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VIABILITY FOR HEAVENLY LIFE

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SUNDAY, FIFTENTH WEEK IN ORDERINARY TIME Isa 55:10-11; Ps 65:10-14; Rom 8:18-23; Mt 13:1-23 The Word of God as Seed of Spiritual Life The Church arranges the readings for this Sunday to aid us in a deeper and better understanding of the mystery of our salvation in Jesus Christ. The prominent analogy is that of the seed sown in the soil. Just as a viable seed sown in the soil struggles with the life it contains against the forces of death, darkness, and decay, our souls, receiving the new and spiritual life from the word of God, struggle against the forces of evil, sin, and death. The forces of death and corruption, working on the seed, cause it to bring forth a new shoot through which it breaks through the earth covering and holding it down, to receive light and fresh air, with which it commences the production of new structures supporting the new life. The seed sown in the dark earth will be unable to accomplish this feat if it is not viable enough. The analogy is apt for our sp...
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ABANDONING OUR IDOLS FOR GOD

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SAINT BENEDICT, ABBOT Isa 6:1-8; Ps 93:1-2,5; Mt 10:24-33 From worship of Idols to God Once we have the light of the Word of God to illuminate our inmost being, to see how truly sinful we are without the grace of God, we begin to cast away our idols in order to approach God. Without the light of the word of God, none can really know himself and his sins. We cannot understand how deceived and deluded we are in putting ourselves first before God, our creator. As we noted yesterday, this deception with oneself is the masterpiece of the devil's tricks. The saints believed and taught that knowledge of self is the foundation of the life of holiness. The knowledge of self does not come without our turning to the interior, where the light of God’s word illuminates our sinful self and teaches us about God. The strategy of the devil is always to distract and remove us from the light of the presence of God, received in contemplation of his word. Thus, it is said that ignorance of the sc...
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BREAKING UP OUR IDOLS

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FRIDAY, FOURTENTH WEEK IN ORDERINARY TIME Hosea 14:2-10; Ps 51:3-4,8-9,12-14,17; Mt 10:16-23 You shall be Like God The setting up of idols for worship within and without is a contamination of the pure initial desire within a human person for the absolute Truth and Goodness we call God. This original desire is divine because it is constituted by the will of the Triune God to make man in the image and likeness of God. Since God works on us without us, making us into His image, He works in us through us to make us like Himself. The evil one, noting that the work of making the human person like God requires our attention on God through his word, came to distract the man and the woman from focusing on the word and the activities of God in creation. Thus, our distraction from the word is the origin of idols. Once the self was put before the will of God, the enemy continually set up an idol for the human person, distracted from God. The evil one deceives us through presenting the self t...
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THE FOOL SAYS THERE IS NO GOD

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  THURSDAY, FOURTENTH WEEK IN ORDERINARY TIME Hosea 11:1-4,8-9; Ps 80:2-3,15-16; Mt 10:7-15 The Foolishness of Idol Worship The only thing that drives or makes us to idolise a creature or make an idol for worship is ignorance of God and his goodness to us. When we lack the knowledge of God, his existence, and benevolence to us who are his beloved creatures, we foolishly and ignorantly set up a shrine for ourselves. We are also ignorant when we seek to serve God in our own way, and not the way he wants us to serve him. As noted yesterday, what drives the setting up of an idol is our desire to do our will. The scripture calls the one who thinks there is no God a fool. We are indeed foolish when we set up our own god for worship because we lack the knowledge of a basic truth, namely, that we live and move in God. Our life is a participation in God who created us for himself. If God created us, He also cares for our welfare and provides us with all we need to sustain our lives he...
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DESIRE TO BE RICH

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WEDNESDAY, FOURTENTH WEEK IN ORDERINARY TIME Hosea 10:1-3,7-8,12; Ps 105:2-7; Mt 10:1-7 The Temptation to Idols God offers us more insight into why we seek to set up idols for ourselves through the prophet Hosea. The temptation to set up idols for ourselves is strong when we feel we have what it takes to control our destiny in life. When we have sufficient resources to meet our needs. When that is the case, we flaunt our wealth and riches and use the power they give us to put ourselves before others and oppress them. With enough wealth and riches to throw about, we look less to God for our needs. We gradually feel that we have no more need for God, or to spend time seeking his face or favour. We desire to worship only the God we can control or manipulate to accomplish our will. Since God cannot be manipulated by us, we end up with a god, an idol. We forget that everything we possess is from God, and we are nothing without him. Many of us seek material wealth because of the securi...
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HOW WE MAKE IDOLS FOR OURSELVES

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TUESDAY, FOURTENTH WEEK IN ORDERINARY TIME Hosea 8:4-7,11-13; Ps 115:3-10; Mt 9:32-37 The Constitution of Idols God made us to know him, to love him, and to serve him, so that we may be happy in his communion forever and ever. This is the Catechism response to the question: Why did God make you? The response may seem simple, but it has depth that we can never fully comprehend. From the simple response, we understand that God did not create us for ourselves; that means we do not exist or live solely to carry out our own plan in life. We are not supposed to plan our lives without God, our Creator. It is a grievous sin to live our lives without reference to God. What makes such an attitude very sinful is the fact that life itself is a participation in God, who is the supreme Being or Life. Understood correctly, every level of life draws from the existence of the supreme Life we call God. So, if sensible animals do not live without reference to God, how then can a rational soul live ...
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SEEKING THE ULTIMATE GOOD

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MONDAY, FOURTENTH WEEK IN ORDERINARY TIME Hosea 2:16,17-18,21-22; Ps 145:2-9; Mt 9:18-26 Our Rediscovery of God As human beings, we are born with an innate desire for God, which ought to mature with time. In creating the material universe, God fashioned everything he made to be the means of our rising to our ultimate Good, who is God. He created everything good. The goodness of each creature is a share in the ultimate goodness of God. The same way our wills rise to the Supreme Good from desiring and using the limited or proportionate goods of creatures, our intellects also rise from the knowledge of creatures to the knowledge of the Eternal Truth that is God. As we noted yesterday, these two faculties are spiritual in their intent and operations. The evil one used the created good to lure man’s mind and heart away from seeking God. The inordinate desire for creatures causes sin within us. To win the hearts of men back to the end for which they were created, God decided to present...
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