- Acts 8: 5-8, 14-17
- Psalms 66: 1-3, 4-5, 6-7, 16, 20
- 1 Peter 3: 15-18
- John 14: 15-21
- What is and is not a sacrament
- It has been said that a sacrament is "an outward sign instituted by Christ to give grace."
- If that is true, when might Christ have instituted the sacrament of Confirmation?
- Is that the only occasion in which God anoints with His Spirit?
- What is the best way to continue to celebrate our Confirmation in our day to day lives?
- Be careful what you ask for
- Think of a time when a person came into your life, and you thought of them as an answer to prayer.
- In the most general sense, what are we really looking for from God when we pray?
- How does God answer those prayers?
- How can you be an answer to someone's prayer?
- How can we be preparing to be that answer to someone's prayers?
- Suffering redeemed
- Just what does it mean to "give your suffering up to Christ".
- How can our suffering possibly benefit Christ?
- How is it that the Mass can be described as an eternal unbloody sacrifice?
- In what sense is that sacrifice still being offered?
- How can we participate in that offering?
- Or - Following Jesus
- What are some things in your life that have had to be put to death/lost as you drew closer to God?
- When you faced that loss, was it abrupt and harsh, or gentle and merciful?
- How do you know that it is God who is asking you to give these things up, and not just cruel fate, bad luck, or rotten karma?
- Why do you think that God asked you to give that up?
- Without seeing You, we love You
- Moses gave the children of Israel ten commandments, how many did Jesus give us?
- How does our love for Jesus strengthen us in obedience to His commandments?
- How does our obedience strengthen our love for Jesus?
- How are you growing in your love for Jesus?
- A sacramental is some object in this world that points to God. Has my life been at all sacramental this week?
- What drives my prayer life, and why?
- How am I better for having been to Mass this week?
- How am I getting to know Jesus better?
Belonging
In Death of the Hired Man Robert Frost tells us
"Home is where, when you go there, they have to take you in"
To the one with no home, no kith, no kin who cares enough to take them in
Homelessness slinks along the road ahead of them
Like the stench of leprosy
Cutting them off from the rest of us with an invisible curtain.
Such abandoned and forgotten find a friend in Jesus
So often shunned, ignored, abandoned in His life.
Jesus walks among the orphaned, clothed in mercy, kindness, love
Unafraid of the rejection clinging to them, for He too knows rejection.
Jesus tells us that He will never leave us abandoned, orphaned, alone
If only we follow Him.
Touch the leper, pierce the curtain of hopelessness
Tell the marginalized that they are important, have dignity, are loved.
How very odd that the best way to find ourselves
Is to seek those who are lost, who have lost all hope, lost their true identity.
"Home is where, when you go there, they have to take you in"
To the one with no home, no kith, no kin who cares enough to take them in
Homelessness slinks along the road ahead of them
Like the stench of leprosy
Cutting them off from the rest of us with an invisible curtain.
Such abandoned and forgotten find a friend in Jesus
So often shunned, ignored, abandoned in His life.
Jesus walks among the orphaned, clothed in mercy, kindness, love
Unafraid of the rejection clinging to them, for He too knows rejection.
Jesus tells us that He will never leave us abandoned, orphaned, alone
If only we follow Him.
Touch the leper, pierce the curtain of hopelessness
Tell the marginalized that they are important, have dignity, are loved.
How very odd that the best way to find ourselves
Is to seek those who are lost, who have lost all hope, lost their true identity.
Shalom!
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