Teresa of Calcutta

I have loved Jesus in the night:
Teresa of Calcutta
A Secret revealed by Paul Murray,OP
Darton, Longman & Todd

This is more than a book about a saint. It is a treasure in a whole field of literature around Mother Teresa. Paul Murray writes as a poet and a mystic and from beginning to end, this is a work that scintillates and shines in the darkness. Fr. Paul brings us into the heart of the Saint and reveals something of the inner secret of her being.

Three characters came across to me as I eagerly read through these pages: I was introduced to the light that shone in the night for Mother Teresa herself. The references to John of the Cross were a welcome ray of light in the darkness that for so many, surrounds this Spanish saint. Thirdly, the person of the author himself seems to speak as he writes in intimate personal tones, weaving a mystic magic into the heart of the reader. He certainly did that for me.

Page 92 tells of the Desert Father whose fingers became like lamps of fire and said if you will, you can become all flame. I could only rejoice that the fingers that typed out the words of this beautiful book are indeed lamps of fire and I believe that many of its readers may become all flame.

A credit to the publishers who have presented a delightful production, the kind of thing one would want to give as a Birthday or Christmas present. Looking at the photos of Fr. Paul communing, (not just speaking) with Mother Teresa, I felt like one who had slipped in secretly on sacred moments.

Stand in your Presence

At Mass say: We thank you for counting us worthy to stand in your presence and serve you. The presence of God in our lives is what enlightens our darkness and keeps us from fainting on the way. We are called to be totally present to the One who is the

Ps: 5:5 "The arrogant cannot stand in your presence." There is a time for standing in readiness to serve, as there is a time for resting and being refreshed. Come aside and rest awhile. This is what takes place during our meditation when we wait upon the Lord. Meditation prepares us to take our stand. We wait with expectation with patient an hope-filled expectation. For what?

Isaiah 40:31 Shows both the resting and the serving in one magnificent statement: But they that wait upon the LORD shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint. Strength is for action, to enable us to serve. Meditation is meant to overflow in service to God and to others.

Mount up like eagles
An eagle knows when a storm is approaching long before it breaks It will fly to some high spot and wait for the winds to come. When the storm hits, it sets its wings so that the wind will pick it up and lift it above the storm. While the storm rages below, the eagle is soaring above it. The eagle does not escape the storm, it simply uses the storm to lift it higher. It rises on the winds that bring the storm. When the storms of life come upon us ... and all of us will experience them ... we can rise above them by setting our minds and our belief toward God.

The storms do not have to overcome us, we can allow God's power to lift us above them. God enables us to ride the winds of the storm that bring sickness, tragedy, failure, and disappointment into our lives. We can soar above the storm. This heaven-inspired soaring is what gives us the strength to stand in the Divine Presence and serve the King of Heaven.

They shall run and not be weary : Walking is too slow sometimes, to reach the prize, There is a need to pay the price and RUN towards it. The secret of coming into the presence of God or any human being, is being ourselves totally present, with all our attention and all our faith in the other. Lack of faith in God's power and God’s love for us, sets up a new god. For if there be anything which usurps the power of God, something that is more potent than God, then that something must be god!

DOOR INTO THE SACRED

This new work by Fr. Paul Murray is a Meditation on the Hail Mary. In his introduction, the author writes: "My hope in writing this tiny book is that, by giving space to some of the most moving and most profound reflections ever written on the Hail Mary, a door will open for the reader into a world in which the strenuous task of thinking and the easeful grace of feeling can both be considered sacred, and where wisdom and enchantment, theology and devotion, are found, at core, to be one and the same thing. For almost an entire millennium the most commonly repeated prayer in the Church, apart from the Our Father, has been the Hail Mary. It’s a prayer that, with great simplicity and ease, brings us at once into the mystery of God incarnate, the mystery of Jesus, son of Mary. For countless numbers of people over the centuries it has proved to be a threshold of grace, a real opening into the mystery and meaning of God’s love, a ‘holy door’."

For myself, I find this latter to be so true. How often on entering an old Church in Italy or France, I have observed the Angel Gabriel carved on one side of the main door and the Virgin Mary on the other side. It made me feel that I was being ushered in to the wonderland of the sacred and secret mystery of God. I hope to have this precious work of Fr. Paul available for our Rosary Retreat in the Retreat Centre, in Tallaght
August 14th--20. If you cannot make the full five days it i possible to drop in for a single day or more.

Rosary Video

The picture shows Dominican Friars singing the Night Office with Our Lady watching over them as they sign the Salve Regina-- Hail Holy Queen!
www.worldpriest asked me to put a Nine minute talk on their Website. Hope you like it.Look up the site below.

Rosary Videohttp://worldpriest.com/home/rosary

Fr. Gabriel at the Dominican Priory, Tallaght Village, Dublin 24

Beads for Meditation

For those who may be shy of producing the Catholic beads in public, it may be of help to know that they are not alone when they pray the Rosary. Hindus, Buddhists and many other folk, use the beads as an aid to meditation. They sit still and pass the beads through their fingers while they repeat a sacred word or mantra. Touching the beads enables them to be serene and secure. The sacred word is more sounded in the depth of the being than spoken by the lips.

So never be tempted to think that the Catholic Rosary is elitist or out of date. Praying with the beads is universal and belongs to every age and civilization. See picture of Buddhist monk meditating with his beads in his hands. You can read more about all this in my book: The Riches of the Rosary, published by Veritas, Dublin.

The Catena of the Legion of Mary

Catena is the Latin word for link or chain. It is the sign of the Holy Slavery of Jesus and Mary as taught by St. Louis Marie de Montfort. It reminds Legionaries that they are bound by the sweet chain of Love and Loyalty to Mary and to each other. Members of the Legion of Mary are not lone rangers working on their own. They are in the service of the Queen of Heaven and they stand shoulder to shoulder in army that has set itself to conquer the world.

Even those who have left are encouraged to pray the Catena and thereby keep a connection with the Legion. The opening Antiphon of the Catena is a panorama of the whole role of Mary: Fair as the Moon, Bright as the Sun, and like an Army in battle array! At once attractive and awesome!

In the Magnificat Mary does what we all need to do: She points to the Lord. For our part we often focus on ourselves -- our projects and our problems and make them still larger. Mary sweetly and surely makes the problems into possibilities as she teaches us instead to magnify the Lord. She is the Magnifier of God and his kingdom. Like her Son, she prays thy name, thy Kingdom, thy will. As we grow in this spirit of Mary, the apostolate becomes no longer my kingdom my project, my problem. As our little kingdom decreases, so does the Kingdom of God take root and grow great.

Pride is the most destructive force in the world and blocks the stream of grace. The Lord scatters the proud hearted. We know this to be true from our own experience and have seen that how it can destroyed or gravely diminish even Mary’s own Legion. Humility on the other hand is the foundation on which the Kingdom is established.

Mary acknowledges that anything that is good in her is the work of the Lord. Her soul proclaims the greatness of God. She knows that God has saved her and she rejoices in God my Saviour. Legionaries should remember the words of St. Ephraem so well: ‘May the spirit of Mary be in every soul to glorify the Lord.’

Fr. Bede the Head spiritual director of the Legion of Mary suggests that while we pray the Magnificat together at all our meetings sometimes we should pray and meditate over it personally and in solitude.

worldpriest.com

Recently I was given the opportunity of appearing live on the
Website entitled: worldpriest.com

The occasion, was the close of the Year for Priests and they asked me to say a few words on the Rosary in the life of a Priest. You can look the site up for yourself and I trust it may bring us a little closer. What I was trying to get across in the short time available, was that in the hands of the Priest, the Rosary was not only a prayer, but that a valuable instrument of preaching the Good News of Jesus and Mary.

For the Rosary is a summary of the Scriptures and Sacred Tradition. Pere Lacordaire spoke of it as L'evangile a genoux-- The Gospel on its knees. You can see and listen live by clicking on the following:
http://www.worldpriest.c/home/rosary_relay_video.php