One beggar telling another beggar

Evangelism is just one beggar telling another beggar where to find bread.  - D.T. Niles

We are all beggars.  We don't have to be perfect or scholars to spread the Gospel.  We only need to share the little that we know with those around us.  We are all lost and seeking the Lord.  Even when we can't do a lot we can still share what we have.  We can share the joy that the Lord brings to our life.

Let Us Pray:
Dear Lord, Help me to remember that we are all beggars trying to search out a little more and grow a little closer to you.  We need the help of others as much as we need to be of help to others.  Help me to be open to the help of others and to always be willing to share your love with others.  I ask you to help guide me to you and to give me the opportunity to share this with those around me.  Give me the strength to reach out to others and give them the help and support that they seek.

They are like us

We hear about the Saints all the time.  They are a great source of inspiration but they are often far off.  They lived long ago, in far away places in very different times.  Most of them were priests or nuns.  It is easy to think that we don't really have much in common with the saints.  But there is one thing that we all have in common (and it's a big one).  

We are all children of the Lord.

I was reading the prayer on the back of a Saint Rita prayer card the other day and one word of one line stood out to me:

Our

"by following the will of our heavenly Father"

Even though Saint Rita lived hundreds of years ago she still prayed to the same Father in heaven that we pray to.  Even though she lived a very different life than I do we still are part of the same Catholic family in Christ.  This is what brings us together.  This is where our lives do intersect with the lives of the saints.

They are like us.

Dear St. Rita, during your entire life on earth you found your happiness by following the will of our heavenly Father. Help me to be as trusting of God in all his designs for me. Help me this day to give myself to him as you did, without limit, without fear, without counting the cost. Help me to be generous in serving the needs of others, patient in all difficulties, forgiving toward all who injure me. Help me to learn more deeply the great mystery of the cross of Jesus, so that by embracing it as you did, I may come to experience its power to heal and to save. Amen.

For more information on the life of Saint Rita look here.
http://www.catholic.org/saints/saint.php?saint_id=205 

Our Brothers and Sisters

I really love when I have the opportunity to go to daily mass.  There is a simplicity about it that brings out the true beauty of the mass.  The simplicity allows me to hear lines of prayers that I say every week in a new light.  
The mass brings us together as a community.  We need that community.  As much as we want to be (and think we are) independent and self sufficient we need a community.  I am starting to build a little community but it is a slow process.  But even if we know no one in the church or if we are visiting a new parish we are still part of a community.  I was reminded of this today as we prayed the penitential act.

"And you, my brothers and sisters, to pray for me to the Lord our God."

The people around us are our brothers and sisters.  We are asking them to pray for us as they are asking us to pray for them.  This brings us closer together as we draw closer to Christ.  We are not alone in the church, we are surrounded by our brothers and sisters who are praying for us. 

Thank them for their service

Cloistered Nuns
Just the thought kind of scares me.  At first it seems a little weird.  What do they do all day?  They pray.  But is that really all they do?  I didn't really understand it.  But then I listened to this program on "The Good Catholic Life" (a local radio talk show) and reflected on the following line from Pope John Paul II (which I first wrote about here)

"Yes, God alone is our true and unfailing support, just as love and prayer are the only sure spiritual levers with which it is possible to lift up the world."- Pope John Paul II (1994)

It was then that I realized that the women who spend there days in prayer are not doing it for themselves, they are doing it for the Lord and for us!  They are not spending there time praying for themselves but they are praying for the Church (for us).  They might not be physically feeding the poor and ministering to the imprisoned or even evangelizing to their neighbors but they are serving the poor, the imprisoned and their neighbors in a much greater way.  They are bringing the sufferings and pains of the people and of the Church to the Lord.  Although it may not be visible to outsiders they are directly serving the needs of the suffering.

Through Prayer!

It reminds me of how we often thank our soldiers serving in the military (as we should).  We thank them for giving up their life (at least part of it) to serve our country (and us).  They are separated from their friends and loved ones as they devote themselves to others.  In a similar way a woman entering a cloistered convent is giving up her friends and loved ones to devote herself to prayer.  This prayer is a service to us all and it involves a great deal of sacrifice on their part.
We should thank them for their service.  We should thank their families for the sacrifice that they make as well.  To me it seems like an unbelievable sacrifice and an unbelievable service.
Thank them.

Praying for Prayer

While I try to pray all throughout the day it is nice to have some quality devoted time to pray, to read the bible and to speak to the Lord.  I can do this best when I am either in a quiet place outdoors or in a quiet church.  This is hard to do.  I need to have the will to pray.  I need to have the time to pray.  I need to have access a suitable environment for this type of prayer.  But I know this time of prayer is amazing and fruitful.  Because of this I always say a special prayer.
I pray for prayer.
When ever I sit down to pray I first thank the Lord for bringing me there.  I thank the Lord for getting me off the couch to come and nurture my relationship with him.

"Dear Lord, Thank you for bringing me here today to spend time in front of your Blessed Eucharist."

"Dear Lord, Thank you for giving me some quiet time out of my hectic day today."

"Dear Lord, Thank you for giving me the will and the want to come talk with you today."

Then when I am finishing up my time of prayer I always ask to Lord to help me return to this time quickly.

Dear Lord, Thank you for this time together.  Please help me to come back to talk with you tomorrow."

Dear Lord, Please help me to find time tomorrow to spend time with you.

Dear Lord, Help me to stay in prayer with you through my hectic day tomorrow and give me the time to return to your Blessed Eucharist soon.

(This can also be a nice time that I think about my scheduled for the next day or so and when I will pray)

I have found this to be extremely beneficial to my prayer time and to my relationship with the Lord.  Spending any time in prayer is a hard thing thing to do and I know I can take all the prayers I can get.

Talking to God

One line in Tim McGraw's song "Highway Don't Care" has stuck with me the past few days.

I bet you got a dead cell phone in your shotgun seat
Yeah, I bet you're bending God's ear talking 'bout me.

There are so many people that I wish I kept in better contact with; friends from college, cousins, neighbors.  But there is only so many hours in a day and it always seems that when I do find the time something else gets in the way.  Like a dead cell phone, or they are busy, or dinner is burning or you only have a few minutes (the list could go on for days).  Things come up.  You lose touch.  

This doesn't need to happen with God.  He is always waiting for you, ready to talk.  You can talk to him while you are trying to save dinner from becoming ash.  You can talk to him when you are out of breath on a run.  Even if you just say hi for a few minutes as you wait in line at the grocery store, he will be glad to talk to you.  And even if you cell phone is dead and you are completely cut off from everyone else you can still talk to God.  

I know that I need to remember this.  Even if I don't dedicate an entire holy hour at adoration each day I can still talk to God throughout the day.  We should be in a constant conversation with God.  We don't need much to have this conversation.  All we really need is an open heart but it will give us so much more that we could imagine. 

The Power of Prayer

Sometimes there are things that I just can't bring myself to pray for.  I feel they are worthy of God's attention but I feel that they are just to hard.  Some things are just impossible. 

im·pos·si·ble

1. not possible; unable to be, exist, happen, etc.

2.unable to be done, performed, effected, etc.: an impossible assignment.

 

If something is impossible what is the point of praying for it.  The situation can't change.  It has already been written in stone.  Some situations are just like that.

 

But then I remember:

 

for nothing will be impossible for God. Luke 1:37  

 

If nothing will be impossible with God why wouldn't I pray?  I really don't know.  I guess I am always trying to limit the Lord to Earthly constraints.  Because I can't do it, God can't do it.  

Really!?!  I think God can do a little more than I give him credit for.

 

Today he (God) showed me once again how wrong I was.  

There was a situation involving one of my students that was going very badly.  It was upsetting me greatly but I just couldn't see how it could be fixed or resolve itself.  No matter what point of view I looked at it from, it just didn't seem possible.  I didn't see a point in praying for the situation because there was no possible way for it to work out anyway.

On my way into work this morning I said a decade of the rosary because I finally  remembered that nothing is impossible with God (but I really didn't see what he could do anyway.)

Then as the day began one person after another kept telling me things that I thought were impossible regarding this situation.  Now its not looking so impossible after all.  

Just another reminder of the power of prayer.

 

 Even though it is hard to understand (because we know what the word impossible means), we need to remember that God is more powerful then even the impossible.     

 

 

Prayer and Love

Photo Source

"Yes, God alone is our true and unfailing support, just as love and prayer are the only sure spiritual levers with which it is possible to lift up the world."- Pope John Paul II (1994)

I don't think we have any doubt that the world needs to be lifted up.  That is for certain. But how are we supposed to do that?

With Prayer and Love.
John Paul II states it very clearly, with prayer and love.  John Paul II has seen what we are up against, he has experienced our world, he know what we face and he still says that it must be met with prayer and love.  Not worry, anger, arguments, hate, frustration, war, protests or ignorance.  But with prayer and love.
Instead of worrying, say a prayer. Instead of arguing, show them your love.  Instead of letting anger build up inside of you, pray for peace.
For it is with love and prayer that we can lift up the world.
If we want to enact some real change, which we must, we need to pray and love.  
So often I worry about problems in the world today.  Then I get angry about them.  Maybe I will discuss the issues with someone.  Soon I will get frustrated because I feel like I can't do anything to fix the problems anyway.  This is not the way to lift the world.  The world can be lifted through love and prayer.  And this is something that I can do.  I can treat others with love. I can share God's love with others, and I can pray and pray.  Pope John Paul II is giving us a sure response to the world around us.
This is something that we must keep in our minds at all times.

That prayer and love are the secrets to lifting up the world.

This is what we must be focused on if we are going to direct the world to the Lord.