Reflection from Friar Nicholas

THURSDAY, FIFTEENTH WEEK IN ORDINARY TIME Exod 3: 13-20; Ps 105:1,5,8-9,24-27; Mt 11:28-30 The Awesome Name of God We continue our reflection on Moses’ vision of God on Mount Horeb, while looking after his father-in-law’s flock. Moses had no prior knowledge or experience of God. Hence, God speaking to him from the heart of a burning bush was a new and strange experience to him. God was asking him to go to Pharaoh, the one he was fleeing from. The strangeness of the vision and the mystical aspect of the experience gave him some strength, but did not remove all his doubts about the possibility of such a mission. The doubt he raised was even on how to introduce God to the Israelites and convince them of the intention of the unknown God to them. His doubt prompted the question: “I am to go, then, to the sons of Israel and say to them, “The God of your fathers has sent me to you.” But if they ask me what his name is, what am I to tell them?” The name God revealed to Moses underscore...

OUR LADY OF MOUNT CAMEL Exod 3: 1-6,9-12; Ps 103:1-4,6-7; Mt 11:25-27 Nobody Knows the Father except the Son Moses’ vision of God on Mount Horeb is typical of who God is to us. God is present in everything, yet unknown and unseen. He speaks to us through everything he made, and he remains silent and distinct from them all. The bush Moses saw was burning but yet unconsumed, just as God is present in everything he made and we experience, yet each remains distinct and knowable through which God speaks to us. God is the consuming flame of love, who loves each of his creatures into existence and yet leaves it distinct and natural in its species. We behold these creatures with our senses, flaming with the fire of love God enkindles in them, yet we fail to see God through them. The existence of each thing is an expression of God’s love for it and for us, men. God loves every one of his creatures into existence. Thus, existence is the flame of the love of God in which he envelopes everyt...

SAINT BONAVENTURE, BISHOP, DOCTOR Exod 2: 1-15; Ps 69:3,14,30-31,33-34; Mt 11:20-24 We are Drawn out of the Water When we hear the word of God and open our hearts to it, we grasp the truth of God, a heavenly reality. The Eternal Word is himself the minister of the word of God, for in the parable of the Sower, he referred to the Son of Man as the Sower of the good seeds. Hence, all who minister the word of God are instrumental agents of the Eternal Word. In this capacity, we consider him to be the High Priest of God’s religion. He is the only High Priest or Sacerdo because he alone gives holy things. By attending to the heavenly bridegroom and opening our hearts and minds in love to his word, we conceive a heavenly child. The heavenly child is the spirit that the Holy Spirit brings to birth in us. So, we can say of the spirit within each of us that he is conceived of the Holy Spirit, as we say of the Son of Man. Hence, we have come to recognise the spirit in each of us, which uni...

MONDAY, FIFTEENTH WEEK IN ORDINARY TIME Exod 1: 8-14,22; Ps 124; Col 1:15-20; Mt 10:34-11:1 The Carriers of the Promise The book of Exodus continues the story of the children of Jacob in Egypt. Just as a new Pharaoh arose who knew nothing of Joseph, a generation of children of Jacob grew up who knew nothing of the promise God had made to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob; therefore, they saw no need to return to the land of Canaan that God had promised their fathers. The word of God is ever alive and active, for God watches over his word. The Israelites started having discomfort in their comfortable sojourn in Egypt. God created the discomfort for them to fulfil his promise to Abraham and his descendants. He caused Pharaoh to start persecuting them. “‘Look,’ he said to his subjects, ‘these people, the sons of Israel, have become so numerous and strong that they are a threat to us. We must be prudent and take steps against their increasing any further, or if war should break out, they mig...

SUNDAY, FIFTEENTH WEEK IN ORDINARY TIME Deut 30: 10-14; Ps 19:8-11; Col 1:15-20; Lk 10:25-37 Jesus Christ is the Law within Us God delivered the children of Israel from their slavery in Egypt and took them through the desert for a purpose. It was not beyond the power of God to resettle them immediately in the land of Canaan, which he promised Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, their forefathers. But he took them into the wilderness or desert to train them in his ways and accustom them to listening and obeying his word. God’s choice of the desert or wilderness was to help them to focus their attention on the Lord, who was present among them. The wilderness lacked the common sources of distraction for the human mind. God treats us the same way by removing the sources of distractions from us. He does this through various means to have us focus on his word. God, in his infinite knowledge and wisdom, knows us completely. He knows what to remove from our lives to create a wilderness around us....

  SATURDAY, FOURTEENTH WEEK IN ORDINARY TIME Gen 49:29-33, 50:15-26; Ps 105:1-4,6-7; Mt 10:24-33 The Revelation of what is Hidden The chief of the hidden things is God, the Trinity of divine Persons. The mystery of God is the main object of our act of faith, which is our cooperation with the sacred gift of faith. The immediate object of our act of faith is the Son of Man. We believe that he is the Son of God in human nature; through him, we believe in the Father, whom he reveals to us. Our acceptance of these truths enkindles the flame of love for the Son and the Father, which is indicative of the presence of the Person of the Holy Spirit within us. The Trinity is the chief mystery of our faith in God, and the source of every other mystery hidden from human knowledge. Faith supports us during our journey here on earth because it penetrates the cloud of divine mysteries through the light which the word of God sheds on our spirits. The word of God achieves this because the word...

SAINT BENEDICT, ABBOT Gen 46:1-7, 28-30; Ps 37:3-4,18-19,27-28,39-40; Mt 10:16-23 The Weakness and Strength of Spiritual Life Our Lord gives us the core wisdom that guides our spiritual life and the principle of its purification and growth. The Son of Man has the fullness of knowledge concerning our human nature and our human conditions. Given this fullness of knowledge, he captures the danger or the difficulty of the spiritual life we have received and the principle that ought to guide us in carrying out the mission that accompanies the gift in these words. “Remember, I am sending you out like sheep among wolves; so be cunning as serpents and yet as harmless as doves.” When compared to the proud worldlings, we are vulnerable, due to our way of life modelled on the word of God. Our Christian faith makes us live and think in a way that is harmless to everyone. The way of life and thinking of the worldlings are different and opposed to ours, and make us easy prey for them. The Lord...