MEDITATION:
Written by Brennan Manning (1934-2013), an American author, laicized priest, and public speaker. This is an excerpt from his book “Abba’s Child.”
Living in the awareness of the risen Jesus is not a trivial pursuit for the bored and lonely or a defense mechanism enabling us to cope with stress and sorrow of life. It is the key that unlocks the door to grasping the meaning of existence. All day and every day we are being reshaped into the image of Christ. Everything that happens to us is designed to this end. Nothing that exists can exist beyond the pale of His presence, nothing is irrelevant to it, nothing is without significance to it.
PRAYER:
Written by Francis of Assisi (c1181-1226), an Italian Catholic friar, deacon and preacher. He founded the men’s Order of Friars Minor, the women’s Order of Saint Claire, the Third Order of Saint Francis and the Custody of the Holy Land.
God, all powerful, most holy, most high and supreme; FATHER: holy and righteous; Lord: king of heaven and earth; we thank you for yourself, because by your holy will and through your only Son and the Holy Spirit you created all things, spiritual and material. You made us in your image and likeness and placed us in paradise, and we, through our transgression fell away.
We give you thanks because, as you created us through your Son, so by the holy love with which you loved us you willed your Son to be born true God and true man of the glorious and holy Virgin Mary, and through his cross and blood and death it was your will to set us free from our captivity. Also we thank you because that same Son of yours will come again in the glory of his majesty to condemn those who refused to repent and acknowledge you; and to say to all who did acknowledge, worship and serve you in repentance: Come, you whom my Father has blessed, receive the kingdom prepared for you since the world began.
And because we are all wretched sinners, unworthy to speak your name, therefore let Jesus Christ himself, our Lord and your beloved Son in whom you are well pleased, give thanks to you for everything, together with the Holy Spirit the Paraclete, as it pleases you and pleases him. He always satisfies you in everything, and through him you have done so much for us. Alleluia!
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