Daily Thoughts - 12/31/2013

Daily Thoughts: Some things to ponder as we prepare to welcome a New Year…

“For last year's words belong to last year's language

And next year's words await another voice.” (T.S. Eliot)

“Keeping a journal has taught me that there is not so much new in your life as you sometimes think. When you re-read your journal you find out that your latest discovery is something you already found out five years ago. Still, it is true that one penetrates deeper and deeper into the same ideas and the same experiences.”  (Thomas Merton)

“The object of a New Year is not that we should have a new year. It is that we should have a new soul and a new nose; new feet, a new backbone, new ears, and new eyes. Unless a particular man made New Year resolutions, he would make no resolutions. Unless a man starts afresh about things, he will certainly do nothing effective.” (G.K. Chesterton)

“Faith is why I'm here today and faith is why I made it through.” (Jonathan Anthony Burkett)

“If you want to identify me, ask me not where I live, or what I like to eat, or how I comb my hair, but ask me what I am living for, in detail, ask me what I think is keeping me from living fully for the thing I want to live for.” (Thomas Merton)

“Being a Christian is less about cautiously avoiding sin than about courageously and actively doing God's will.” (Dietrich Bonhoeffer)

“Do not forget that the value and interest of life is not so much to do conspicuous things...as to do ordinary things with the perception of their enormous value.”  (Fr. Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, SJ)

“As long as we continue to live as if we are what we do, what we have, and what other people think about us, we will remain filled with judgments, opinions, evaluations, and condemnations. We will remain addicted to putting people and things in their "right" place.”  (Fr. Henri J.M. Nouwen)

“Faith is not for overcoming obstacles; it is for experiencing them—all the way through!”  (Fr. Richard Rohr, OFM)

Whoever you are, you are human. Wherever you are, you live in the world, which is just waiting for you to notice the holiness in it.” (Barbara Brown Taylor)

According to the Talmud, every blade of grass has its own angel bending over it, whispering, “Grow, grow.”  (Barbara Brown Taylor)

If the only prayer you said was thank you, that would be enough.”  (Meister Eckhart)

Have a great December 31^st everyone and a Happy 2014!

Daily Prayer: I thought Thomas Merton’s prayer would be a good end of the year prayer for all of us today –

My Lord God, I have no idea where I am going. I do not see the road ahead of me. I cannot know for certain where it will end. Nor do I really know myself, and the fact that I think that I am following your will does not mean that I am actually doing so. But I believe that the desire to please you does in fact please you. And I hope I have that desire in all that I am doing. I hope that I will never do anything apart from that desire. And I know that if I do this you will lead me by the right road though I may know nothing about it. Therefore will I trust you always though I may seem to be lost and in the shadow of death. I will not fear, for you are ever with me, and you will never leave me to face my perils alone. (Thomas Merton - Thoughts in Solitude)

Runner’s Thoughts: Run with the wind today into a New Year blessed by God!

Daily Blessing: Greetings family and friends, on this last day of 2013. I begin this day thankful for the year that has passed but happy and excited to bring in a New Year. I pray all of you are where you need and want to be and that you will get a chance to celebrate with family and/or friends tonight. If you need to travel please travel safe. If you are going to be out and about at, around or after midnight, please be safe!

I offer a simple blessing on this last day of 2013 -  O Loving God, hear our prayers today as we pray in thanksgiving for the year that has just past and with hope for the year we are about to begin. Bless us with the grace if wisdom that we have gathered over this last year and help us during the coming year to soften the hearts of all so that we may always know your friendship. Grant peace and prosperity to your people bless each of today and always with your love. Amen! May all of us encounter peace, hope and many new dreams in 2014. See you next year! Peace in the Christ Child...Fr. Paul

Daily Thoughts - 12/29/2013

Daily Thoughts: As we celebrate this Sunday between Christmas and the New Year we do so honoring the family, specifically the Holy Family, but in honoring the Holy Family we remember all families. In my homily last year on the Feast of the Holy Family I mention one of my favorite fictional characters from TV, Special Agent, Leroy Jethro Gibbs, from the show NCIS. During an episode a few years ago part of the story line was Abby’s struggle with family. She finds out that she was adopted. In a very touching scene she goes to Gibbs and says that she doesn't know who she is now and Gibbs' reply goes something like this, "Abby, family is more than science and DNA, family is about the people who care about you and you have a lot of people who care right here." To me it was a touching scene that reflected some of Gibbs' wisdom but also it reflects our feast today.

We might look are the Holy Family and say how can the Holy Family be an example of family life? They were the perfect family, how could my family even begin to measure up to them? They were special people, blessed in a unique way by God. Jesus is the Son of God. Mary came into the world without sin. An angel came to both Joseph and Mary. How can we ever measure up to the Holy Family? In a word by caring!

Gibbs was right the basic value of family is that family cares no matter what. And it doesn’t always come from DNA. Haven’t there been times when you considered a person family even though they did have your DNA? You considered them family because in some way they cared about you, about your family.

All of the stories we find about the Holy Family are about people who care for each other and for those around them. The gift of the Holy Family is the grace of caring! Perhaps our challenge today is to remember the people who care, those we are connected to by DNA and those we are not – all of whom we call family!

Daily Prayer: God the Creator of all families, graciously help us to imitate the love of the Holy Family for each other and the world. Grace us with the gift of caring so we might always bring your loving presence to a world that at times forgets to care. May your gift of family always keep hope alive within us. We continue though out this Christmas Season to pray for families in grief; for little ones whose lives were too short; for teachers, administrators and responders who put others first; for firefighters who risk their lives; for a community that must find a way to live; for all of us who seek a world of lasting peace! For truly blessed are all who hope in you! Amen!

Runner's Thought: A truly successful run is one in which the work of returning to God's presence in practiced over and over again.

Daily Blessing: I hope you are having a great Sunday and have not forgotten to give a little time to God today. We are celebrating the Feast of the Holy Family so I hope you are with family today and will take the time to enjoy the gift of their presence today. I ran across a Prayer of Thanksgiving a few years ago and it seems like a good prayer to use today for our Daily Blessing. So to all families and to all of you I ask God’s blessing on us all today as I pray…

God of all blessings, source of all life, giver of all grace: We thank you for the gift of life: for the breath that sustains life, for the food of this earth that nurtures life,

for the love of family and friends without which there would be no life.

We thank you for the mystery of creation: for the beauty that the eye can see, for the joy that the ear may hear, for the unknown that we cannot behold filling the universe with wonder, for the expanse of space that draws us beyond the definitions of our selves.

We thank you for setting us in communities: for families who nurture our becoming, for friends who love us by choice, for companions at work, who share our burdens and daily tasks, for strangers who welcome us into their midst, for people from other lands who call us to grow in understanding, for children who lighten our moments with delight, for the unborn, who offer us hope for the future.

We thank you for this day: for life and one more day to love, for opportunity and one more day to work for justice and peace, for neighbors and one more person to love and by whom be loved, for your grace and one more experience of your presence, for your promise: to be with us, to be our God, and to give salvation.

For these, and all blessings, we give you thanks, eternal, loving God, through Jesus Christ we pray. Amen.

Blessings on all families today and may all have a blessed and holy Sunday and for you and your family may it be a special on. Peace in the Holy Family...Fr. Paul

Daily Thoughts - 12/28/2013

Daily Thoughts: Today is the feast of the Holy Innocents. It has special meaning for me because when I took my vows as a Passionist my title was Paul Raymond of the Holy Innocents. I took the Holy Innocents as my title, because before entering the Passionists I worked as a social worker and my responsibilities were abused and neglected children. I also worked with hard to place adoptive children. So when I entered the Passionist I wanted to honor children particularly those often forgotten by or unwanted by the world. I thought what better way to honor and to remember the children I served, worked with and encountered by placing them and myself under the protection of the Holy Innocents.

There is not a day goes by that I don’t pause to remember many of the children that I encounter in my work. I often wonder what happened to them. Many of them were wonderful children who just need a chance to break the cycle of abuse and neglect. They were children with gifts who often didn’t get the chance to realize those gifts because of decisions that adults had made. I continue to commend them and children around the world to the care and protect of the Holy Innocents.

The Holy Innocents are martyrs and saints. Spirit of God who care for those often not cared for or forgotten. Through the celebration of their feast today and through their always present spirits may we come to value the gift of children and the gift of life.

Blessings upon all children today! Have a great Saturday everyone.

Daily Prayer: Loving Jesus, you once said unless we become like children we cannot enter your Kingdom. So we pause in prayer today to honor your most Holy Innocents and we call upon you through the intercession of these loving spirits to help us on our journey of life to the Kingdom and so we pray – Angels of God, our guardians so dear, to whom God's love entrusts us here; ever this day, be at our sides to light, to guard to rule and guide. Amen!

Runner’s Thoughts: “Running becomes religious in a robust sense when one infuses the experience – not unnaturally – with religious meaning and purpose.” (Jeffrey P Fry – “Running Religiously” from Running and Philosophy a Marathon for the Mind)

Daily Blessing: Happy Saturday everyone! I hope this finds you well and enjoying this Saturday morning. The weather here in Pelham is supposed to be sunny and on the warmer side, but it is cloudy and I don’t feel much warmth. Perhaps the rain forecast for tomorrow is coming a little earlier. Well no sense wondering or worrying  it is all beyond my control.

We celebrate the feast of the Holy Innocents today and so the focus is on children so let our blessing today be not only for us but for all children especially those who are most vulnerable, those in their mother’s womb and those who have just come into the world…Loving Jesus we ask your blessing today upon us and upon all your children especially those in most need of your blessing. You once embraced the little children who came to you, and said: "Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these!" Look now with loving eyes on the innocence of all your children and those who love them, and bless us all this day that we may never forget the gift of children and their closeness to you. Jesus in your grace and goodness let us live life continually, longing for you and loving you. Then we will surely come to our eternal home, through you, our Savior. Who lives and reigns forever and ever. Amen! Blessing upon all children and upon all of us today and always. Peace in Christ’s Passion…Fr. Paul

Daily Thoughts - 12/27/2013

Daily Thoughts: “Beloved: What was from the beginning, what we have heard, what we have seen with our eyes, what we looked upon and touch with our hands concerns the Word of life….” The opening lines from the First Letter of St. John which was read at today mass. They have always been comforting yet challenging words for me. They are certainly profound words today as we celebrate the feast of St. John, the apostle, evangelist and beloved friend of Jesus. As we often refer to him, the youngest of the apostle or at least the fastest as we hear in today’s Gospel (John 20: 1a and 2-8).

John by tradition lived the longest and was not martyred as the rest of the apostles were. In his old age he became a prisoner in exile, a mystic, a hermit and certainly a profound writer of the story of Jesus. Unlike his fellow evangelists John’s story is steeped in images, stories not found in the other Gospels and personal expressions of faith. John’s story of Jesus soars to the heights of the mystery of God, thus John is often imaged as an eagle.

In some ways we are all like John, living our life, running ahead when we can, believing when we get the chance to enter the mystery. We use the stories of our lives to proclaim the presence of God. We have seen things; heard things and touched things and they have all been about and from God. We are all God’s beloved.

May the spirit of St. John bring out the mystic in all of us today. May we look beyond what we hear, see and touch to the presence of God born in each of us this day!

Have a great day everyone!

Daily Prayer: Loving God, may your love make us what we have been called to be this day – your beloved. Amen!

Runner’s Thoughts: “Running! If there's any activity happier, more exhilarating, more nourishing to the imagination, I can't think of what it might be. In running the mind flees with the body, the mysterious efflorescence of language seems to pulse in the brain, in rhythm with our feet and the swinging of our arms.” (Joyce Carol Oates) – Now we know why St. John was such a good mystic, writer and runner!

Daily Blessing: TGIF in the midst of Christmas week my friends. I hope this finds you well today and ready to enjoy the weekend. We find ourselves in the midst of the Octave of Christmas which means at least in a liturgical sense today is Christmas once again. So in the spirit of Christmas I offer you my prayers and a blessing today – May the spirit of Christmas bring us peace – The joy and gladness of Christmas give us hope – The warmth of Christmas grant us love. Christmas blessings to all today and in the spirit of St. John may our feet be swift today so we can get to the weekend quickly and safe! Peace in Christ’s Passion…Fr. Paul