Noticing Other People's Failings

31 May 2025

The sharper you are at noticing other people’s failings, the more apt will you be to overlook your own.

        Saint Ignatius of Loyola

On the Ascension

30 May 2025

Jesus didn’t travel thousands of miles like a space rocket. He rose up a little way above the earth and a cloud received Him out of their sight. All that was gone was the sight of Jesus. The cloud means that He is no longer within our ordinary limits. Jesus is now present and does things the whole range of God’s way of being present and doing things while remaining a man, but a man fulfilled and glorified. We confess this when we say that “He sitteth on the right hand of God the Father Almighty.” The right hand is not some particular place as we think of, but the exercise of the whole power of God, which is now in the hands of Jesus.

So the ascension does not mean that Jesus has gone away. Quite the opposite. He is with us now even more powerfully than when men saw Him. We live, then, in the presence of our ascended, ever-present Lord. Because He is with us, we cannot be destroyed. Jesus has made the way to victory for us. He leads us that way, gives us strength and courage for it, and finally brings us to the bright cloud of heaven. We go on, then, from the ascension as did the first disciples “with great joy” (Luke 24:52).

        Norman Nagel

On Contemplative Prayer

29 May 2025

Everyone is capable of inward contemplative prayer, and it is a terrible shame that almost all people have it in their heads not to do it. We are all called to this prayer as we are all called to eternal life. Contemplative prayer is nothing more than heartfelt affection and love. What is necessary is to love God and to focus on him.

        Jean Guyon

God's Presence

28 May 2025

The presence of God calms the soul, and gives it quiet and repose.

        François Fénèlon

Faith and Trust in God

27 May 2025

Try not to worry. Everything in life has its ups and downs, yet above everything else, we must live a life of faith, seeing all things as coming from the hand of God and for our own good.

        Blessed Luisitia Josefa

A Good Deed

26 May 2025

A good deed is never lost. – He who sows courtesy, reaps friendship; he who plants kindness, gathers love; pleasure bestowed upon a grateful mind was never sterile, but generally gratitude begets reward.

        Saint Basil the Great

The Light of World

25 May 2025

The city has no need of sun or moon because the church is not governed by the light or elements of the world. Rather, it is led through the darkness by Christ the eternal Sun.

        Bede the Venerable