Assumption August 31 2013 Father Gerson Living A Joyful Life Part 2

Father's main talk was on living a joyful life. You may listen to the whole thing minus most of the technical difficulties. Highlights include:

• Cemeteries wealthiest places on earth.
• Christian joy. Don't keep it bottled up. Man and woman of joy. Christian.
• Three reasons why the Catholic Church loses members to other versions of Christianity.
• The symbolism of the Dragon in Revelations.
• Do you lose authority if you apologize?

Father also showed a very touching video of how good can come from extreme bad. I edited it out but luckily Youtube has the same woman saying the same story and I share the video with you here.


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Father also said the mass that day and I must apologize that I did not catch it all on audio for the homily.



My notes from the missing first part:

• Invitations . Healthy spirituality eyes open.  
• Speak of somebody who was sensitive . 
• Observation: Fight in order to get places of honor.
•  Invitation to imitate God. Take my yoke. I am meek . Come to me tired and overwhelmed. 
• Christ is our model our point of reference.  

The rest of the homily is here.


It was my third time in Assumption accompanying a Verbum Dei priest and I always enjoy the experience. I hope you listen to the audio.




The audio for the main talk is here.

http://www.mediafire.com/?k7peh7gv9dxwgl3

The audio for the homily is here.

http://www.mediafire.com/?gtmhsok15jw64lo


Readings for Sunday are here.    http://www.catholic.org/bible/daily_reading/?select_date=2013-09-01

All Verbum Dei Audio in Dropbox here. 

https://www.dropbox.com/sh/bhkkb3qsi4o8n33/wJUOiVP68V

page 577 in Sharper Than A Sword  by Father James McTavish

Mediafire for all the School of the Word audio is here:

 http://www.mediafire.com/?2ydbw8552x5fe

Those Who HUMBLE Themselves Will Be Exalted

Hello. Sorry this is late. Today after a some weeks away Fr. Gerson returns to the School of the Word in PhilAm Life to give a great talk on humility. I will let his talk speak for itself in the audio portion but let me say that he gives a great example that we can not judge other people at their lowest because it can happen to us if we are proud. In a future blog entry I will include a similar talk he gave yesterday in Assumption San Lorenzo.


Ed

Link to mediafire download file is here.   http://www.mediafire.com/?04et6ixkmucs297

Readings for Sunday are here.    http://www.catholic.org/bible/daily_reading/?select_date=2013-09-01

All Verbum Dei Audio in Dropbox here.

https://www.dropbox.com/sh/bhkkb3qsi4o8n33/wJUOiVP68V

page 577 in Sharper Than A Sword  by Father James McTavish

How To Pray With The Word of God

A BLUEPRINT FOR Prayer

We  Speak  To  God   

• Presence 
• Forgiveness 
• Thanksgiving
• Petition

God speaks to us

• Make a effort to listen to God through a specific reading from the Bible. Remain there.

We  speak to God

• See what you need to change. 
• Share the Word  of God with others.

PRAYING  with the WORD

1. First stop running  and sit still. Quiet  and calm, yourself.

2. Place yourself in an attitude of deep listening, then take up a suitable passage from, scriptures. Read it slowly and listen attentively as you  read, substitute your name for those used when 'you' occurs, so as to make it as personal as possible.

3. While you read, pause just a little longer over those lines or phrases or words that strike you. They may either console or disturb you, confirm, or reproach you.

4   . After you have finished reading the passage, come back to those lines or phrases or words that struck you. Stay with one of these as long as you can. Ponder  over it in your heart as much as you can. These words may say something to you about yourself, e.g. greater acceptance of self, about your  relationship with others, about the father's healing and forgiving love in Jesus, etc

5.    Start a conversation with the Lord around this: Now asking questions, now listening, now expressing your feelings, your concerns, now pausing to Listen to Him,  now waiting on Him,  now surrendering to Him.. Do not try to draw out applications or make resolutions. Always be careful not  to drag the Word of God  down to suit  your  needs - Let the word of  God  judge you, not you it. slowly leave your  own plans aside if that is what He wants, and learn to take up His thoughts, His ways.

6. Do not hurry to move  on to the next sentence or phrase, but stay where you are for as long as it appeals to you. By your renewed

encounter  with the Lord through the text you will strike deeper

Levels of friendship with Him.

Patrick O’Sullivan, SJ

Conditions  FOR PRAYER

1.silence - to be silent is not merely to be mute. Spiritual silence is. an emptying of  oneself   in order to make room for God. 

2. detachment - Means to abandon, ourselves in  God’s hands as  Christ did. 'Father I abandon  myself  in your hands.. Do with me what you will." Have the courage to present our lives like a blank  sheet where he can  write whatever he wants.

3. PERSONAL  acceptance - we go to God  as we are, and. not pretend to be someone we're not. He loves us as we are and with what we have.

4. Optimism and  HOPE - Hope prevents us from settling and taking  things for granted. It  implies that we aim high and are  never satisfied with what has been  reached so far (i cor 13.7). Pessimism is never a fruit of the spirit. Hope means to believe in God’s love.

5. Petition - we  become  beggars before God, knowing that even, the steps we  take  are given, to us by  God.   Ask  and you will receive, knock and I  will open..* (Mt 7:7) 

6  . effort - prayer is a  work, a discipline, it cannot rest upon, mere spontaneity. Prayer tomorrow begins today or there will be no prayer tomorrow.

7. Sincerity  - in prayer we reveal ourselves to God, the more we are present to him the more we become present to ourselves, to be present to Jesus is to step deeper into ourselves, net step out of ourselves.

8. Resolution  - Never finish prayer without a resolution,. We have to accommodate our life to the gospel in  every prayer we make. Prayer requires a change. 

The Gospel of The Good Samaritan Fr. Gerson in Assumption

Today July 13, 2013.

Father's sermon this week tackles the parable of the Good Samaritan as well the challenge he was given by the man of the law earlier in the reading.

Highlights include:

• Simplify what is complicated. 
• Concept of Real Life by Pope Benedict
• Real Joy 
• The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho
•  Jesus reference to law in the Gospel
• Who Jesus declared as an example  of great great faith

Readings for the mass are here.


Audio is  here.

http://www.mediafire.com/listen/37aa985f7jsbhhb/Sermon_for_Good_Samaritan_July_13_2013_Assumption(2).mp3

All Verbum Dei Audio in Dropbox here.

https://www.dropbox.com/sh/bhkkb3qsi4o8n33/wJUOiVP68V



Ed

What The Following Of Christ Offers To Us Is Freedom

One of the keys to learning for me is to put yourself in the mindset that whatever is in front of you truly has something you have not heard of before or at least something you have heard of but has not quite sunk in yet. I have been going to mass for multiple decades and I went to Catholic school for all my elementary and high school. There are always words and passages in the Gospel that I thought I knew and I really do not. Today's lesson does not disappoint.

In this week's podcast listen for:

• The symbolism of Jerusalem and the contrast with Hollywood.
• The theme of opposition , rejection in Christ's life on Earth.
• The vengeful disciples.
• What is wrong with the concept of being born again. 
• Why does the Son of Man have nowhere to rest his head?
• Let the dead bury the dead? How and why?
• Perplexing symbolism at the end of the Gospel .
• What is true freedom?

I was glad to be there to hear this talk and through the magic of the Internet you can too.

To download Fr.Gerson's lesson click here.

The relevant readings for this lesson are here.

All Verbum Dei Audio in Dropbox here.

https://www.dropbox.com/sh/bhkkb3qsi4o8n33/wJUOiVP68V

Ed

Podcast Taking Up Your Cross and Following Christ

Come listen to Father Gerson as he breaks down the meaning of Luke 9 18:24.

• The fight between our true self and our false self. 
• The distorted image as opposed to the image and likeness of God. 
• Supposed to be master of creation and not the slave. 

Link to podcast is here.

All Verbum Dei Audio in Dropbox here.

https://www.dropbox.com/sh/bhkkb3qsi4o8n33/wJUOiVP68V


Ed

First Temporal Vows Dan Steve Jojo

For the Photobucket album click here.