in the darkness of my heart.. Jesus, I trust in You! Amen
Excerpt from Easter Vigil Reflection March 30, 2024 Sister Marie Therese “MT” Summers, OSB, Prioress, Benet Hill Monastery
HOLY – WHOLLY – HOLEY. Three words that sound alike, are spelled differently, have their own distinct meaning and yet are connected one with the other.
Holy, H-O-L-Y.
Repeatedly in the Hebrew Scripture in Leviticus, we hear: Be holy because I am holy. Be holy as I am holy. Be holy for I your God am Holy. Again in the Christian Scriptures in 1 Peter, it says: As God who called you is holy, so be holy in all you do; 16 for it is written: “Be holy, because I am holy.”[a] This Holy means sacred, morally blameless, consecrated, saint. And though we know ourselves as both saint and sinner, each one of us is called to this holiness.
Lord, draw me to holiness today. Created in Your image, I grant You permission to make me Your instrument. Jesus, I trust in You! Amen
Excerpt for the Easter Vigil Reflection, March 30, 2024, Sister Marie Therese “MT” Summers, OSB, Prioress, Benet Hill Monastery
Day 8
Close your eyes and let yourself be carried away on the flowing current of my grace; close your eyes and do not think of the present, turning your thoughts away from the future just as you would from temptation. Repose in me, believing in my goodness, and I promise you by my love that if you say, “You take care of it,” I will take care of it all; I will console you, liberate you and guide you.
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything!
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything!
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything!
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything!
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything!
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything!
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything!
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything!
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything!
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything!
Day 7
I perform miracles in proportion to your full surrender to me and to your not thinking of yourselves. I sow treasure troves of graces when you are in the deepest poverty. No person of reason, no thinker, has ever performed miracles, not even among the saints. He does divine works whosoever surrenders to God.
So don’t think about it any more, because your mind is acute and for you it is very hard to see evil and to trust in me and to not think of yourself. Do this for all your needs, do this, all of you, and you will see great continual silent miracles. I will take care of things, I promise this to you.
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything!
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything!
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything!
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything!
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything!
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything!
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything!
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything!
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything!
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything!
Day 4
You see evil growing instead of weakening? Do not worry. Close your eyes and say to me with faith: “Thy will be done, You take care of it.” I say to you that I will take care of it, and that I will intervene as does a doctor and I will accomplish miracles when they are needed.
Do you see that the sick person is getting worse? Do not be upset, but close your eyes and say, “You take care of it.” I say to you that I will take care of it, and that there is no medicine more powerful than my loving intervention. By my love, I promise this to you.
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything!
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything!
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything!
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything!
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything!
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything!
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything!
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything!
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything!
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything!
Day 2
Surrender to me does not mean to fret, to be upset, or to lose hope, nor does it mean offering to me a worried prayer asking me to follow you and change your worry into prayer. It is against this surrender, deeply against it, to worry, to be nervous and to desire to think about the consequences of anything.
It is like the confusion that children feel when they ask their mother to see to their needs, and then try to take care of those needs for themselves so that their childlike efforts get in their mother’s way. Surrender means to placidly close the eyes of the soul, to turn away from thoughts of tribulation and to put yourself in my care, so that only I act, saying, “You take care of it.”
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything!
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything!
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything!
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything!
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything!
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything!
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything!
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything!
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything!
O Jesus, I surrender myself to you, take care of everything!
Smitten With Goodness 