Daily
Thoughts:
Jesus says in the Gospel (John 8:12-20) today, “You judge by appearances….”
Often our judgments of people are just based on appearances. It is either the
color of their skin, their ethnic background, the language they are speaking,
the clothing they are wearing, the god they believe in, the part of the world
they come from that we use to decide who people are. We have not bothered to
stop and talk with them or listen to their story or understand what they
believe and value. We just judge them, we put them into a box from which they
will never escape.
Jesus seems
always to be judged by appearance by the religious leaders of his time. He
cannot escape the box they have placed him in no matter what he does and says
or how hard he tries. The problem is when people are judged in this way, those
who do the judging lose. The religious leaders lose because they missed the
presence of God in their life. God was standing in their midst and they didn’t
see God. God can be standing in our
midst, perhaps not as dramatically as Jesus, but God is still presence in
others and if we judge them by only appearance we lose.
Susanna
(Daniel 13: 1-9, 15-17, 19-30, 33-62) was judged unfairly and what we learn
from her story is that unfair judgments always catch up with those who do the
judging. The truth always finds its way to the surface. It can be a difficult
process and at times we need people like Daniel to point out the flaws in our
judgment but truth will always win even though it may take time, sometimes a
life time.
As we go
about our day let us not judge by appearance. Let us look for the truth, look
for the presence of God in all we meet. Let us be guided by the Light of the
world.
Have a great
Monday everyone!
Daily
Prayer:
Loving God, you are our light and life. Grace us with the wisdom to recognize
the many works of your hands today. Help us to be your light in the world today
by the way we live our life. Enable us to turn away from the desire to judge
and to trust in your presence in everyone we meet. Make us instruments of your
love, your joy and your peace so that we never walk in darkness but only in
your light! Amen!
A
Runner’s Thoughts: As we run today let us receive God’s blessings through
every breath we take. We breathe in the presence of God and we exhale all our
struggles, all our faults, all our failings. With each breath let us allow God
to create something new within us as we run. Enlivening us with the breath of
life, the breath of grace, the breath of God!
Daily
Blessing:
Monday greetings and blessings to all! I hope you had a great weekend or at
least a good one! I pray that your new work week will start off well with a
morning without any issues or problems. If that is not the case, I pray that God
will bless you with a day that gets better as you go along!
We will
begin the mission here at St. Joseph’s Parish this morning with the 9:00 am
mass and with our evening service at 7:30 pm as always your prayers for the
faith community here at St. Joseph’s and their preacher are greatly
appreciated.
Blessings
upon everyone today, may your day be productive, life-giving and gifted by
God’s presence. And unlike the religious leaders of Jesus’ time may you
recognize the presence of God in each moment of your day! Peace in Christ’s
Passion…Fr. Paul
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