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Dominican Preaching through Word and Image
Taking Jesus Seriously
A few years ago I read a book entitled, Taking Jesus Seriously, by John Cowan. I recall agreeing with the author that we tend to rationalize away many of the things that Jesus said, and thus don’t really take him seriously. Just pay attention, what are the things that many religious people (we) wave their (our) arms about? Then ask yourself, did Jesus talk about these things? And then look at the overwhelming social needs in our country and world. Then ask yourself, what did Jesus say about this?
Today’s Gospel reading from Luke left me wondering.
On a sabbath Jesus went to dine at the home of one of the leading Pharisees. He said to the host who invited him, “When you hold a lunch or a dinner, do not invite your friends or your brothers or sisters or your relatives or your wealthy neighbors, in case they may invite you back and you have repayment. Rather, when you hold a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind; blessed indeed will you be because of their inability to repay you. For you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous.”
So, if I pay attention to my life, and the banquets and dinners I attend, I see tables of plenty. Then I ask myself, “Who is missing?” How do the guest lists match up with Jesus’ guest list, without my trying to rationalize it with giving time or money to a homeless shelter?
What will it cost me to really take Jesus’ words seriously? And how can we encourage one another to really do just that?
Finding the Cure in a Pumpkin Patch
The only cure is love, by Helen Caldicot
I just walked around my garden. It is a sunny, fall day and white fleecy clouds are scudding across a clear, blue sky.
The air is fresh and clear with no taint of chemical smells, and the mountains in the distance are ringed by shining silver clouds.
Earlier I picked a pan full of ripe cherry guavas to make jam, and the house is filling with the delicate aroma of simmering guavas.
Figs are ripening on the trees and developing that gorgeous deep, red glow at the apex of the fruit.
Huge, orange-colored lemons hang from the citrus trees, and lettuce, beet-roots, and cabbage are growing in the vegetable garden….
It is clear to me that unless we connect directly with the Earth, we will not have the faintest clue why we should save it.
Source: If You Love This Planet
Preacher of Wonder
Always be on the lookout for the presence of wonder.
E.B. White
Charlotte’s Web
Every morning I receive a daily quote from Gratefulness.org. After reading today’s, I knew there were many images that easily preach the presence of wonder. Are we listening?
Everybody is Unique
Everybody is unique.
Do not compare yourself
with anybody else
lest you spoil God’s curriculum.
– Baal Shem Tov
Being at Peace
We are not at peace with others because we are not at peace with ourselves, and we are not at peace with ourselves because we are not at peace with God.
-Thomas Merton
Creation Gives Thanks
It is so thoughtful and commendable to thank those who do us favors that if we glance around, we see that when earth is regaled by heaven’s waters and sunlight, it sends forth grass and flowers in grateful payment for the gift. Very tenderly the gardener cares for the trees so that, having grown quite tall, they bend down their fruit…to pick, almost as if to say: “Take this fruit in return for your kind care.”
– Reading from Tuesday’s Psalter: Francisco de Osuna, The Third Spiritual Alphabet
Bent Over with a Burden
In today’s Gospel reading (Lk 13:10-17), Jesus heals a woman whose back is so bent and deformed, she cannot stand. There are many today who have burdens that keep them from standing and walking freely. How are we working to free and heal them?
God’s Viewpoint on Immigration
From today’s first reading:
Thus says the LORD:
“You shall not molest or oppress an alien,
for you were once aliens yourselves in the land of Egypt.
You shall not wrong any widow or orphan.
If ever you wrong them and they cry out to me,
I will surely hear their cry.
Exodus 22:21-23
The Bible states it very clearly in Exodus and elsewhere that we are to be just with those who cross our borders, because once we were aliens in the land. And with the exception of our Native People, all of us are either immigrants or children of immigrants. Let us be just.
Surely God does hear the cry of the immigrant as they are misused at job sites, deported before they receive their paychecks, and separated from their families. Santo Toribio Romo has been known to appear to immigrants crossing the hot, barren, dry Sonoran desert, and lead them to safety. We can pray for the intercession of Santo Toribio on behalf on immigrants who are in danger at this moment.
Please join the Dominican Sisters of San Rafael in working for just immigration reform. Our corporate stance can be found on our website.
Contemplation of Creation
- . . . their answer was their beauty.
From today’s reading in the Psalter
I asked the earth, the sea and the deeps, heaven, the sun, the moon and the stars….My questioning of them was my contemplation , and their answer was their beauty.
From The Confessions of St. Augustine
For the Beauty of the Earth
Our hymn at morning prayer today was “For the Beauty of the Earth.”
For the beauty of the earth,
For the glory of the skies;
For the love which from our birth,
Over and around us lies;
Lord of all, to Thee we raise
This, our hymn of grateful praise.
For the wonder of each hour,
Of the day and of the night;
Hill and vale and tree and flow’r,
Sun and moon, and stars of light;
Lord of all, to Thee we raise
This, our hymn of grateful praise.
For the joy of ear and eye,
For the heart and mind’s delight;
For the mystic harmony,
Linking sense to sound and sight;
Lord of all, to Thee we raise
This, our hymn of grateful praise.
by Folliott S. Pierpoint, 1864
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