14th Week of Pentecost

TUESDAY
1 John 4:7-21
Beloved, let us love one another, because love is of God; everyone who loves is begotten by God and knows God. Whoever is without love does not know God, for God is love. In this way the love of God was revealed to us: God sent his only Son into the world so that we might have life through him. In this is love: not that we have loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as expiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also must love one another. No one has ever seen God. Yet, if we love one another, God remains in us, and his love is brought to perfection in us. This is how we know that we remain in him and he in us, that he has given us of his Spirit. Moreover, we have seen and testify that the Father sent his Son as savior of the world. Whoever acknowledges that Jesus is the Son of God, God remains in him and he in God. We have come to know and to believe in the love God has for us. God is love, and whoever remains in love remains in God and God in him. In this is love brought to perfection among us, that we have confidence on the day of judgment because as he is, so are we in this world. There is no fear in love, but perfect love drives out fear because fear has to do with punishment, and so one who fears is not yet perfect in love. We love because he first loved us. If anyone says, “I love God,” but hates his brother, he is a liar; for whoever does not love a brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen. This is the commandment we have from him: whoever loves God must also love his brother.

Luke 15:8-10
“Or what woman having ten coins and losing one would not light a lamp and sweep the house, searching carefully until she finds it? And when she does find it, she calls together her friends and neighbors and says to them, ‘Rejoice with me because I have found the coin that I lost.’ In just the same way, I tell you, there will be rejoicing among the angels of God over one sinner who repents.”

Prayer of the Faithful, vol. III
FIRST PRAYER
Lord, have mercy on us and save us.
God of goodness,
you have promised your heavenly treasures to those who are
good.
Grant us the rewards you assured the laborers of the eleventh hour,
who sincerely believe in you and acknowledge you.
Count us among those invited to your spiritual banquet,
and grant us a place at your right hand.
Then, clothed in resplendent apparel,
we shall joyfully go out to meet you with deeds of love,
and receive from you the happiness you promised to those who
do good.
We shall praise and glorify you,
now and forever.
Amen.

Saint of the Day: Teresa of Calcutta 1910-1997 (Mother Teresa, born Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhiu, known as the Saint of the Gutters). Founded the Congregation of the Missionaries of Charity in 1950. Winner of the NObel Peace Proze in 1979. today the Missionaries of Charity work in 30 countries.

Meditation:
Do not wait for leaders; do it alone, person to person. – Mother Teresa

God speaks in the silence of the heart, and we listen. And then we speak to God from the fullness of our heart, and God listens. And this listening and this speaking is what prayer is meant to be. – Blessed Teresa of Calcutta

A clean heart is a free heart. A free heart can love Christ with an undivided love in chastity, convinced that nothing and nobody will separate it from his love. Purity, chastity, and virginity created a special beauty in Mary that attracted God’s attention. He showed his great love for the world by giving Jesus to her. – Blessed Teresa of Calcutta

As Lent is the time for greater love, listen to Jesus’ thirst. “Repent and believe,” Jesus tells us. What are we to repent? Our indifference, our hardness of heart. What are we to believe? Jesus thirsts even now, in your heart and in the poor – He knows your weakness. He wants only your love, wants only the chance to love you. – Blessed Teresa of Calcutta

We too are called to withdraw at certain intervals into deeper silence and aloneness with God… to be alone with Him – not with our books, thoughts, and memories but completely stripped of everything – to dwell lovingly in His presence, silent, empty, expectant, and motionless. We cannot find God in noise or agitation. – Blessed Teresa of Calcutta