My final silver month

Today being the 14th, I have just begun the final month of my silver jubilee year: next month I will celebrate the 26th anniversary of my first profession of vows. It was the day on which I publicly professed my response to the Love which had called me to greater, wider loving; to proclaim, with my life, the unconditional, unlimited love which I knew God poured out on me. And it was a day in which I can remember my entire body being suffused with joy; pure, absolute, unchecked joy, filling and flooding my every fibre. 

And so, I have entered this final silver month reflecting on a homily and an address given by Pope Francis during his recent visit to Bahrain. Alone and together, they deserve to be read; they also bring both the call to love and the gift of joy together, interweaving and flowing into and from each other.

In the homily, the Pope reminds us that we are called to love always and to love everyone; that this is, of course, tough, but we are not expected to do it alone... 

The power of Jesus is love. Jesus gives us the power to love in this way, which for us seems superhuman. This ability, though, cannot be merely the result of our own efforts; it is primarily the fruit of God’s grace. A grace that must be implored insistently... So often we bring our requests before the Lord, but what is essential for us as Christians is to know how to love as Christ loves. His greatest gift is the ability to love, and that is what we receive when we make room for the Lord in prayer, when we welcome his presence in his transforming word and in the revolutionary humility of his broken Bread. Thus, slowly, the walls that harden our hearts tumble, and we find our joy in carrying out works of mercy towards everyone. Then we come to realize that happiness in life comes through the Beatitudes and consists in our becoming peacemakers (cf. Mt 5:9).

We will find our joy in loving, and in living the Beatitudes...

The address is from the Pope's meeting with clergy, religious and pastoral workers, in which he spoke of the living waters flowing from the Heart of Jesus, and from the hearts of his followers; his lovers. And he spoke of joy, as a wellspring brimming and bubbling and flowing over...

The Spirit is a wellspring of joy. The fresh water that the Lord wants to make flow in the “deserts” of our humanity, earthly and frail, is the certainty that we are never alone on the journey of life. The Spirit is the One who does not leave us on our own. He is the Comforter, who consoles us by his quiet and soothing presence, who accompanies us with love, supports us in struggles and difficulties, encourages our most beautiful dreams and deepest desires, and opens us to the wonder and beauty of life... The joy of the Spirit is... a joy born of a relationship with God, from knowing that despite the struggles and dark nights that we sometimes endure, we are not alone, lost or defeated, because he is with us.

To all of you who have discovered this joy and experience it in community, I would say: preserve this joy, indeed, let it grow ever greater. Do you know the best way to do that? By giving it away. Yes, Christian joy is naturally contagious, since the Gospel makes us go beyond ourselves to share the beauty of God’s love.

And that joy we have found will increase when we give it away, by sharing the beauty of the love we have received...


Comments

  1. Thank you for this. It is lovely. And congratulations on your silver jubilee year!

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  2. Thanks for this recalls many things given by the Spirit all through my 63 yrs of religious life..... Finding it tough now.....

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