Monday Musings - What Is The Height of Perfection?

 

Pondering Tidbits of Truth - July 31, 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.

Mother Angelica  "Please, make a visit every so often. Just go into your church for a moment and say, “Hi, Jesus, I’m here. I don’t have much to say.” He knows that...He wants our will, our love, our faith, and our trust. Remember now, you have that, you have everything. Every day, whatever church you belong to, he waits in that tabernacle, hoping when that door opens, it’s you."

 

St. Peter Julian Eymard "Oh! How well the devil knows that by keeping souls away from the Eucharist he is destroying the Christian family and fostering selfishness in us. For there are only two loves: the love of God and the love of self. We must give ourselves to the one or to the other. How unhappy are they who no longer have the Eucharist! What darkness! What lawlessness of mind! What coldness of heart! Satan alone reigns as master and with him every evil passion! As for us, the Eucharist delivers us from all evils!"         (An excerpt from 30 Day Eucharistic Revival: A Retreat with St. Peter Julian Eymard)

St. John Chrysostom

"There is nothing to be dreaded in human ills except sin—not poverty, or disease, or insult, or ill treatment, or dishonor, or death, which people call the worst of evils. To those who love spiritual wisdom, these things are only the names of disasters, names that have no substance. No, the true disaster is to offend God, to do anything that displeases him."

 (From A Year With The Church Fathers)

Eucharistic Reflection - Give Him Your Heart

"Imagine now that you hear these sweet words from your Savior: 'It is because you are poor that I come into you; it is because you are sick that I come to heal you; it was to give you My life and let you share My sanctity that I made Myself Sacrament; come then with confidence and give Me Your heart; that is all I desire from you'." 

St. Peter Julian Eymard from Holy Communion)

 

 

Pondering Tidbits of Truth - January 16, 2024

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 John Catoir  "The more you trust God, the happier you will be...The great spiritual masters tell us that the path to both happiness and holiness is found in fidelity to the duty of the present moment. If you take care of the little things, the big things will take care of themselves. Be faithful to the duty of the present moment. Do it for the Lord, and be at peace."  (An excerpt from Uplifting Thoughts for Every Day)

St. Peter Julian Eymard  “What displeases God most on earth and in us is sin. You must give this truth your attentive consideration. The just and the saints themselves are not exempt from sin. And we, have we not at least venial sins on our conscience? The just and the saints themselves are not exempt from sin. Have we never had to weep for mortal sins? There is only one evil on earth, only one thing which should fill us with dread: sin. All created things please God, even those which seem obnoxious to us; neither the earthworm nor mud are offensive in the sight of God. Those things are in their natural state. Sin, on the contrary, is a perversion of the divine will, a degradation of God's work, a contradiction to his nature and to his divine being. Sin is an offense and an insult to God's sovereign authority, to his majesty, and to his empire; it is an insult of the creature to its Creator."  (An excerpt from 30 Day Eucharistic Revival)    Father Jean-Pierre de Caussade, S.J.  "The soul that does not attach itself solely to the will of God will find neither satisfaction nor sanctification in any other means however excellent by which it may attempt to gain them. If that which God Himself chooses for you does not content you, from whom do you expect to obtain what you desire? . . . No soul can be really nourished, fortified, purified, enriched, and sanctified except in fulfilling the duties of the present moment."  (An excerpt from Abandonment to Divine Providence)

 

 

 

 

Eucharistic Reflection - Live On The Divine Eucharist

 

Monday Musings - There Are Only Two Loves

 

Eucharistic Reflection - Don't Let The Devil Keep You Away!

 

"Oh! How well the devil knows that by keeping souls away from the Eucharist he is destroying the Christian family and fostering selfishness in us. For there are only two loves: the love of God and the love of self. We must give ourselves to the one or to the other.   How unhappy are they who no longer have the Eucharist! What darkness! What lawlessness of mind! What coldness of heart! Satan alone reigns as master and with him every evil passion! As for us, the Eucharist delivers us from all evils!"  (Excerpted from 30 Day Eucharistic Retreat - A Retreat with St. Peter Julian Eymard by Father Donald H. Calloway, MIC)

Eucharistic Reflection - Something We Cannot Understand

“We can understand why the Son of God loved man enough to become man Himself. The Creator must have been set on repairing the work of His hands. We can also understand how, from an excessive love, the God-man died on the cross.

But something we cannot understand, something that terrifies those of little faith and scandalizes unbelievers, is the fact that Jesus Christ after having been glorified and crowned, after having completed His mission here below, wanted still to dwell with us and in a state more lowly and self-abasing than at Bethlehem, than on Calvary itself.

With reverence, let us lift the mysterious veil that covers the Holy of Holies and let us try to understand the excessive love which our Savior has for us.”

(St. Peter Julian Eymard from The Hidden God)

Eucharistic Reflection - Of Course, You Are Unworthy!

"Do you feel unworthy to Receive Holy Communion? You should. You are unworthy. We are all unworthy. Knowing your unworthiness is a sign that you have a healthy spiritual life and proper disposition for receiving Holy Communion...

Though we are all unworthy of such a great gift, our Retreat Master [St. Peter Julian Eymard] is very clear that the only thing that should keep us from Holy Communion is mortal sin."

(Excerpt from 30 Day Eucharistic Revival - A Retreat with St. Peter Julian Eymard by Father Donald H. Calloway, MIC)

Eucharistic Reflection - The Bread For Which Humanity Was Famishing

 

“Ah, yes! The Eucharist began at Bethlehem in Mary's arms. It was she who brought to humanity the Bread for which it was famishing, and which alone can nourish it. She, it was who took care of that Bread for us. It was she who nourished the Lamb whose life-giving Flesh we feed upon. 

She nourished Him with her virginal milk; she nourished Him for the sacrifice, for she foreknew His destiny. Yes, she knew from the beginning, and every day she realizes it more fully, that her Lamb is only for immolation. She accepts God's will, and bearing Him in her arms, herself prepares for us the victim at Calvary - that Victim of our Altars.”

(From Our Lady of the Blessed Sacrament by Saint Peter Julian Eymard)

Eucharistic Reflection - Become An Interior Soul

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

“Hence I say, if we wish to become saints, we must become interior souls. We are obliged thereto by our vocation as adorers. Without this interior spirit, how can we pray? If in the presence of our Lord we cannot spend a single instant without a book, if we have nothing to say to Him from our own heart, what are we going to do at Adoration? What can we never speak to Him from the abundance of our own heart? Must we always borrow the thoughts and words of strangers? No, no! Let us strive to become recollected interior souls.

No one can be this in the way that Jesus and Mary were; but everyone can become recollected in the degree given him by grace. Without the interior life, we shall never receive any consolation, encouragement in prayer; we shall only be unhappy at the feet of our Lord. If you wish to become true adorers, we must have this interior spirit. We should talk to our Lord when kneeling in His presence, ask Him questions, await His reply; we should enjoy God's presence. We should be happy in His company, happy in His service; we should take pleasure in His familiarity, so sweet, so encouraging. But to discover the Heart of Jesus we must be interior.

After all, what does it mean to be interior? It means to love, to converse, to live with Jesus. But Jesus does not make Himself heard by bodily ears, nor seen with bodily eyes; He speaks only to the recollected soul. He is wholly interior in the Blessed Sacrament: He no longer enters into the heart through the sight, as during His mortal life; He now enters the soul direct and speaks to it alone. When the soul does not expand in His presence it is because He does not act upon it - there is some obstacle in His path.

Ah! Do not make our Lord out to have said what is not true! He has said that His yoke is sweet and His burden light. But it is only so for him who carries it in a prayerful, recollected spirit; otherwise, he will find it heavy and fatiguing. When we do not lead interior lives, everything we do goes haltingly. Oh, how I should wish to see accomplished in us what was so fully realized in the Blessed Virgin: ‘The Kingdom of God is within you’ - the Kingdom of love, of virtue and of interior graces. Then indeed shall we begin to be adorers and saints. The grass of the field dies yearly because its roots do not lie deep in the soil; but the oak, the olive and the cedar stand year after year because their roots run deep into the earth. In order to grow strong, to endure, we must descend to the very depths, even to self-annihilation…There we shall find Jesus. He is there annihilated... it was such that Mary found Him. Oh, may that Blessed Mother, our perfect exemplar of the interior life, make us live, as she did, in Jesus! May we, like her, remain always in Him and never leave Him!”

(From Our Lady of the Blessed Sacrament by Saint Peter Julian Eymard)

Eucharistic Reflection - Mother, Make Us Comprehend

"Virgin Immaculate, who, after the Ascension of thy Divine son, didst console thy exile on earth by the Real Presence of Jesus in the Sacrament and didst spend before the Tabernacle the greater part of thy days and even thy nights, make us comprehend the treasure we possess on the altar. Inspire us to visit often the God of Love in the Sacrament in which He abides to receive the homage that He deserves by so many titles, and to guide, protect and console us in this exile."

(From Our Lady of the Blessed Sacrament by Saint Peter Julian Eymard)

Eucharistic Reflection - The Most Beautiful Of All Missions

"Eucharistic adorers share Mary’s life and mission of prayer at the foot of the Most Blessed Sacrament. It is the most beautiful of all missions, and it holds no perils.  It is the most holy, for in it all the virtues are practiced.  It is, moreover, the most necessary to the Church, which has even more need of prayerful souls than of powerful preachers; of men of penance rather than of men of eloquence.  Today more than ever have we need of men who, by their self-immolation, disarm the anger of God inflamed by the ever-increasing crimes of nation. 

We must have souls who by their importunity re-open the treasures of grace which the indifference of the multitude has closed.  We must have true adorers; that is to say, men of fervor and of sacrifice. 

When there are many such souls around their Divine Chief, God will be glorified, Jesus will be loved, and society will once more be Christian, conquered for Jesus Christ by the apostolate of Eucharistic prayer."

(Meditation of  St. Peter Julian Eymard)

Eucharistic Reflection - To Adore!

Eucharistic Adoration is the greatest of actions and there is nothing greater or holier we can do on earth than this adoration. To adore is to share the life of Mary on earth when she adored the Word Incarnate in her virginal womb, when she adored Him in the Crib, on Calvary, in the divine Eucharist.

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

To adore is to share the life of noble souls on earth, whose love and happiness found expression in the long hours they passed at the foot of the Tabernacle to adore therein the hidden God and to glorify and love Him as much as they could. The Tabernacle was their only reason for loving life; they lived only to consume themselves in the flames of His love.

To adore is to share the life of the saints in heaven who never cease to praise, bless and adore the goodness, the love, the glory, the power and the divinity of the Lamb immolated for the love of men and the glory of God the Father.

Eucharistic Adoration is the holiest of actions. It is so because it is the perfect exercise of all the virtues.

(St. Peter Julian Eymard)

Eucharistic Reflection - We Have Time for Everything But God

(Image Source: Wikimedia Commons)

"Why (as St. Peter Julian Eymard observed more than 100 years ago) do we have time for everything except for visits to our Lord and God, Who is waiting and longing for us in the Blessed Sacrament? Why do so few visit You? Why are those who try to do so often locked out? Why are Your Church and its members so timid and so silent about this great mystery and gift? Why have we lost reverence for and belief in Your Real Presence?"

(Excerpt from I Thirst For Your Love)

Pondering Tidbits of Truth - January 27, 2022

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.

 

 

Johann Tauler, O.P.

"Priests, on account of their dignity, have a right to more honor and respect. They represent the sovereign Priest, Jesus Christ; you owe them therefore a very profound respect. They may be good to you and treat you with condescension, but never let a layman dare to make himself the equal of a priest and treat him with familiarity. Never consider them as your comrades, but as your superiors. Remain in your place; and if one of them wants to condescend to your level, do not take advantage of it in any other way than to put yourselves still lower."

(From Spiritual Conferences) 

 

 St. Peter Julian Eymard

"Since Jesus Christ has loved me, I will love Him in spite of everything and nothing will ever prevent me from loving Him! The events of the time, the spiritual forces, hunger, nakedness, the sword or death, no, nothing will separate me from the love of Jesus Christ, by Whom we triumph over everything: 'Who can be our adversary, if God is on our side'."

(From The Eucharist and Christian Perfection II)  

 

 

Father Federico Suarez

"If there are so many Christians who today live aimlessly with little depth, and hemmed in on all sides by narrow horizons, it is due, above all, to their lack of any clear idea of why they, personally, exist...What elevates a man and truly gives him a personality of his own is the consciousness of his vocation, the consciousness of his own specific task in the universe."

(From Mary of Nazareth)