MikeLigalig.com

Unity of Christians    Minute Meditations
Lord, hear the prayers of your people and bring the hearts of believers together in your praise and in common sorrow for their sins. Heal all divisions among Christians that we may rejoice in the perfect unity of your Church and move together as one to eternal life in your kingdom.

   â€” from The Catholic Prayer Book

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At Judgment Time    Minute Meditations
Have pity upon every man, Lord, in that hour when he has finished his task and stands before thee like a child, whose hands are being examined.  –Paul Claudel


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Being One With God    Minute Meditations
God’s primary purpose for becoming Incarnate is grounded in the divine desire to love, to be our beginning and our end, to be “God with us,” in order that we might dwell in the presence of the divine.

   â€” from The Humility of God

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In God’s Arms    Minute Meditations
To be a Christian is not to be a member of an exclusive group nor is it to see oneself as privileged by God. Rather, it is to throw oneself into the arms of the compassionate love of God and to live a life of costly love by way of mercy, peace and reconciliation.

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My Flesh is True Food    Minute Meditations
Any person who can wake Lazarus, walk on whitecaps, still the storm and manage a million other things that a world of books couldn't contain can make bread his own flesh. The Holy Spirit has no limitations. It just takes faith, that's all.


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Unconditional Love    Minute Meditations
In an unbelievably intimate and loving way, Christ chooses to give himself freely to us regardless of our condition. We can approach Christ at communion weakened, saddened, fatigued, confused, or bored, but because our Savior loves us so much, he chooses to give freely of himself no matter what our response.


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Choosing to Love    Minute Meditations
While the last century has created some unique contexts that are particularly challenging to us, it is important to remember that all generations have suffered since turning away from God. And thus--like all God's children--we are called to return to him and be consoled, to walk in his paths of love.

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The Nature of Sin    Minute Meditations
The gravity of sin depends on two things--the seriousness of the offense and the one whom it offends. When a person defies God, his sin is that much more disgraceful because he has insulted the all-good Creator who has gratuitously given him everything.


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St. Joseph of Leonissa
(1556-1612)


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Joseph avoided the safe compromises by which people sometimes undercut the gospel. Born at Leonissa in the Kingdom of Naples, Joseph joined the Capuchins in his hometown in 1573. Denying himself hearty meals and comfortable quarters, he prepared for ordination and a life of preaching.

In 1587 he went to Constantinople to take care of the Christian galley slaves working under Turkish masters. Imprisoned for this work, he was warned not to resume it on his release. He did and was again imprisoned and then condemned to death. Miraculously freed, he returned to Italy where he preached to the poor and reconciled feuding families as well as warring cities which had been at odds for years. He was canonized in 1746.


Comment:

Saints often jar us because they challenge our ideas about what we need for "the good life." "I’ll be happy when. . . ," we may say, wasting an incredible amount of time on the periphery of life. People like Joseph of Leonissa challenge us to face life courageously and get to the heart of it: life with God. Joseph was a compelling preacher because his life was as convincing as his words.

Quote:

In one of his sermons, Joseph says: "Every Christian must be a living book wherein one can read the teaching of the gospel. This is what St. Paul says to the Corinthians, ‘Clearly you are a letter of Christ which I have delivered, a letter written not with ink, but by the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone but on tablets of flesh in the heart’ (2 Corinthians 3:3). Our heart is the parchment; through my ministry the Holy Spirit is the writer because ‘my tongue is like the pen of a ready scribe’ (Psalm 45:1)."



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Waiting For God    Minute Meditations
Expectancy is the key to waiting for God. What we wait for will come to pass. Are we waiting expectantly for it? The best part of waiting is seeing how God fulfills our dreams and watching the miracle unfold in our lives.


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Model for Humility    Minute Meditations
The model for humble living is Jesus Christ, who refused to cling to divine status; possessed a deep reverence for and patience with others; reflected an interior silence and self-possession; and was willing to forgive.


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God's Master Plan

This Lent, my hope is that you will catch a new vision of the eternal Father who never fails to fulfill his word. No matter what obstacles arise, he never loses sight of his goal: to form and fashion a human family to share in the infinite love of the Trinity.

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Divine Discipline    Minute Meditations
Lord, whatever I’ve decided to give up for Lent, let me use that small sacrifice to remind me of the continual self-denial you call me to. And most of all, let me remember the reason for your call to be able to participate in your divine life!


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Draw Closer to God    Minute Meditations
What we do for Lent is far less important than why we do it. The time-honored traditions of prayer, fasting, and almsgiving are less to benefit us than to draw us closer to God and improve the lives of those around us.

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Living the Gospel    Minute Meditations
Not all of us are called to give dramatic, public witness to God’s word. We are all called, however, to live the Gospel in our lives.


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New Life    Minute Meditations
Those who experience the loving mercy of God in the sacrament of reconciliation should find themselves standing alongside the newly baptized at Easter filled with great joy at the new life God has given us all.


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Hunger for God    Minute Meditations
Fasting is more than a means of developing self-control. It is often an aid to prayer, as the pangs of hunger remind us of our hunger for God.


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Jesus Can Relate    Minute Meditations
God became a human being in the Person of Jesus—fully divine and yet fully human. Like a friend who knows us inside and out, Jesus knows what it is to be like one of us.

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Giving Your All    Minute Meditations
Some seem to love Jesus for the wrong reasons—merely to save themselves. While others reject him for the right reasons—they know he is asking for everything and they are not ready to give everything.


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Dying for Love    Minute Meditations
May the fiery and honey-sweet power of your love, O Lord, wean me from all things under heaven, so that I may die for love of your love, who deigned to die for love of my love. –St. Francis

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