Thought for the Day – 2 September – Today’s Gospel: Mark 7:1–23 – Twenty-second Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year B
‘This people honours me with their lips but their heart is far from me…”…Mark 7:6
“The interior life is primordial… The active life is the consequence of the interior life and has no value unless it depends upon it. We should like to do everything to the best of our ability, perfectly. But if it isn’t linked to our interior life it is to no purpose. All the value of our life and activity stems from our interior life, the life of love for God and the Virgin Mary, the Immaculata – not in theories or sweetness but in the practice of a love that consists in the union of our will with the will of the Immaculate Virgin.
Above and over all we must deepen this interior life. If it is truly a case of spiritual life then supernatural means are required. Prayer, prayer and prayer alone is what is needed to undertake the interior life and its flowering. Interior recollection is necessary.
Let us not be anxious about unnecessary things but gently, peacefully, let us try to preserve recollection of spirit and be attentive to God’s grace. That is why silence helps us.”…St Maximilian Kolbe (1894-1941) Martyr
“You must, so to speak, tear off your own skin, which Saint Paul calls the old man, in order to be clothed with the Spirit of Jesus Christ, which is, according to the same Apostle, the new man.”
.St Francis de Sales (1567-1622) Doctor of the Church
“So let me ask you – are there moments when you place yourself quietly in the Lord’s presence, when you calmly spend time with Him, when you bask in His gaze? Do you let His fire inflame your heart? Unless you let Him warm you more and more with His love and tenderness, you will not catch fire. How will you then be able to set the hearts of others on fire by your words and witness?
Pope Francis Gaudete et Exscultate
AnaStpaul 