Tagged: message of the day

DO YOU LOVE?

“Which of these three, in your opinion, was neighbor to the man who fell in with the robbers?” –Luke 10:36 Life is not just a matter of loving God but of loving the Lord our God with all our hearts, all our souls, all our strength, and all our minds (Lk 10:27). How do we know whether we are loving God with all our being? A good indication is whether or not we are loving our neighbors as ourselves (Lk 10:27). “One who has no love for the brother he has seen cannot love the God he has not seen”...

LIP BALM

“Now that this has touched your lips, your wickedness is removed, your sin purged.” –Isaiah 6:7 A seraph touched Isaiah’s lips with a hot ember from the heavenly altar (Is 6:6). The seraph said: “Now that this has touched your lips, your wickedness is removed, your sin purged” (Is 6:7). Something from heaven touched Isaiah’s lips, and his lips were then opened to speak the prophetic Word of God. How blessed we are, for something sent from heaven touches our lips also: the Eucharist, the body of Christ (Jn 6:32-33; Catechism, 1402). Like Isaiah’s ember, the Eucharist touches our lips,...

RE-TREED

“I have humbled him, but I will prosper him.” –Hosea 14:9 God calls us “oaks of justice, planted by the Lord to show His glory” (Is 61:3). However, if we sin and refuse to repent, “the Lord, the Lord of hosts, lops off the boughs with terrible violence; the tall of stature are felled, and the lofty ones brought low; the forest thickets are felled” (Is 10:33-34). Nevertheless, we can eventually accept the grace to repent, then we will “strike root like the Lebanon cedar, and put forth” our shoots (Hos 14:6). We will produce many leaves (Hos 14:8) and...

THE ECOLOGY OF MISSION

“As you go…” –Matthew 10:7 We all are missionaries by virtue of our Baptisms. It is extremely important for each of us to accomplish our missions for the Lord. To do this, we must know and respect the ecology of mission. Our missions are ones of healings, miracles, and deliverances (Mt 10:8). These acts of God’s power, however, are not to be isolated from proclaiming the kingdom of God (Mt 10:7). Moreover, we will not have the power of mission if we have not chosen the poverty of mission (Mt 10:9-10). Also, we won’t be able to reach the world...

SELF-“IMPROVEMENT”

Daily Word of God (விவிலிய முழக்கம்) –  Today’s Reading and Message in Tamil (Audio) :  “Their heart is false.” –Hosea 10:2 The more the Israelites prospered, the more they slipped into idolatrous worship, setting up altars and pillars dedicated to false gods (Hos 10:1). Isn’t that like us? We delude ourselves into thinking that once we strike it rich, we’ll give God His share of our attention. However, this is self-deception. We’ve inherited a fallen nature, warped by original sin. Our flesh is never satisfied; it always wants more. The more we have, the more we want for ourselves, and...