Retreat Lights

Several priests of various orders were celebrating a liturgy during a retreat. They were Franciscans, Benedictines, Dominicans, Carmelites, and Jesuits. Suddenly the lights of the retreat house dimmed and went out. The Franciscans burst into a song praising God for the darkness. The Benedictines continued the prayers from memory, without missing a beat. The Dominicans began to discuss light as a signification of the transmission of divine knowledge. The Carmelites fell into silence and started to practice slow, steady breathing. The Jesuits sent one of their guys into the basement to replace the fuse.

Principles

Comedian Groucho Marx quipped, "Those are my principles. If you don't like them, I have others."

You and I have principles. And we also have opinions. I have opinions about what I think is right or wrong or good or bad. But… they're only opinions - I COULD be wrong! I won't try to build my life around my opinions, but I WILL endeavor to stand by my principles.

A 15-year-old boy learned a valuable lesson about life principles. He wrote a letter to "Dear Abby" about finding a woman's wallet that contained $127 as well as the woman's identification. He hopped onto his bicycle and peddled over to her house - about a mile away. He told her he found her wallet and she gave him a big hug. She also gave him twenty dollars.

That evening the boy told his parents about the event and his father said, "I don't think you should have accepted $20 for doing what you should have done. A person shouldn't be rewarded for being honest."

He pondered his father's statement and decided he would return the money. He biked to the lady's home and gave her back the twenty dollars. She didn't want to take it, but he told her she had to - that his father pointed out something to him that he had never realized before. Her eyes filled with tears as she said, "This is one for Ripley."

The boy's question to Abby? "Abby, who is Ripley?"

Is a life built around principles so unusual that Robert Ripley should mention it in his column "Believe It or Not"? When ideals such as honesty and a personal standard of always doing the right thing guide our every action and decision, we actually change. These great principles shape our lives and make us into persons of character. They build self esteem and teach confidence. That boy is fortunate to be raised by a wise father who had the wisdom to say, "Those are my principles."

Martin Luther King, Jr. put it well: "The time is always right to do what is right." Those were his principles. Decide to always do what is right - today and every day - and you will find yourself building a life that matters.

Essential Knowledge

An emperor summoned a man who was thought to be the wisest man in the world.  He asked him to write a book of all essential knowledge.

The learned man set to work and twelve years later he offered the emperor a series of books. “It is too much.” said the emperor. “Assemble all essential knowledge into one book.”

The man obeyed and returned four years later with one book. “It is still too much,” said the emperor. “I need to run my empire and I am a very busy man.  Write on several pages what you think is really important and then come back to me.’

Again the scholar set to work. After two years he had summarized the essence of his knowledge onto several pages. He gave them to the monarch, who was extremely busy that day and he gave the man a final request: all on one sheet of paper.  

The man needed several years to put what he regarded as essential knowledge onto one just sheet of paper. “It is still too much,” the emperor said. ‘I want to make you a proposal: stop writing. Try to concentrate the essence of your knowledge into one word and come and tell me that word. I will pay you well.’

The man retired to an isolated place and thought deeply. When he eventually found the word that represented the essence of all his knowledge, experience, and wisdom, he asked for an audience with the emperor, now an old man. “Have you got the word?” the emperor asked the scholar. “Yes, Majesty. I have found it.”  “Come and whisper it into my ear.” said the emperor.

Do you know the secret?

Do you know the Word?

Iroquois Prayer

We return thanks to our mother, the earth, which sustains us.

We return thanks to the rivers and streams, which supply us with waters.

We return thanks to all herbs, which furnish medicine for the cure of our diseases.

We return thanks to the corn, and to her sisters, the beans and the squashes, 

which give us life.

We return thanks to the wind, which moving the air has banished diseases.

We return thanks to the moon and the stars, 

which have given us their light when the sun was gone.

We return thanks to the sun, that he has looked upon the earth with a beneficent eye.

Lastly, we return thanks to the Great Spirit, in whom is embodied all goodness, 

and who directs all things for the good of his children.

12 Rules

  1.  Do one thing at a time. No multi-tasking.

  2.  Do it slowly and deliberately.
  3.  Do it completely.
  4.  Do less.
  5.  Put space between things.
  6.  Develop rituals.
  7.  Designate time for certain things.
  8.  Devote time to sitting.
  9.  Smile and serve others.
10.  Make cooking and cleaning become meditation.
11.  Think about what is necessary.
12.  Live simply.

How We Look at Others

A young couple moves into a new neighborhood.  The next morning while they are eating breakfast, the young woman sees her neighbor hanging the wash outside.

"That laundry is not very clean,” she said. "She doesn't know how to wash correctly. Perhaps she needs better laundry soap." Her husband looked on, but remained silent.

Every time her neighbor would hang her wash to dry, the young woman would make the same comments.

About one month later, the woman was surprised to see a nice clean wash on the line and said to her husband: "Look, she has learned how to wash correctly. I wonder who taught her this?"

The husband said, "I got up early this morning and cleaned our windows."

And so it is with life. What we see when watching others depends on the purity of the window through which we look.

Thirtieth Sunday in Ordinary Time

Throughout the month of October, all our Sunday gospel readings have come from chapter 10 of St. Mark’s gospel. We began the chapter with Jesus’ discussion about marriage, divorce and the special place children have in the kingdom.  Then we encountered the rich man who wanted to inherit eternal life but was unwilling to take the action necessary to gain it.  Last week we heard James and John ask Jesus for positions of power and influence in the kingdom of God but Jesus could not fulfill their request. This week we finish the chapter with Jesus encountering and healing Bartimaeous, a blind beggar sitting on the side of the road between Jericho and Jerusalem.  

The story of Bartimaeous presents a striking contrast both to Jesus’ discussion with the rich man and his conversation with James and John.   Bartimaeous had a double handicap; he was blind and we assume he was poor because he was sitting on the side of the road begging.  Although he was blind and poor, Bartimaeous had some qualities the rich man, James and John lacked.  He had determination, faith, humility, courage and childlike acceptance. 

Bartimaeous went to a lot of trouble to get Jesus’ attention. Once he got it he leapt into action, “He threw aside his cloak, sprang up, and came to Jesus” (Mark 10:50). In all likelihood, that cloak was Bartimaeous’ only possession yet he was willing to leave it behind to stand before Jesus.   When Jesus asked, “What do you want me to do for you” (Mark 10:51), the same question he asked James and John a few verses earlier, Bartimaeous didn’t ask for power, money, success or eternal life, he merely said, “Master, I want to see” (Mark 10:51).   Then Jesus healed him saying, “Go your way; your faith has saved you” (Mark 10:52).  Now the story could end here but it doesn’t.  There is one more line, “Immediately he received his sight and followed him on the way” (Mark 10:52). 

Bartimaeous, with his sight fully restored, does not wander off to visit with family and friends or to tell everyone about what happened to him. His restored sight provided him with a vision greater than merely seeing what was around him; he saw a vision of the kingdom.  With that vision, Bartimaeous made a life changing decision; he left everything behind and followed Jesus on the way to the cross. 

Our living God,
you are very near to us in our joys and pains.
Give us the eyes of faith and love to see
the mission you have given us in life
and the courage and grace to carry it out.
Make us also clear-sighted enough to see
the needs of people who cry out their misery
or suffer in silence,
that we may bring them your healing compassion
and lead them to you.
We ask this through Christ our Lord.

Amen

Let Go

To "let go" does not mean to stop caring, it means I can't do it for someone else. 

To "let go" is not to cut myself off, it's the realization I can't control another. 

To "let go" is not to enable, but to allow learning from natural consequences. 

To "let go" is to admit powerlessness, which means the outcome is not in my hands.

To "let go" is not to try to change or blame another, it’s to make the most of myself. To "let go" is not to care for, but care about. 

To "let go" is not to fix, but to be supportive. 

To "let go" is not to judge, but to allow another to be a human being. 

To "let go" is not to be in the middle arranging all the outcomes, but to allow others to affect their own destinies. 

To "let go" is not to be protective, it's to permit another to face reality. 

To "let go" is not to deny, but to accept. 

To "let go" is not to adjust everything to my desires, but to take each day as it comes, and cherish myself in it. 

To "let go" is not to regret the past, but to grow and live for the future. 

To "let go" is to fear less and love more.

Seeking

We are told that St. Francis used to spend whole nights praying the same prayer:  “Who are you, God? And who am I?” Evelyn Underhill claims it’s almost the perfect prayer. The abyss of your own soul and the abyss of the nature of God have opened up, and you are falling into both of them simultaneously. Now you are in a new realm of Mystery and grace, where everything good happens!

Notice how the prayer of Francis is not stating anything but just asking open-ended questions. It is the humble, seeking, endless horizon prayer of the mystic that is offered out of complete trust. You know that such a prayer will be answered, because there has already been a previous answering, a previous epiphany, a previous moment where the ground opened up and you knew you were in touch with infinite mystery and you knew you were yourself infinite mystery. You only ask such grace-filled questions, or any question for that matter, when they have already begun to be answered.

Spiral Galaxy

William Beebe, the naturalist, used to tell this story about Teddy Roosevelt. At Sagamore Hill, after an evening of talk, the two would go out on the lawn and search the skies for a certain spot of star-like light near the lower left-hand corner of the Great Square of Pegasus. Then Roosevelt would recite: "That is the Spiral Galaxy in Andromeda. It is as large as our Milky Way. It is one of a hundred million galaxies. It consists of one hundred billion suns, each larger than our sun."

Then Roosevelt would grin and say, "Now I think we are small enough! Let's go to bed."

I Said Nothing

In Germany they first came for the Communists,

and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Communist.

Then they came for the Jews,

and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Jew.

Then they came for the trade unionists,
and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a trade unionist.

Then they came for the Catholics,
and I didn't speak up because I was a Protestant.

Then they came for me -
and by that time no one was left to speak up.

- Martin Niemöller

Samuel Morse

Wakefield tells the story of the famous inventor Samuel Morse who was once asked if he ever encountered situations where he didn't know what to do. Morse responded, "More than once, and whenever I could not see my way clearly, I knelt down and prayed to God for light and understanding."

Morse received many honors from his invention of the telegraph but felt undeserving: "I have made a valuable application of electricity not because I was superior to other men but solely because God, who meant it for mankind, must reveal it to someone and He was pleased to reveal it to me."

Beethoven's Piano

On a visit to the Beethoven museum in Bonn, a young student became fascinated by the piano on which Beethoven had composed some of his greatest works. She asked the museum guard if she could play a few bars on it; she accompanied the request with a lavish tip, and the guard agreed. The girl went to the piano and tinkled out the opening of the Moonlight Sonata. As she was leaving she said to the guard, "I suppose all the great pianist who come here want to play on that piano."

The guard shook his head. "Padarewski [the famed Polish pianist] was here a few years ago and he said he wasn't worthy to touch it."

Look to this Day

Look to this day,

For it is life,
The very life of life.
In its brief course lies all
The realities and verities of existence,
The bliss of growth,
The splendor of action,
The glory of power ---

For yesterday is but a dream
And tomorrow is only a vision,
But today, well lived,
Makes every yesterday a dream of happiness
And every tomorrow a vision of hope.
Look well, therefore, to this day.

Another Beatitude

Blessed are they who understand

My faltering step and shaking hand,

Blessed, who know my ears today
Must strain to catch the things they say,

Blessed are they who seem to know
My eyes are dim and my mind is slow,

Blessed are they who looked away,
I spilled my tea on the cloth that day!

Blessed are they who, with cheery smile,
Stopped to chat for a little while,

Blessed are they who know the way
To bring back memories of yesterday,

Blessed are they who never say,
"You've told that story twice today!"

Blessed are they who make it known
That I'm loved, respected and not alone,

And blessed are they who will ease the days
Of my journey home, in loving ways

By Elizabeth Clark and Inspiration Daily

Feast Day of St. Luke the Evangelist

On October 18, Catholics and other Christians around the world will celebrate the feast of St. Luke, the physician and companion of St. Paul whose gospel preserved the most extensive biography of Jesus Christ.

St. Luke wrote a greater volume of the New Testament than any other single author, including the earliest history of the Church. Ancient traditions also acknowledge Luke as the founder of Christian iconography, making him a patron of artists as well as doctors and other medical caregivers.

Luke came from the large metropolitan city of Antioch, a part of modern-day Turkey. In Luke's lifetime, his native city emerged as an important center of early Christianity. During the future saint's early years, the city's port had already become a cultural center, renowned for arts and sciences. Historians do not know whether Luke came to Christianity from Judaism or paganism, although there are strong suggestions that Luke was a gentile convert.

Educated as a physician in the Greek-speaking city, Luke was among the most cultured and cosmopolitan members of the early Church. Scholars of archeology and ancient literature have ranked him among the top historians of his time period, besides noting the outstanding Greek prose style and technical accuracy of his accounts of Christ's life and the apostles' missionary journeys.

Other students of biblical history adduce from Luke's writings that he was the only evangelist to incorporate the personal testimony of the Blessed Virgin Mary, whose role in Christ's life emerges most clearly in his gospel. Tradition credits him with painting several icons of Christ's mother, and one of the sacred portraits ascribed to him – known by the title “Salvation of the Roman People”-- survives to this day in the Basilica of St. Mary Major.

Some traditions hold that Luke became a direct disciple of Jesus before his ascension, while others hold that he became a believer only afterward. After St. Paul's conversion, Luke accompanied him as his personal physician-- and, in effect, as a kind of biographer, since the journeys of Paul on which Luke accompanied him occupy a large portion of the Acts of the Apostles. Luke probably wrote this text, the final narrative portion of the New Testament, in the city of Rome where the account ends.

Luke was also among the only companions of Paul who did not abandon him during his final imprisonment and death in Rome. After the martyrdom of St. Paul in the year 67, St. Luke is said to have preached elsewhere throughout the Mediterranean, and possibly died as a martyr. However, even tradition is unclear on this point. Fittingly, the evangelist whose travels and erudition could have filled volumes, wrote just enough to proclaim the gospel and apostolic preaching to the world.

Patronage: artists, bachelors, bookbinders, brewers, butchers, doctors, glass makers, glassworkers, gold workers, goldsmiths, lacemakers, lace workers, notaries, painters, physicians, sculptors, stained glass workers, surgeons

Being Human

“Overcoming denial means intentionally and fully knowing oneself as a human being - warts and all. Being human means that you aren't everything you want to be - or everything you think you are - good or bad. Being human means that your thinking is sometimes irrational. It also means that everyday you have thoughts you would not like to have shared with people around you. Being human means that you live in a body which might not be perfect and sometimes has pain and is getting... older and probably is not in the same shape as what you see on TV and movies. Being human means you might not always have the kind of attitude you'd like to have. Being human means that you have those messy human feelings you wish would go away. Having feelings means that you sometimes make decisions based on feelings which aren't always in your best interest and sometimes hurt you and hurt people you love. Being human means that you can't do it alone - you need support. Being human also means that you are a child of Creation. A Loving God formed you and loves you as you are. Being human means that you are a spiritual being living in a physical body. Being human means that you are BOTH good and bad, BOTH saint and sinner, BOTH loving and selfish. Being human means that you have BOTH pain and pleasure. Being human means that you have needs that you can't always meet. Being human means that you are NOT in control.

”Being human isn’t all negative. We are each gifted with mind and heart and wonderful senses to enjoy the world and to serve one another. We are all gifted and talented in tremendous ways – unique to us in a world filled with wonder. We each have many strengths in addition to any flaws we may have. We are made for great joy. God gave us a world filled with beauty and with pleasure. Being a Spiritual Person doesn’t mean we avoid all pleasure. But that we accept it with grateful hearts.

Feast Day of St. Marguerite d'Youville

St. Marguerite d’Youville
(1701-1771)

Born in Varennes, Canada, Marie Marguerite Dufrost de Lajemmerais had to interrupt her schooling at the age of 12 to help her widowed mother. Eight years later she married Francois d'Youville; they had six children, four of whom died young. Despite the fact that her husband gambled, sold liquor illegally to Native Americans and treated her indifferently, she cared for him compassionately in before his death in 1730.

Even though she was caring for two small children and running a store to help pay off her husband's debts, Marguerite still helped the poor. Once her children were grown, she and several companions rescued a Quebec hospital that was in danger of failing. She called her community the Institute of the Sisters of Charity of Montreal; the people called them the "Grey Nuns" because of the color of their habit. In time, a proverb arose among the poor people of Montreal, "Go to the Grey Nuns; they never refuse to serve." In time, five other religious communities traced their roots to the Grey Nuns.

Pope John XXIII, who beatified her in 1959, called her the "Mother of Universal Charity." She was canonized in 1990.

Trivia Question

Here's a trivia question. What was the second name Saul had in Scripture?

"Paul?" Wrong. Paul is the third name Saul had in Scripture.

Then Ananias went to the house and entered it. Placing his hands on Saul, he said, "Brother Saul, the Lord - Jesus, who appeared to you on the road as you were coming here - has sent me so that you may see again and be filled with the Holy Spirit." (Acts 9:17)

You probably spotted it. The second name Saul had was Brother Saul.

It may not seem ...like a big deal to us, but you can bet Saul never forgot the day a man called him Brother for the first time. Imagine sitting in darkness for three days without food, drink, or encouragement and suddenly receiving a kind word. What a gift!

A faithful friend says not simply kind words, but the right words at the right time. Ananias shared the truth with Saul in a very gentle way and baptized him. The first person whom Saul saw after he heard the truth of the Holy Spirit was a God-sent friend.

Ananias showered Saul with some of the most precious gifts you can give another human being. He was there for Saul, he touched him like a friend who cared, and he spoke kindly to him, with the right words at the right time.

Over the next several days, he taught Saul, he encouraged him, and he introduced him to more people who had that same touch, that same kindness, that same love born of the Holy Spirit. What wonderful power Saul discovered in Damascus! The first form of that power he discovered was the power of faithful friends.

Feast Day of St. Teresa of Avila

On Oct. 15, Roman Catholics celebrate the Spanish Carmelite reformer and mystic St. Teresa of Avila, whose life of prayer enriched the Church during the 16th century counter-reformation.

Teresa Sanchez Cepeda Davila y Ahumada was born in the Castilian city of Avila during the year 1515,  the third child in a family descended from Jewish merchants who had converted to Christianity during the reign of King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella. Her father Alphonsus had become an ardent Catholic, with a collection of spiritual books of the type his daughter would later compose herself.

As a child, Teresa felt captivated by the thought of eternity and the vision of God granted to the saints in heaven. She and her younger brother Rodrigo once attempted to run away from home for the sake of dying as martyrs in a Muslim country, though they soon ran into a relative who sent them back to their mother Beatrice.

When Teresa was 14, her mother died, causing the girl a profound grief that prompted her to embrace a deeper devotion to the Virgin Mary as her spiritual mother. Along with this good resolution, however, she also developed immoderate interests in reading popular fiction (consisting, at that time, mostly of medieval tales of knighthood) and caring for her own appearance.

Though Teresa's spiritual directors in later life would judge these faults to be relatively minor, they still represented a noticeable loss of her childhood zeal for God. Alphonsus decided his teenage daughter needed a change of environment, and sent her to be educated in a convent of Augustinian nuns. Teresa found their life dull at first, but soon came to some understanding of its spiritual advantages.

Illness forced her to leave the convent during her second year. But the influence of her devout uncle Peter, along with her reading of the letters of the monk and Church Father St. Jerome, convinced Teresa that the surest road to salvation lay in forsaking marriage, property, and worldly pleasures completely. Against the will of her father, who wanted her to postpone the decision, she joined the Carmelite Order.

Teresa became a professed member of the order at age 20, but soon developed a serious illness that forced her to return home. She experienced severe pain and physical paralysis for two years, and was expected to die when she went into a coma for four days. But she insisted on returning to the Carmelite monastery as soon as she was able, even though she remained in a painful and debilitated state.

For the next three years the young nun made remarkable progress in her spiritual life, developing the practice of recalling herself into the presence of God through quiet contemplation. As her health returned, however, Teresa lapsed into a more routine prayer life. While she remained an obedient Carmelite, she would not re-establish this close personal connection to God for almost twenty years.

When she was nearly 40, however, Teresa found herself dramatically called back to the practice of contemplative mental prayer. She experienced profound changes within her own soul, and remarkable visions that seemed to come from God. Under the direction of her confessors, Teresa wrote about some of these experiences in an autobiography that she completed in 1565.

Teresa had always been accustomed to contemplate Christ's presence within her after receiving him in the sacrament of Holy Communion. Now, however, she understood that the presence she received did not simply fade: God was, in fact, with her always, and had been all along. It was simply a matter of putting herself in his presence, with love and attention – as one could do at any moment.

This revolution in her spiritual life enabled Teresa to play a significant role in the renewal of the Church that followed the Council of Trent. She proposed a return of the Carmelites to their original rule of life, a simple and austere form of monasticism – founded on silence and solitude – that had received papal approval in the 12th century and was believed to date back to the Old Testament prophet Elijah.

Together with her close collaborator, the priest and writer later canonized as Saint John of the Cross, she founded what is known today as the Order of Discalced Carmelites – “discalced,” meaning barefoot, symbolizing the simplicity to which they chose to return the order after a period of corruption. The reform met with fierce opposition, but resulted in the founding of 30 monasteries during her life.

Teresa's health failed her for the last time while she was traveling through Salamanca in 1582. She accepted her dramatic final illness as God's chosen means of calling her into his presence forever.

“O my Lord, and my spouse, the desired hour is now come,” she stated. “The hour is at last come, wherein I shall pass out of this exile, and my soul shall enjoy in thy company what it hath so earnestly longed for.”

St. Teresa of Avila died on Oct. 15, 1582. She was canonized on March 22, 1622, along with three of her greatest contemporaries: St. Ignatius Loyola, St. Francis Xavier, and St. Philip Neri.

In 1970, Pope St. Paul VI proclaimed St. Teresa as one of the first two woman Doctors of the Church, along with 14th century Dominican St. Catherine of Siena

God Grant Me the Serenity

The Serenity Prayer is well known in most circles. You can find it printed on coffee mugs, plaques, tapestries, cards, etc. I’m sure you’re all familiar with it. “God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can and the wisdom to know the difference”. I cannot begin to count the times I have prayed this prayer. Many times it is part of my morning devotions. I ask God to give me peace for the day to accept the things I cannot change. On more than one occasion I have prayed this prayer under my breath and quickly! When someone was in my face I wanted God to give me peace to accept what I obviously wasn’t going to be able to change.

To accept things that we cannot change is hard for us humans. We have conquered the wildest of rivers with our great dams. We have harnessed the power of the atom. We have found cures and vaccines for many diseases and continue to make great strides in every field. The idea of asking God for peace to accept those things we cannot change is alien to us. Yet there are things I cannot change. I cannot change people. As much as I would like to I simply cannot make people love God and turn to him for help. I can show the way. I can preach the way. I can offer to go with them on the way but I cannot make them change. I cannot change history either. What has happened is done. Not even God rewrites history. It stands as a record of the successes and failures of each of us for all to see. Whether it is people or history or other circumstances, God is able to give us peace in the midst of the situation.

“God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can and the wisdom to know the difference”.

Approval

We can secure other people's approval, if we do right and try hard; but our own is worth a hundred of it.   — Mark Twain

There was once a young girl who thought that if only she tried a little harder, she could please her parents; if only she were prettier, her friends would like her better. She tried constantly to gain their approval. Sometimes they said they liked her, and sometimes they didn't.

Then one night an angel came to her in a dream and told her, "You are fine just the way you are. You don't have to change. I want you to start noticing your own beauty and loving yourself exactly the way you are." 

Doing what the angel suggested - giving love and approval to herself - wasn't easy, but she found that when she did it she felt a peace that was not dependent on what others thought. She thanked her angel for caring enough to come and give her such wise advice. 

What are some things I like about myself?

See His Blood Upon the Rose

I see his blood upon the rose

And in the stars the glory of his eyes,
His body gleams amid eternal snows,
His tears fall from the skies.

I see his face in every flower;
The thunder and the singing of the birds
Are but his voice-and carven by his power
Rocks are his written words.

All pathways by his feet are worn,
His strong heart stirs the ever-beating sea,
His crown of thorns is twined with every thorn,
His cross is every tree.

Joseph Mary Plunkett

Your Inner Self

There is a place, deep inside you, that is filled only with the things you've allowed to come in. Take a careful look, and see what that special place holds. For although nothing can get in unless you allow it, everything there will surely get out. The things you hold inside of you will eventually take hold in your outer self and the world in which you live. One day, your innermost imaginings will become your outermost reality.

So what are you imagining? 
Is your inner self full of fear, anger, doubt and resentment? 
Or do you fill your innermost thoughts with love, faith, confidence, gratitude and joy?

Whatever is on the inside will soon be on the outside, and will indeed define who you are. Make positive use of that control you have over your deepest, innermost self.

Fill the inside with goodness, with love, with the best you can imagine. For what you keep inside, is what you do become.

Feast Day of St. John XXIII

St. John XXIII was born Angelo Giuseppe Roncalli at Sotto il Monte, Italy, in the Diocese of Bergamo on 25 November 1881. He was the fourth in a family of 14. The family worked as sharecroppers. It was a patriarchal family in the sense that the families of two brothers lived together, headed by his great-uncle Zaverio, who had never married and whose wisdom guided the work and other business of the family. Zaverio was Angelo's godfather, and to him he always attributed his first and most fundamental religious education. The religious atmosphere of his family and the fervent life of the parish, under the guidance of Fr. Francesco Rebuzzini, provided him with training in the Christian life.

He entered the Bergamo seminary in 1892. Here he began the practice of making spiritual notes, which he continued in one form or another until his death, and which have been gathered together in the Journal of a Soul. Here he also began the deeply cherished practice of regular spiritual direction. In 1896 he was admitted to the Secular Franciscan Order by the spiritual director of the Bergamo seminary, Fr. Luigi Isacchi; he made a profession of its Rule of life on 23 May 1897.

From 1901 to 1905 he was a student at the Pontifical Roman Seminary. On 10 August 1904 he was ordained a priest in the church of Santa Maria in Monte Santo in Rome's Piazza del Popolo. In 1905 he was appointed secretary to the new Bishop of Bergamo, Giacomo Maria Radini Tedeschi.

When Italy went to war in 1915 he was drafted as a sergeant in the medical corps and became a chaplain to wounded soldiers. When the war ended, he opened a "Student House" for the spiritual needs of young people.

In 1919 he was made spiritual director of the seminary, but in 1921 he was called to the service of the Holy See. Benedict XV brought him to Rome to be the Italian president of the Society for the Propagation of the Faith. In 1925 Pius XI named him Apostolic Visitator in Bulgaria, raising him to the episcopate with the titular Diocese of Areopolis. For his episcopal motto he chose Oboedientia et Pax, which became his guiding motto for the rest of his life.

On 19 March 1925 he was ordained Bishop and left for Bulgaria. He was granted the title Apostolic Delegate and remained in Bulgaria until 1935, visiting Catholic communities and establishing relationships of respect and esteem with the other Christian communities.

In 1935 he was named Apostolic Delegate in Turkey and Greece. His ministry among the Catholics was intense, and his respectful approach and dialogue with the worlds of Orthodoxy and Islam became a feature of his tenure. In December 1944 Pius XII appointed him Nuncio in France.

At the death of Pius XII he was elected Pope on 28 October 1958, taking the name John XXIII. His pontificate, which lasted less than five years, presented him to the entire world as an authentic image of the Good Shepherd. Meek and gentle, enterprising and courageous, simple and active, he carried out the Christian duties of the corporal and spiritual works of mercy: visiting the imprisoned and the sick, welcoming those of every nation and faith, bestowing on all his exquisite fatherly care. His social magisterium in the Encyclicals Pacem in terris and Mater et Magistra was deeply appreciated.

He convoked the Roman Synod, established the Commission for the Revision of the Code of Canon Law and summoned the Second Vatican Council. The faithful saw in him a reflection of the goodness of God and called him "the good Pope." He was sustained by a profound spirit of prayer. He launched an extensive renewal of the Church, while radiating the peace of one who always trusted in the Lord. Pope John XXIII died on the evening of 3 June 1963, in a spirit of profound trust in Jesus and of longing for his embrace.

Taken from L'Osservatore Romano, September 6, 2000.