Daily Retreat 01/08/09
2009 Jan 8 Thu: Christmas Weekday
1 Jn 4: 19 – 5: 4/ Ps 71(72): 1-2. 14 and 15bc. 17/ Lk 4: 14-22
From today’s readings: “Whoever does not love a brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen.... Lord, every nation on earth will adore You..... Jesus returned to Galilee in the power of the Spirit, and news of Him spread throughout the whole region....”
Delightful Logic of Love
God’s love is like the sun’s light - we can turn our backs on it and shut out its warmth, but it is impossible to altogether stymie its influence. God is good, and God is love, and so to intentionally not love God is like attempting to cast a shadow on the sun!
And yet, our experience of the sun’s light is almost always indirect - we see the sweeping landscapes or glowing sky, or whatever is in our line of sight - all this, imbued with light from the sun, but the source of the light, the sun itself, is impossible to directly view (except when muffled with atmosphere haze or tantalizingly hovering on the horizon at sunrise and sunset).
What would we say of a person who says, “I love the sunlight!” but assiduously avoids the daylight? Such a person must surely be suffering from a mental mixup! So it is, explains St. John, with the person who claims to love God (the source of love), but rejects the nearby manifestation of that love (his brother).
1 Jn 4: 19 – 5: 4/ Ps 71(72): 1-2. 14 and 15bc. 17/ Lk 4: 14-22
From today’s readings: “Whoever does not love a brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen.... Lord, every nation on earth will adore You..... Jesus returned to Galilee in the power of the Spirit, and news of Him spread throughout the whole region....”
Delightful Logic of Love
God’s love is like the sun’s light - we can turn our backs on it and shut out its warmth, but it is impossible to altogether stymie its influence. God is good, and God is love, and so to intentionally not love God is like attempting to cast a shadow on the sun!
And yet, our experience of the sun’s light is almost always indirect - we see the sweeping landscapes or glowing sky, or whatever is in our line of sight - all this, imbued with light from the sun, but the source of the light, the sun itself, is impossible to directly view (except when muffled with atmosphere haze or tantalizingly hovering on the horizon at sunrise and sunset).
What would we say of a person who says, “I love the sunlight!” but assiduously avoids the daylight? Such a person must surely be suffering from a mental mixup! So it is, explains St. John, with the person who claims to love God (the source of love), but rejects the nearby manifestation of that love (his brother).
posted by FrPitstick | 1/06/2009
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