Harvesting The Fruits of Contemplation

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. Father Richard D. Breton “May our parishes become beacons of hope in a culture that thirsts for meaning. May they become places where people say” ‘Here I encounter Christ. Here I belong. Here I am sent to share His love.’ May we [our] priests lead the way, with the laity at our side, trusting the Holy Spirit, grounded in the sacraments, committed to truth and open to renewal.” (From A Transcendent Brand of Hope and Renewal -  A Priest’s Reflection published in November 6, 2025 issue of The Wanderer )     D r. Gregory Popcak   "When you are at Mass, don't just go through the motions. Ask God to help you find Him in the Eucharist. When you hear or read Scripture, prayerfully ask God what He is saying to you through the words. When you pray, don't just say words at God. Bring your whole self to it, rededicate your li...

"Offer your whole life to the Lord during Mass every day. Put yourself on the patent with the bread that will become the Body of the Lord. Be the water that is mingled with the wine that will become His precious Blood." (Excerpt from Communion is a Flame Bursting Within by Catherine Doherty, Servant of God)

"Everything can be borne between two Masses if every morning we eat the bread of Saints. We will be able to face any kind of day. We will plunge into the sea of fire and come out burning ready to go forth and light fires of love.  You are an empty chalice. Every morning you have to be filled. Every morning you offer yourself, your day, your being and consecrate yourself as a sacrifice to make up for what is wanting in the passion of Christ. I eat Christ in the morning and I am eating up myself through the day." ( Communion is a Flame Bursting Within by Catherine Doherty)

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 Paul II "You must learn to think, speak and act in accordance with the simplicity of the Gospel: Yes, yes; no, no. You must learn to call white, white; and black, black. To call sin, sin; and not to call it liberty or progress, even if the fashion is to stand against this teaching." (Address to Youth in Rome, 1981) Catherine Doherty, Servant of God "Communion is the union of man's soul with God the source of all strength. Our communions could change the world if the fire of the Holy Spirit were really allowed to fall on the earth and to renew it through you and me. Our faith centers around the truth that God loved us first and all we have to do to be fiery Apostolic Catholics is to love Him back. If we meditate deeply on the Eucharist we will distinctly hear the loving, powerful, immense heartbeat of God. We would h...

" Have you ever thought about the immense gift God has given to us in the holy Eucharist? Everything you can say about Christianity is related to the Eucharist in one way or another. Open the eyes of your heart and let yourself be pierced by this mystery.   God, the second person of the most Holy Trinity, gives Himself to us in the humblest possible way, as bread and wine. The multiplication of the loaves and fishes was a beautiful miracle but our Lord did not come just to feed 4000 people on a particular day. He came to give Himself as bread every day until the end of time. The multiplication of the loaves and fishes is dwarfed by this daily multiplication of Himself at the Eucharistic banquet." (Excerpted from  Communion is a Flame Bursting Within by Catherine Doherty)

(Image Source: Wikimedia Commons ) "Communion spurs you on. It is like a flame bursting within your soul. Off you go to love passionately, recklessly, imprudently, unto folly, without counting the cost to yourself. In the Eucharist, we receive the strength to preach the Gospel with our life in everyday activities, not looking for false glamor or status. From the Eucharist, we draw the courage to go and fight. Wherever we find ourselves, these are the front lines. " Catherine Doherty, Servant of God

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. A Lay Dominican from the St. Joseph Province “In a world with noise, finding silence is a task.  Adoration may be the only place of silence for you all throughout the week. Sanctify it!" (From Godhead Here in Hiding Whom I Do Adore – Lay Dominicans Reflect on Eucharistic Adoration )   Catherine Doherty, Servant of God “Joy is very quiet and full of wonder. It is like a light that shines in the darkness and is connected with hope and with love. To give you an idea of my joyous moments, the first occurs when I wake up every morning with the incredible thought that here God has granted me another day to love Him and to serve Him. Simultaneously, other thoughts come to me from Satan and from my own humanity and emotions. They creep in like shadows over the shining light of my joy They whisper: ‘Look you are going to have a full ...

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. Catherine Doherty, Servant of God "God invites us to accept the loneliness of walking alone with Him. He says: ‘Yes, you need help from other people, but first get it from Me. Attach yourself to Me. I will give you everything you need, for I am the Lord of everything. I will renew and restore you and you will have new eyes and new ears." (From Are You Ever Lonely? March 2023 issue of Restoration )   St. John Marie Vianney "What a sad life does he lead who wants both to please the world and to serve God! It is a great mistake to make, my friends. Apart from the fact that you are going to be unhappy all the time, you can never attain the stage at which you will be able to please the world and please God. It is as impossible a feat as trying to put an end to eternity. Take the advice that I am going to give you now and you will be les...

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.   Venerable Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen   “If you have never before prayed to Mary, do so now. Can you not see that if Christ himself willed to be physically formed in her for nine months and then be spiritually formed by her for thirty years, it is to her that we must go to learn how to have Christ formed in us? Only she who raised Christ can raise a Christian.”   (From The Cries of Jesus from the Cross )   Father Donald Haggerty “Many times in her life Mother Teresa repeated that the presence of Jesus Christ in the Eucharist was inseparable from His presence concealed in the poor. The presence is  one presence, she constantly affirmed. The same Jesus who hides in the Sacrament is disguised in the distressing appearance of the poor man. As she prayed on her knees before that Host in Kolkata, ...

 

( Source of Image ) Catherine Doherty, Servant of God and the Founder of Madonna House Apostolate, was a special soul. The more I learn of her life and read the books she has written, the more intriguing and inviting a spiritual model she becomes. I enjoy reading Restoration , the monthly newspaper of the Madonna House Apostolate ( https://www.madonnahouse.org ). You will too. In order to understand why Catherine urged her associates to always fulfill the duty of the moment (my emphasis) – and why we might want to do so - let me share (with permission) excerpts from three articles that were published in the July-August 2022 issue of Restoration . According to Theresa Davis, Catherine had this to say: “The only thing anybody should want to be is a saint. The greatest tragedy is not to be a saint...All you have to do is to be madly in love with God. And to do that you have to live the Gospel without compromise. You don’t live the Gospel in a vacuum. Jesus never lived in a vacuum. Y...

We are not required to ask for suffering. We are not prohibited from seeking to be relieved from our suffering. But when God wills it, we can accept it and recognize it for what it actually is:

T hank you Elizabeth Riordan at  Theology Is A Verb for hosting Worth Revisiting each week. It is a privilege to share our work with you and your followers .  Here is my contribution. The Kind Of Prayer We Need Today (Originally posted on October 25, 2019)   Servant of God Catherine Doherty is correct: we have forgotten how to pray. Let her refresh our memory:  “Prayer now is the last resort. We have forgotten how to pray. (Image Source: Wikimedia Commons ) We have forgotten that there must be a time when we are silent so we can hear what God wants to say to us. Yes, my friends, we must pray. It must be the prayer of two people in love with each other who cease to talk…Two people in love! When you are in love with God you will understand that He loved your first. You will enter into a deep and mysterious silence and in that silence become one with the Absolute…Your oneness with God will overflow to all your brothers and sisters. My fr...

Servant of God Catherine Doherty is correct: we have forgotten how to pray. Let her refresh our memory:  “Prayer now is the last resort. We have forgotten how to pray. (Image Source: Wikimedia Commons ) We have forgotten that there must be a time when we are silent so we can hear what God wants to say to us. Yes, my friends, we must pray. It must be the prayer of two people in love with each other who cease to talk…Two people in love! When you are in love with God you will understand that He loved your first. You will enter into a deep and mysterious silence and in that silence become one with the Absolute…Your oneness with God will overflow to all your brothers and sisters. My friends this is the kind of prayer we need today. If you pray like this you will be overshadowed by the wings of a dove, the symbol of the Holy Spirit. On those wings your prayer of silence will be lifted into the hands of ‘the Woman Wrapped in Silence,’ and she will lay it at t...

  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 . Catherine Doherty, Servant of God “A person in love with God is always on the alert to make friends, make a friend – not for any ulterior motive but just because friendship is the fruit of Christian love. A stranger is only a friend I haven’t met yet.”  ( From Poustinia ) Dr. Peter Kreeft “We can consider him [Jesus Christ in every person and in ourselves] because he really is there. He is in his whole Body as your soul is in your whole body. We really do meet and touch and help or harm Christ in our neighbors. If we lived this one thought, we would convert and transform the world.” (From Christianity for Modern Pagans – Pascal’s Pensees ) St. Catherine of Siena "He will provide the way and the means, such as you could never have imagined. Leave it all to ...