Harvesting The Fruits of Contemplation

FOR ONE WHO LOVES (From Father Mark)   When you come into My presence to adore Me, and prefer Me to the other things that solicit your attention and make claims upon your time, I am consoled and glorified.   The proof of friendship is the choice of one's friend over all else. I want you to prefer Me, to give Me time that could be given to other persons and things. In so doing, you will show Me your love and offer Me the consolation of a true friendship.   I would ask this preferential love of all My priests. Friendship, if it is to thrive, must be practiced. This is as true of friendship with Me as it is of human friendships. I wait for the companionship of My priests.   With them I hold My priesthood in common -- and My victimhood. This is what makes the friendship of My priests so precious to My Sacred Heart.   With them too I share the purest joy of living in the presence of My Immaculate Mother and of exper...

Pondering Tidbits of Truth is my simple and inadequate way of providing nuggets of spiritual wisdom for you to chew on from time to time. From St. Thomas Aquinas “ Man should not consider his material possessions his own, but as common to all, so as to share them without hesitation when others are in need. ” From St. Claude de la Colombiere, S.J. “Imagine the anguish and tears of a mother who is present at a painful operation her child has to undergo. Can anyone doubt on seeing her that she consents to allow the child to suffer only because she expects it to get well and be spared further suffering by means of this violent remedy? Reason in the same manner when adversity befalls you. You complain that you are ill-treated, insulted, slandered, robbed. Your redeemer (the name is a tenderer one than that of father or mother), your Redeemer is a witness to all you are suffering. He who loves you and has emphatically declared that whoever touches you touches the appl...

Pardon the self-promotion but there is only one way to sell a book - let as many people and groups know about it! I was privileged to be profiled in  this month's issue of the Catholic Writers' Guild (CWG) Member Newsletter. In the event you have not seen it or are not yet a CWG member, the Profile follows: (Excerpted from CWG Member Newsletter Issue #52- July 2012) MEMBER PROFILE – MICHAEL SEAGRIFF Author and Lay Dominican Maria: Michael, you recently had a book published “Forgotten Truths to Set Faith Afire: Words to Challenge, Inspire and Instruct.” Congratulations! When did you feel receive God’s inspiration to write this book? How did it “come to you,” as they say? Michael: Over the past fifteen years, God placed a tremendous hunger in my heart to study the Truths of our Catholic Faith. During that time, I highlighted and made photocopies of thousands of passages from various articles a...

    "O inestimable charity! Even as You, true God and true Man, gave Yourself entirely to us, so also You left Yourself entirely for us, to be our food, so that during our earthly pilgrimage we would not faint with weariness, but would be strengthened by You, our celestial Bread. O man, what has your God left you? He has left you Himself, wholly God and wholly Man, concealed under the whiteness of bread. O fire of love! Was it not enough for You to have created us to Your image and likeness, and to have recreated us in grace through the Blood of Your Son, without giving Yourself wholly to us as our Food, O God, Divine Essence? What impelled You to do this? Your charity alone. It was not enough for You to send Your Word to us for our redemption; neither were You content to give Him us as our Food, but in the excess of Your love for Your creature, You gave to man the whole Divine essence . . ."   (St. Catherine of Siena )   (Source of image: Real Prese...

Today our Dominican family celebrates the memorial of St. Rose of Lima (1586-1617). She was the first canonized saint of the Western hemisphere, a contemporary of St. Martin DePorres and Saint John Macias , and “patron saint of Lima, Peru, all the Americas, the Phillippines, India, florists, gardeners, and people ridiculed for their piety” .   The Office of Readings today offers this excerpt from her writings for our fruitful meditation and response:   Our Lord and Savior lifted up his voice and said with incomparable majesty: “Let all men know that grace comes after tribulation. Let them know that without the burden of afflictions it is impossible to reach the height of grace. Let them know that the gifts of grace increase as the struggles increase. Let men take care not to stray and be deceived. This is the only true stairway to paradise, and without the cross they can find no road to climb to heaven.” When I heard these words, a strong force came upon me an...

"Why did Jesus not limit His Eucharistic Presence to the solemn moments of Holy Mass? Why does He not continue it only during those hours when, amid lights and flowers, He receives the adoration and homage of His sons? Why does He remain also during the nights, even in tabernacles where He is abandoned and forgotten and sometimes subjected to sacrilegious profanation?" "It would seem that this persistent miracle of the Real Presence of Jesus under the appearances of the consecrated bread, even in times of profanation, is an excessive prodigality, both useless and incompatible with the Divine Majesty." "And yet, this is the very reason why Jesus chose to do so; to love with a love that knows no measure and does not shrink from excess. This was the purpose for which He invented and “instituted the Holy Eucharist as we have it. ‘He loved to the end.’” (From The Holy Eucharist by Jose Guadalupe Trevino)

Pondering Tidbits of Truth is my simple and inadequate way of providing nuggets of spiritual wisdom for you to chew on from time to time. From Scripture (Hebrews 13:3) “Be as mindful of prisoners as if you were sharing their imprisonment, and of the ill-treated as of yourselves, for you may yet suffer as they do. From Saint Edmund Campion [When asked to save his life by renouncing his Catholic Faith, this saint had this to say;] “Your Majesty, for the past ten years I have given this matter thought. I thought about it seriously when I left the Church of England and went to the continent to be reconciled with Rome . I thought of it seriously when I entered the Society of Jesus and was ordained a priest. And ever since I have been back in England , how many times I thought that I could indeed save my life if I turned traitor to my Lord Christ and His Church! But He Himself has said to us all: ‘He who would save his life must lose it.’ I remain t...

Why Lord do I not leap for joy whenever I am in Your Presence as St. John the Baptist did while in the womb of his mother Elizabeth? Why do I sometimes take Your Presence in the Eucharist for granted? Where is the awe and amazement that should overcome me whenever You are placed on my tongue? Where are the tears of joy and gratitude that should freely flow from the eyes of such an unworthy recipient of Love Himself as You penetrate and saturate every cell of this earthen vessel with Your Sacred Blood? Why do I ever allow myself to be distracted by anyone or anything else during these intimate moments with You? Why do I sometimes unconsciously thwart and impede the graces You intend to shower upon me as You and I are physically united? Why am I so often in a rush to leave Church and abruptly end our intimate visit? Why Lord do I fail to love You and Your Blessed Mother as much as You and she love me? Why?

We know this martyr saint, whose feast day we commemorate today, offered his earthly life so that another might physically live.   His writings, although maybe not as well known as the manner of his death, make it clear that it was the preservation of one’s eternal life that was more important to him. Why not honor this humble, loving priest by spending a few minutes reading and reflecting upon two unchanging spiritual principles he undoubtedly knew would be abandoned by so many after his death.     On Truth - No one in the world can change Truth. What we do and should do is seek It and serve It when It is found.   On Salvation of Souls - We have no right to rest as long as a single soul is Satan's slave. I suspect if St. Maximilian Kolbe was still among us, he might ask each of us: “What have you done to serve the Truth and to save souls?” What would your response be?

What follows in the link below is another gem from Father Mark - a priest who loves the Eucharist and his brother priests as all of us should. It is relatively brief and well worth the time to read.                                                 Priests at Every Moment

        How must we draw inspiration from Our         Lord, and how obey Him in all that we do?        By recalling His Presence in the Blessed        Sacrament and by praying for His guidance.        Do not go to seek Our Lord in heaven, for      He is nearer to you than that. It is well,     doubtless, to rise toward His glorious throne     from time to time, and to desire to see His    splendor, but in practical life, you should    have Him nearer to you, and it is in the    Most Blessed Sacrament that you should    seek and find Him.   Our Lord might say to you: "Why do you   neglect My Presence here? Do you think it   is of no importance and that you can do ...

If you love your priests, you will forward Father Mark’s most recent post to them and pray for them daily. You will find his post in its entirety here . Let me share this excerpt:      There is no need for My priests to go through life isolated, lonely, and friendless. I want to be the Faithful Companion of their days and of their nights. I want to be their solace and their rest. I want to be their Friend, ever ready to listen to them, to welcome them, to heal them, and renew their hope. Oh, if only they would seek Me out in those tabernacles where I wait for them, in those tabernacles where no one joins Me in My ceaseless prayer to the Father. Never miss an opportunity to greet Me, to adore Me, to remain with Me, even if only for a moment, in the Sacrament of My Love. In eternity you will see the inestimable value of every moment spent in My Eucharistic presence. The Eucharist is, has been, and always will be the Answer. Why do we ...

Tomorrow we celebrate the feast day of our Father, St. Dominic!  (Church of St. Vincent Ferrer, NYC)   God has used and continues to use the Order of Preachers to defend His Church and proclaim His Truth. For nearly 800 years, Dominicans have worked untiringly to save souls. Every day, they strive to faithfully live their motto: "To Praise, To Bless, To Preach." If you want a brief glimpse into the life of St. Dominic and the various ways in which he prayed take a look here and here . The Dominican Province of St. Joseph has a  phenomenal website well worth your time. Want to look into The Dominican Soul ? Maybe God is calling you to a vocation as as Lay Dominican. Check us out! Why not honor this great saint today by offering the following  prayer attributed to him: “May God the Father who made us bless us. May God the Son send his healing among us. May God the Holy Spirit move within us and give us eyes to see with, ear...

 The Catholic Writers' Guild has awarded its "Seal of Approval" to Forgotten Truths to Set Faith Afire! - Words to Challenge, Inspire and Instruct.

This feast day for St. John Marie Vianney should garner more attention than it does or will. What a shame! Here is what I wrote last year on this occasion. I frequently write urging prayers for our priests, prayers for more holy priests, prayers for priests whose lives are truly centered on the Eucharist, and for priests who have an unflinching zeal for the salvation of souls. Why not offer a monthly Novena to St. John Vianney on behalf of your priests?    Despite the pleas of John Paul II and Benedict XVI that their priests follow this holy man’s example, this patron saint of priests is too often ignored. How can that be?   To help better appreciate what a gift St. John Vianney is to our Church and to his brother priests, I recommend you take a look at St. John Vianney's Pastoral Plan , a two part article written by Fr. John Cihak, S.T.D. and which appeared at Ignatius Insight . You can find Father’s work here and here . Father Roger J. Landry also wrote a...

“The secret for arriving quickly at a life centered in the Eucharist is, during a certain period of time, to make Jesus in the Most Holy Sacrament the habitual object of the exercise of the presence of God, the dominant motive of our intentions, the meditation of our spirit, the affection of our heart, the object of all our virtues. And if the soul is generous enough, one will come at length to this unity of action, to familiarity with the adorable Sacrament, to think of it with as much and even greater ease than of any other object. Easily and gently one's heart will produce the most tender affections. In a word, the Most Holy Sacrament will become the magnet of devotion in one's life and the centre of perfection of one's love.   Eight days would be enough for a simple and fervent soul to acquire this Eucharistic spirit; and even if one should have to put weeks and months to acquire it, can this ever be compared with the peace and the happiness which thi...

We are always in need of a good laugh - all the better when it relates to some pressing public concern. via Tim Hawkins and Aggie Catholics

Pondering Tidbits of Truth is my simple and inadequate way of providing nuggets of spiritual wisdom for you to chew on from time to time. From Venerable Fulton J. Sheen "...in previous ages men lived in the sense of the Presence of God. As the earth carries its own atmosphere while it revolves around in space, so men carried with them their faith. Today, there is a feeling not of the Presence of God, but rather the absence of God: We have not lost our thirst, but we have denied the existence of water."   ( Radicalism and Sacrifice ) From St. John of the Cross "Endeavor to be inclined always: not to the easiest, but to the most difficult; not to the most delightful, but to the harshest; not to the most gratifying, but to the less pleasant; not to what means rest for you, but to hard work; not the consoling, but to the unconsoling; not to the most, but to the least; not to the highest and most precious, but to the lowest and most despise...