Saturday - July 01, 2017
“Think well. Speak well. Do well.
These three things,
through the mercy of God,
will make a man go to Heaven.”
– St. Camillus de Lellis
TODAY'S READINGS
July 1, 2017
Saturday of the Twelfth Week in Ordinary Time
Lectionary: 376
Reading 1GN 18:1-15
The LORD appeared to Abraham by the Terebinth of Mamre,as Abraham sat in the entrance of his tent,
while the day was growing hot.
Looking up, he saw three men standing nearby.
When he saw them, he ran from the entrance of the tent to greet them;
and bowing to the ground, he said:
"Sir, if I may ask you this favor,
please do not go on past your servant.
Let some water be brought, that you may bathe your feet,
and then rest yourselves under the tree.
Now that you have come this close to your servant,
let me bring you a little food, that you may refresh yourselves;
and afterward you may go on your way."
The men replied, "Very well, do as you have said."
Abraham hastened into the tent and told Sarah,
"Quick, three measures of fine flour!
Knead it and make rolls."
He ran to the herd, picked out a tender, choice steer,
and gave it to a servant, who quickly prepared it.
Then Abraham got some curds and milk,
as well as the steer that had been prepared,
and set these before them;
and he waited on them under the tree while they ate.
They asked him, "Where is your wife Sarah?"
He replied, "There in the tent."
One of them said, "I will surely return to you about this time next year,
and Sarah will then have a son."
Sarah was listening at the entrance of the tent, just behind him.
Now Abraham and Sarah were old, advanced in years,
and Sarah had stopped having her womanly periods.
So Sarah laughed to herself and said,
"Now that I am so withered and my husband is so old,
am I still to have sexual pleasure?"
But the LORD said to Abraham: "Why did Sarah laugh and say,
'Shall I really bear a child, old as I am?'
Is anything too marvelous for the LORD to do?
At the appointed time, about this time next year, I will return to you,
and Sarah will have a son."
Because she was afraid, Sarah dissembled, saying, "I didn't laugh."
But he replied, "Yes you did."
Responsorial PsalmLUKE 1:46-47, 48-49, 50 AND 53, 54-55
R. (see 54b) The Lord has remembered his mercy."My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord,
my spirit rejoices in God my Savior."
R. The Lord has remembered his mercy.
"For he has looked with favor on his lowly servant.
From this day all generations will call me blessed:
the Almighty has done great things for me,
and holy is his Name."
R. The Lord has remembered his mercy.
"He has mercy on those who fear him
in every generation.
He has filled the hungry with good things,
and the rich he has sent away empty."
R. The Lord has remembered his mercy.
"He has come to the help of his servant Israel
for he has remembered his promise of mercy,
The promise he made to our fathers,
to Abraham and his children for ever."
R. The Lord has remembered his mercy.
AlleluiaMT 8:17
R. Alleluia, alleluia.Christ took away our infirmities
and bore our diseases.
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
GospelMT 8:5-17
When Jesus entered Capernaum,a centurion approached him and appealed to him, saying,
"Lord, my servant is lying at home paralyzed, suffering dreadfully."
He said to him, "I will come and cure him."
The centurion said in reply,
"Lord, I am not worthy to have you enter under my roof;
only say the word and my servant will be healed.
For I too am a man subject to authority,
with soldiers subject to me.
And I say to one, 'Go,' and he goes;
and to another, 'Come here,' and he comes;
and to my slave, 'Do this,' and he does it."
When Jesus heard this, he was amazed and said to those following him,
"Amen, I say to you, in no one in Israel have I found such faith.
I say to you, many will come from the east and the west,
and will recline with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob
at the banquet in the Kingdom of heaven,
but the children of the Kingdom
will be driven out into the outer darkness,
where there will be wailing and grinding of teeth."
And Jesus said to the centurion,
"You may go; as you have believed, let it be done for you."
And at that very hour his servant was healed.
Jesus entered the house of Peter,
and saw his mother-in-law lying in bed with a fever.
He touched her hand, the fever left her,
and she rose and waited on him.
When it was evening, they brought him many
who were possessed by demons,
and he drove out the spirits by a word and cured all the sick,
to fulfill what had been said by Isaiah the prophet:
He took away our infirmities
and bore our diseases.
******************************
A TRUE STORY…
How to Receive God’s Comfort......
Though you have made me see troubles, many and bitter, you will restore my life again; from the depths of the earth you will again bring me up. You will increase my honor and comfort me once again. (Psalm 71:20-21)
When one has been abused, especially when it’s occurred over and over again, it’s very difficult ~ it even seems impossible ~ to feel God’s comfort, let alone be aware of His compassion and unconditional love. The question is asked: “If God really loves me, then why did He allow the abuse to happen? Where was He when I needed His protection?”
Here is the true story of a woman in her 40s as she received healing from a childhood of sexual and physical and emotional abuse. She’d been to a therapist for several years before coming to me for spiritual healing. During one of our sessions I felt led by the Holy Spirit to say: “It’s time to kneel down before God and open yourself up to whatever He wants to do with you. It’s the only way to find out that He will not hurt you, that you are totally safe with Him, and that He will not take advantage of your vulnerability to cause you more pain.”
It was advice that was extremely difficult to say yes to, but with sheer determination, she did say yes, and here is what happened:
I went to my room and shut the door behind me. I fell to my knees in front of the crucifix and began to pray. I worked at humbling myself before the Lord and once again felt the pangs of victimhood. I then allowed Him to do anything He wished to me, included making me suffer in some way. I flinched as I imagined Him hitting me on the top of my bowed head ~ but He never did.
Just then the Rosary began on the radio. It was the Sorrowful Mysteries.
The first decade began, the Agony in the Garden. I heard Jesus begin to cry as memories of my abuse began to unfold. I remembered sitting on my bed and crying as I waited for someone to come in and do something awful to me. I could feel again the terror caused by this waiting for doom. Then I heard Jesus crying with me. Together we wailed away.
Then He asked me if I was waiting on Him because He was going to do something bad to me, and I told Him, “No.” After that, we stepped through the years of tears I cried, and I heard Him crying louder. I felt honored that He cried with me, but then He said to me, “I am not crying for you alone; I am crying for my children who are hurting you. For your suffering, you already have been given a mansion in my Father’s house, but it is they who hurt you for whom I weep for the loudest.”
The second decade began, the scourging at the pole. Jesus wanted me to see my scourging. My brother was whipping me and making me scrub the kitchen floor on my hands and knees with a scrub brush and bucket of water. He kept yelling at me, “SLAVE! WORK SLAVE WORK!”
I cried harder and Jesus was crying right along with me. My mind flashed through all the unfairness that was thrown on me, and each step of the way, He was right there. Once again He asked me if I saw Him abusing me. I told him, “No.”
The third decade began, the crowning of thorns. Jesus brought to view the crown being pushed onto His head, but just for a moment, for once again, He took me to my own suffering. He showed me my mother on top of me, pinning my shoulders to the floor with her knees, my head in her hands, crashing my head onto the cold hard kitchen floor over and over again. Jesus wailed louder, crying for my mother more than for me. Then He asked me if it was He who was beating my head into the floor and I said, “No.”
I began to calm down as I began to realize that Jesus was not my abuser, nor did He have anything to do with it happening to me. He was weeping for us over what was going on. But He was never the abuser.
The fourth decade began, the carrying of the cross. I felt the weight of my cross being flung upon my shoulders, the weight of other people’s burdens that had been laid onto my back. I had my baby sister on my hip and I was tending to her crying. I was in charge of my mother’s house. I had never looked at this as a burden, but Jesus pointed out that I was nine years old and the mother of my mother’s children. He told me, “You were a baby that never got to be a baby.” I cried for myself. I saw myself fixing chicken in the kitchen and felt the guilt of everyone getting sick because I didn’t know how to cook it all the way through. God relieved me of that guilt by saying, “You were only a baby. It was not your responsibility; it was your mother’s responsibility.”
I was crying for the nine-year-old mother that I was forced to be, but once again, Jesus was crying louder and harder for the people who had forced this upon me. He asked me once again if I saw His hand in the abuse anywhere. And once again I said, “No.” I began to recompose as we finished this decade.
The fifth decade began, Jesus dying on the cross. Jesus let me see Him hang on the cross and pointed out the nails in His hands. Then He took me back to my childhood bedroom. I remembered the first time my brother raped me. As I recalled the pain (this was hard to do, because I had shoved this memory back so far that it was almost gone from view), Jesus flashed the hammering of the nail into His hand and cried out with the greatest agony of all. He received every pounding of the hammer because of the violation put upon me, and He made sure I knew He was crying mostly for those who were abusing me.
Jesus asked me if I saw Him raping me. I said, “No.”
I no longer felt like God’s victim. As we began to pray the Hail Holy Queen prayer, I asked God to forgive my brothers. I repeated this over and over again. For the first time in my life, I meant it. When I kissed the cross on my rosary beads, I imagined what it must have been like for Mary Magdalene to have kissed His precious feet. I kissed the beads and thanked Mother Mary for bringing Her Son to me. And then I went to Father God and crawled up into His lap, with praises of Jesus on my lips.
I know now that Jesus loves me enough to have suffered for me and with me. Never did He leave my side. Never did He abandon me, nor forsake me.
Oh, my Lord ~ How blessed we are to have such a loving, kind and merciful God!
------------------------------
God Bless You.....
The mother of Jesus promised St. Dominic that, “one day through the rosary & the scapular I shall save the world!”
