Advent on this mountain of prayer
I hope all of you have had a blessed Gaudete Sunday! The Liturgy was so full of joy and the Holy Spirit and of course, it always lifts our souls to have pink in the sanctuary! It is truly a joyful color. After starting this blog last May we were inundated with blog spam - I am sure you are familiar with this nuisance. In November I was so bombarded with it and was just hitting the delete button as quick as I could that I accidentally deleted some "real" comments from you our friends! I am sorry that that happened. But that won't be happening any longer thanks to a plug-in called WP-SpamFreewhich we activated a week ago. God bless the designers of this great anti-spam plugin! I don't know what to do with all the time I have on my hands now that I am not sifting through spam. (Not really, but you know what I mean.) In one week it has blocked 699 spam comments!
I thought you would appreciate the following meditation on Advent which Msgr. Powers gave to us for a homily during the first week of Advent. May it aid you in finding your "mountain" - your time and place to prepare with ever greater intensity for the coming of "Love-Divine" And may God reward you Msgr.! We deeply appreciate your spirituality and your fatherly friendship!
J.M.J. On this mountain:
In this monastery God will provide…
Your presence here is the call of vocation, a call from the Heavenly Father through the Holy Spirit to follow Jesus
A call into the mystery of the Crucified Christ…
A call to holiness…. to live for God alone
On this mountain… in this monastery
Away from the world…
In enclosure…. in solitude…. in silence… in recollection you can be for God alone…
On this mountain… in this monastery
You will have God’s will in your Rule where there is obedience in the total gift of the will
There is the opportunity to completely empty yourself in imitation of Jesus in radical poverty…
Where the goal is absolute love of God in total gift and total surrender in the vow of Chastity…
On this mountain … in this monastery you are given the opportunity and the grace and the environment to live for God alone…
It will be the mountain of Calvary, the living of the Paschal mystery… seeking Christ in his suffering… knowing union with Christ in the Cross…
At the foot of the Cross with the Sorrowful Virgin Mother… Loving the Suffering Christ to the depth of an espousal love… to be the spouse of Jesus the Crucified…
On this mountain your prayer will be continual
The prayer of the Eucharist… The prayer of the Church… The prayer of the Crucified Christ…
Your prayer will be personal… Attentive to the Spirit…adoring God in your heart
Your prayer will be Eucharistic… Before the Blessed Sacrament in worship…in adoration…in praise… in petition for the church…in atonement for sins
Your prayer will be that of the Spirit: vocal or deeply silent... words…or total silence… peaceful or in conflict… contemplative…or even infused…
On this mountain in this monastery… God will provide…
the way to sainthood in your devotion to the Passion… the way of holiness in your vocation… the way of love in service to one another in community… the way of self fulfillment in total giving the way of the Spirit in the Charism of Paul of the Cross.
In this monastery God will provide rich food in the gift of his Divine Will…
On this mountain … in this monastery it is said to You: Behold our God….to whom you looked to save us. Here is the Lord for whom you look… The hand of the Lord rests on this mountain.
Amen
Msgr. Bernard Powers
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