Pondering Tidbits of Truth - October 30, 2025

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. 

St. John of the Cross

"What more do you want, o soul! And what else do you search for outside, when within yourself you possess your riches, delights, satisfactions, fullness and kingdom - your Beloved Whom you desire and seek? Be joyful and gladdened in your interior recollection with Him, for you have Him so close to you. Desire Him there, adore Him there. Do not go in pursuit of Him outside yourself. You will only become distracted and wearied thereby, and you shall not find Him, nor enjoy Him more securely, nor sooner, nor more intimately than by seeking Him within you."

(From Spiritual Canticle)

Thomas a Kempis "You must first have peace in your own soul before you can make peace between other people. Peaceable people accomplish more good than learned people do. Those who are passionate often can turn good into evil and readily believe the worst. But those who are honest and peaceful turn all things to good and are suspicious of no one. ... It is no test of virtue to be on good terms with easy-going people, for they are always well liked. And, of course, all of us want to live in peace and prefer those who agree with us. But the real test of virtue and deserving of praise is to live at peace with the perverse, or the aggressive and those who contradict us, for this needs a great grace. ... in this mortal life, our peace consists in the humble bearing of suffering and contradictions, not in being free of them, for we cannot live in this world without adversity. Those who can best suffer will enjoy the most peace, for such persons are masters of themselves, lords of the world, with Christ for their friend, and heaven as their reward."                                      (From Imitation of Christ)

St. Lawrence Justinian

"The Mass is the most excellent, the most holy, the most acceptable to God and useful to us, that can be imagined. And so,  while it is going on, the angels assist in crowds, with bare feet, with earnest eyes, with downcast brows, with great silence, with incredible amazement and veneration. With what purity, attention, devotion and reverence, then, ought the priest to celebrate it?"

(From A Year With The Saints)

Eucharistic Reflection - Growing in Humility

 

“So how do we grow in humility through the Eucharist? A few simple practices can help.

First, we must always approach the Eucharist with reverence. Come to Mass prepared, recollected and aware of the great mystery before you.  One way we do this is by looking at the prayers and readings beforehand, thus allowing us to participate more fully at Mass.

Second, make frequent visits to the Blessed Sacrament. Even a few minutes in prayer before the tabernacle can teach the soul humility, We don't need to worry about bringing a prayer book or what we are going to say, just be with Jesus.

Third , we must allow the Eucharist to shape our daily lives. After receiving Communion, ask yourself: How can I be’ bread broken’ and ‘wine poured out’ for others today?

Fourth, serve in your ministry, quietly. Remember anything we do for the Church is not our right, it is a privilege. Allow your love for Eucharist to spill over into hidden acts of service that reflect Christ's humility.

The Eucharist is humility made visible before our eyes. It is God's love poured out in silence and hiddenness, a love that gives itself completely without seeking recognition. If we wish to grow in humility, we must draw near to the Eucharist  - not only to receive it but to let it transform us.”

(Excerpted from Learning Humility from the Eucharist written by Father Richard D. Breton and published in the October 16, 2025 issue of The Wanderer)

Monday Musings - What The Eucharist Teaches Us

 

Eucharistic Reflection - How To Grow In Humility

 

(Photo ©Father Lawrence Lew, O.P. Used with Permission)

“If you want to grow in humility, spend time in Eucharistic adoration. In the silence of the chapel before the Blessed Sacrament, we come face to face with the humility of God.

There, Christ waits for us - not demanding, not forcing, but simply inviting. In adoration. we learn to quiet the noise of our pride and ambitions. We learn to listen more than we speak. We learn to rest in God's presence without needing to prove ourselves.

Adoration teaches us that humility is not about doing but about being - being with Christ, who humbled Himself to be with us.”

(Excerpted from Learning Humility from the Eucharist written by Father Richard D. Breton and published in the October 16, 2025 issue of The Wanderer)

Monday Musings - Rosary Reflection - When Parents Pray The Rosary

 

"The faults of children are not always imputed to the parents, especially when they have instructed them and given good example. Our Lord, in His wondrous Providence, allows children to break the hearts of devout fathers and mothers. Thus the decisions your children have made don't make you a failure as a parent in God's eyes. You are entitled to feel sorrow, but not necessarily guilt. Do not cease praying for your children; God's grace can touch a hardened heart. Commend your children to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. When parents pray the Rosary, at the end of each decade they should hold the Rosary aloft and say to her, 'With these beads bind my children to your Immaculate Heart"'. She will attend to their souls."

(St. Louise de Marillac)

Pondering Tidbits of Truth - October 15, 2025

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.

St. Bernard of Clairvaux

“Look to the star of the sea, call upon Mary. In danger, in distress, in doubt, think of Mary, call upon Mary. May her name never be far from your lips, or far from your heart. If you follow her you will not stray; if you pray to her, you will not despair; if you turn your thoughts to her, you will not err. If she holds you, you will not fail; if she protects you, you need not fear; if she is your guide, you will not tire; if she is gracious to you, you will surely reach your destination."

(From A Homily of St. Bernard)

 

St. John Henry Newman

“Realize it, my brethren; —every one who breathes, high and low, educated and ignorant, young and old, man and woman, has a mission, has a work. We are not sent into this world for nothing; we are not born at random; . . . God sees every one of us; He creates every soul, He lodges it in the body, one by one, for a purpose. He needs, He deigns to need, every one of us. He has an end for each of us; we are all equal in His sight, and we are placed in our different ranks and stations, not to get what we can out of them for ourselves, but to labor in them for Him. As Christ has His work, we too have ours; as He rejoiced to do His work, we must rejoice in ours also.”

 (From Newman Reader)

 

Father Florian Racine   “How can we live from the power of the Holy Spirit if this gift is not renewed in the Eucharist? Eucharistic adoration is a perpetual outpouring of the Holy Spirit to give us the heart of a child, to put us at the disposal of the Heart of God, to learn in those long hours spent before the Blessed Sacrament how to say ‘Abba, Father’ with the right attitude…"

(From Could You Not Watch with Me One Hour?)

 

Rosary Reflection - Its Beauty

 

"The entire Rosary has the beauty of reproducing the theological thoughts concerning Mary, they are reproduced in the entire dialectic of truth and deduction. Marian theology and the Rosary are two poems that are united into one, two hymns forming one hymn, two magnificent temples, two cathedrals of thought and piety, that come together as one...

Here in the Rosary, piety speaks in the language of theologians. Here meditation rises to the heights attained by scholars. Here prayer dwells where the scholars are brought to a halt.

Marian theology and the Rosary are therefore similar to two temples having at the same height their pinnacles and spires. The people of God in the Church have found the Rosary, its Book of Psalms. The clergy have the Divine Office, the people have the Rosary. Like The Divine Comedy, the Rosary is a trilogy: it recalls the joys, sorrows, and triumphs of Jesus and in perfect symmetry, for each part it has five chants, and each chant in turn is an episode. 

The Rosary could very well be called the poem of human redemption. The Rosary is a poem that takes its lively but simplistic hues from the pure palette of the Gospel; while at the same time it draws its logical ties, its harmonious responses, its entire intimate dialectic from the highest theology."

                           (Saint Bartolo Longo)

Eucharistic Reflection - I Come Before the Lord

 

(Image Source: cathopic.com)

I come as I am, before the Eucharistic Lord, the beloved Eucharistic Son of the Father. I come in silence and sincerity as one in need. I come neither piously nor sentimentally. I come not on my own merit, moral strength nor conviction, but one seriously aware of my personal frailty, weakness, forgetfulness, inconsistency, pretentiousness, in short my sinfulness. I come as one in need. I come in truth just as I am, in need of the mercy, forgiveness, healing and correction. Like the Publican I cry out to the merciful one before me; “Oh God be merciful to me a sinner”. (Lk. 18:13)

The Lord’s Eucharistic Presence before me is the one who calls me and receives me as I am; “come to me all you who are weary and are burdened and I will refresh you. Take My yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am meek and humble of heart” (Mt. 11:28).  I come before our Eucharistic Lord not crestfallen, downcast, dejected or depressed at my inner and outer poverty. Rather like the Publican in humility and truth I come before our Eucharistic Lord, before the merciful one and experience joy, and peace at the reception of my presence there with Him as I am, His welcome of me; a reception and call full of a tenderness that is personal and unique to and for me, yet at the same time not privatized but open to all.

The Lord’s reception of me, His receiving me as I am, is an astounding welcome that changes me from the inside out. I am touched to the core of my being in the awareness that He, the Eternal Son, has been sent by the Father and has come for me, as if I were the only one and not because of my perfections nor because of my goodness, but because of the love that the Father has for me.

I think of Zacchaeus, the despised tax collector whom Jesus called to Him in the most amazing, surprising and totally unexpected way. I am so touched by Zacchaeus’ perceptive regard for his personal need to also see Jesus and his shrewd astuteness in running ahead, being short in stature and cleverly climbing the low-lying Sycamore tree that he too, although reviled and shunned by the crowd, nevertheless hoped to also get a glimpse at Jesus as he passed by. Zacchaeus I feel sure was acutely aware of his despicable, shameful goings-on, yet there he was seriously intent on laying eyes on Jesus, if only for a moment, perhaps secretly hoping that Jesus had come for him too. And then the unimaginable happens! Jesus looks up at him and not only penetrates him with His gaze full of affection and recognition, but also calls him by name and asks to be welcomed into his home; “Zacchaeus, hurry and come down for I must stay at your house today. So he hurried down and was happy to welcome him.” (LK. 19:5-7)

This miraculous encounter between Zacchaeus and Jesus is what awaits all of us who come, just as we are in our poverty and need, to the one who comes for us first, our Eucharistic Lord; secretly or not so secretly hoping that the one who welcomed Zacchaeus and called him by name, will surely also welcome us and calls us also by name. “Fear not, for I have redeemed you I have called you by name, you are mine”. (Is. 43:1)

 (Mrs. Mary Hurley OP, Our Lady of Providence & St. Thomas Aquinas Fraternity, Providence, RI, excerpted from Godhead Here in Hiding Whom I Do Adore Lay Dominicans Reflect on Eucharistic Adoration)

Monday Musings - A Rosary Reflection

 

Rosary Reflection – The Rosary Will Bring Back A Harvest of Holiness

(Image Source: Marge Hendry

Photo©Michael Seagriff)

[Another prophetic but ignored excerpt and plea from the Apostolic Letter On The  Rosary of The Virgin Mary]

The Rosary of the Virgin Mary, which gradually took form in the second millennium under the guidance of the Spirit of God, is a prayer loved by countless Saints and encouraged by the Magisterium. Simple yet profound, it still remains, at the dawn of this third millennium, a prayer of great significance, destined to bring forth a harvest of holiness. It blends easily into the spiritual journey of the Christian life, which, after two thousand years, has lost none of the freshness of its beginnings and feels drawn by the Spirit of God to “set out into the deep” (duc in altum!) in order once more to proclaim, and even cry out, before the world that Jesus Christ is Lord and Saviour, “the way, and the truth and the life” (Jn 14:6), “the goal of human history and the point on which the desires of history and civilization turn”.

The Rosary, though clearly Marian in character, is at heart a Christocentric prayer. In the sobriety of its elements, it has all the depth of the Gospel message in its entirety, of which it can be said to be a compendium. It is an echo of the prayer of Mary, her perennial Magnificat for the work of the redemptive Incarnation which began in her virginal womb. With the Rosary, the Christian people sits at the school of Mary and is led to contemplate the beauty on the face of Christ and to experience the depths of his love. Through the Rosary the faithful receive abundant grace, as though from the very hands of the Mother of the Redeemer…

 “A number of historical circumstances also make a revival of the Rosary quite timely. First of all, the need to implore from God the gift of peace. The Rosary has many times been proposed by my predecessors and myself as a prayer for peace. At the start of a millennium which began with the terrifying attacks of 11 September 2001, a millennium which witnesses every day innumerous parts of the world fresh scenes of bloodshed and violence, to rediscover the Rosary means to immerse oneself in contemplation of the mystery of Christ who “is our peace”, since he made “the two of us one, and broke down the dividing wall of hostility” (Eph 2:14). Consequently, one cannot recite the Rosary without feeling caught up in a clear commitment to advancing peace, especially in the land of Jesus, still so sorely afflicted and so close to the heart of every Christian.

A similar need for commitment and prayer arises in relation to another critical contemporary issue: the family, the primary cell of society, increasingly menaced by forces of disintegration on both the ideological and practical planes, so as to make us fear for the future of this fundamental and indispensable institution and, with it, for the future of society as a whole. The revival of the Rosary in Christian families, within the context of a broader pastoral ministry to the family, will be an effective aid to countering the devastating effects of this crisis typical of our age.

(St. John Paul II)

Rosary Reflection -The Efficacy of the Rosary

 

“The Most Holy Virgin in these last times in which we live has given a new efficacy to the recitation of the Rosary to such an extent that there is no problem, no matter how difficult it is, whether temporal or above all spiritual, in the personal life of each one of us, of our families…that cannot be solved by the Rosary. There is no problem, I tell you, no matter how difficult it is, that we cannot resolve by the prayer of the Holy Rosary.”

(Sister Lucia dos Santos)

Rosary Reflection - No Longer Relevant or Needed in Our Time?

	There is confusion among some Catholics these days – no doubt planted by the Evil One, who fears the Blessed Mother and the power of her Rosary. Some would have us believe that recitation of the Rosary is an antiquated devotion no longer relevant or needed in current times. Nothing could be further from the truth as can be seen by the Blessed Mother’s promise to St. Dominic and Blessed Alan de Roche and as she herself re-emphasized to the children at Fatima: - Whoever shall faithfully serve me  by the recitation of the Rosary, shall receive powerful graces.  - I promise my special protection and the greatest graces to all those who shall recite the Rosary.
	- The Rosary shall be a powerful armor against hell, it will destroy vice, decrease sin, and defeat heresies
	- It will cause virtue and good works to flourish; it will obtain for souls the abundant mercy of God; it will withdraw the hearts of people from the love of the world and its vanities, and will lift them to the desire of eternal things. Oh, that souls would sanctify themselves by this means.
	- The soul which recommends itself to me by the recitation of the Rosary, shall not perish.
	- Whoever shall recite the Rosary devoutly, applying himself to the consideration of its Sacred Mysteries shall never be conquered by misfortune. God will not chastise him in His justice, he shall not perish by an unprovided death; if he be just, he shall remain in the grace of God, and become worthy of eternal life.
	- Whoever shall have a true devotion for the Rosary shall not die without the Sacraments of the Church.
	- Those who are faithful to recite the Rosary shall have during their life and at their death the light of God and the plentitude of His graces; at the moment of death they shall participate in the merits of the Saints in Paradise.
	- I shall deliver from purgatory those who have been devoted to the Rosary.
	- The faithful children of the Rosary shall merit a high degree of glory in Heaven.
	- You shall obtain all you ask of me by the recitation of the Rosary.
	- All those who propagate the Holy Rosary shall be aided by me in their necessities.
	- I have obtained from my Divine Son that all the advocates of the Rosary shall have for intercessors the entire celestial court during their life and at the hour of death.
	- All who recite the Rosary are my children, and brothers and sisters of my only Son, Jesus Christ.
	- Devotion to my Rosary is a great sign of predestination.

Source for the 15 Promises: (http://www.theholyrosary.org/rosarybenefits)

Pondering Tidbits of Truth - October 2, 2025

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.

Dom Augustin Guillerand, O. Cart. 

"Life is a journey. Provided we keep going, all is well. What God cannot tolerate - what is, indeed, intolerable - are those stationary souls who either are inert by nature or persuade themselves that they have reached the summit, and that there is nothing more for them."

(From Where Silence Is Praise: From the Writings of Dom Augustin Guillerand, O. Cart.)

 Father Dismas Sayre, O.P

In our modern world, man sees Jesus's forgiveness and mercy as almost givens, taken for granted. Of course, even the most permissive and “merciful” want whatever they might consider evil to be punished, but never their own evil. It's funny how that works. As has often been stated by various authors, two thieves were crucified with Christ. One was saved, so we should not despair, but one was lost, so we should not presume.

Yes, it is very possible for us to lose our salvation, to lose our way eternally. Our Lord is crystal clear on this point in His many parables, as much as He is crystal clear on the need for forgiveness and mercy. But the goal of God's justice is not to separate us eternally but to restore us.

(From  Yes, It Is Very Possible published in the July-August 2025 issue of Light and Life)

Alan Schreck, Ph.D.

"The crucifix reminds us that God's response to human suffering is to put Himself in a position to experience the worst of it. The Resurrection of Jesus sows that the power of God  overcomes evil and its consequence."

(From Jesus - What Catholics Believe)

Just Awesome!