The Lord
said to her in reply, "Martha, Martha, you are anxious and worried about
many things. There is need of only one
thing.
Like Martha,
we are almost assuredly anxious and worried about many things. But when Jesus says there is need of only one
thing, what, exactly IS that one thing?
St. Thomas
Aquinas and others identify that one thing as being a life of contemplation, or
contemplative prayer. And most of us
probably associate contemplative prayer only with monks and nuns and priests.
But we all
have the capacity for contemplative prayer, and, when we try to enter into
contemplative prayer we should know that the Devil will try to distract us in
every moment. But the Catechism says it
is not a sin to be distracted in prayer, all that is needed is to, once you
realize you have been thinking about other things, to simply refocus back on the
Lord Jesus.
We live in
anxious times and distracting times…the most distracted times in human history
so far. And so it is hard to carve out
time for prayer. But a monk at St.
Meinrad said “Until we are convinced that prayer is the best way to spend our
time, we will never find time for prayer.”
Like Mary,
let us choose the better part; let us spend time in the presence of Jesus each
day in prayer. Let us step away from the
busyness of life to still our minds, hearts, bodies and souls at the foot of
the Master.
Father John, God bless you - I pray that one day you will return to YouTube. For those of us that are far away - homebound - it is your sheep that recognize your voice. I'm absolutely positive that if the Apostle Paul had the technology he would do the same - we really need you, you are a spiritual Father - we need that dynamic duo of Meyer and Hollowell
ReplyDeleteI am not able to preach extemporaneously anymore because of the brain tumors. I post my text for my homily each week. Sunday Mass is also live most Sundays at Saint Paul's Parish in Greencastle on Facebook.
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