From the Hermitage
Dear Friends,
Somewhere in space there is a reflection floating that I dispatched to you about an hour ago. For some reason, perhaps the Holy Spirit, I returned to the composition to find that it no longer existed! Remember yesterday, "If today you hear his voice, harden not your hearts"? I think God must have been talking to me after he read what I had composed!!!! Nonetheless, it have given me reason to give further thought to what the cited gospel reading means to me.
It is simple. How often to I write that sentence? Perhaps too often! However, let's start. The gospel is a reminder that God really cannot be bought by "burnt offerings and sacrifices." What He wants from me and for everyone is quite different.
He is asking us to look deeply into our hearts, our soul. Look to see how much we give our lives to Him and His desires for us. It is so much easier to put money into a collection that to put time into working at removing the faults and sins that keep us from fully sharing the love God wants to put into our lives. It is much easier to give up meals, movies and monied things than to give up those days when God is absent in our lives of prayer, reflection and especially thanksgiving.
This is what God is asking for us now that we stand on the threshold of the end of the first half of Lent. Of course it is never easy, is it? Human nature is truly a challenge but we cannot forget the love of God that is poured out to us if we but take the time, take the time, take the time to listen to the voice of the Holy Spirit.
This is a brief summary, I believe, which was sent to that outer space.
Oremus pro Invicem!
Fr. Milt
