Private Vows in The Laity/Spirituality

[BarbTherese]

Hymns are prayers in musical form.  The words can carry the intellect and the music the spirit with our lifting of heart and mind in a heartfelt "glance towards Heaven" (Definition of St Therese Lisieux for Prayer).

Putin was hoping that the Hamas Israeli war would draw the USA from Ukraine.  The USA has a bigger financial investment and return in Israel than in the Ukraine.  Hence the arms shipment Ukraine was expecting has been halved and sent to Israel. 

[BarbTherese]

What is Hamas? What you need to know about the Palestinian militant group that rules the Gaza Strip https://www.cnbc.com/2023/10/10/hamas-israel-conflict-heres-what-you-need-to-know-about-hamas.html

A ground offensive by Israel into Gaza now seems inevitable. The big question is what comes next https://www.cnbc.com/2023/10/23/israel-hamas-war-what-next-if-israel-embarks-on-a-gaza-ground-assault.html

 

[BarbTherese]

 

 

The Destruction of Sennacherib

BY LORD BYRON (GEORGE GORDON)

The Assyrian (or the enemy)came down like the wolf on the fold,

And his cohorts were gleaming in purple and gold;

And the sheen of their spears was like stars on the sea,

When the blue wave rolls nightly on deep Galilee.

 

   Like the leaves of the forest when Summer is green,

That host with their banners at sunset were seen:

Like the leaves of the forest when Autumn hath blown,

That host on the morrow lay withered and strown.

 

   For the Angel of Death spread his wings on the blast,

And breathed in the face of the foe as he passed;

And the eyes of the sleepers waxed deadly and chill,

And their hearts but once heaved, and for ever grew still!

 

   And there lay the steed with his nostril all wide,

But through it there rolled not the breath of his pride;

And the foam of his gasping lay white on the turf,

And cold as the spray of the rock-beating surf.

 

   And there lay the rider distorted and pale,

With the dew on his brow, and the rust on his mail:

And the tents were all silent, the banners alone,

The lances unlifted, the trumpet unblown.

 

   And the widows of Ashur are loud in their wail,

And the idols are broke in the temple of Baal;

And the might of the Gentile, unsmote by the sword,

Hath melted like snow in the glance of the Lord!

[BarbTherese]

 Thank you so much for prayer.  The doctors discovered I am immune to the antibiotics normally used to treat my infected leg.  They increased the dose as a starting point and already I am getting relief from pain and my leg has started to dry out.  It is such a jolly release!

   

 

   

 

[BarbTherese]

I put the entry into the wrong place.  For latest news go to today's entry into "Private Vows/Spirituality".

[BarbTherese]

HOW BRITAIN BEGAN THE EUROPEAN BETRAYAL OF WARTIME PROMISES IN THE MIDDLE EAST:

 

     

[BarbTherese]

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"But Jesus called them unto him, and said, Suffer little children to come unto me, and forbid them not: for of such is the kingdom of God. Verily I say unto you, Whosoever shall not receive the kingdom of God as a little child shall in no wise enter therein." https://www.compassion.com/poverty/suffer-the-little-children.htm#:~:text=But Jesus called them unto,in no wise enter therein."

 

There can come a time when The Spirit leads one into darkness, a place one does not want to go......but choice has been taken away.  One has no choice but to walk in the darkness in either trust in The Lord, or the complete lack of trust in Him.  One must choose - either or - and only in the ballpark of trust or lack of trust.

[BarbTherese]

THE WAY OF THE CROSS

There is a little verse I learnt in Primary School: "All for Thee, Sacred Heart of Jesus, O My Saviour, it is all for Thee".  Whenever I was suffering small or large, that was the verse that came to my mind and heart, to my lips.  It meant that I was nailed to The Cross with Jesus.  Nailed to His Cross and poured forth in His Sacred Heart in Love and Mercy for all His Father gifted Him; namely CREATION.  I was suffering to be poured out in Love and Mercy without exceptions for all.   Hence, I can state that most of my life I have been nailed to The Cross of Jesus.  Rare are the days I was not suffering in some form.

There is no magic in my little learned verse, it merely expresses poetically, the disposition of my heart and mind, of my soul.  You can do precisely the same with your own sufferings and difficulties; even make up your own little verse.

                           ___oOo___

Avoid M Scott Peck's book on the Road Less Travelled.  It is the Prosperity Gospel in a veiled form.  I don't think he even recognised this as the author of the work.  Suffering, to be suffering, is not alleviated.  If it is alleviated it is difficulty.  That is how I would express it anyway.  And our difficulties can be offered too to Jesus on His Cross. A soldier who looses both legs during war is not given both actual legs back.  He suffers.  He might get artificial legs and come to terms with his disability making his suffering, actual difficulties major or minor.d

Notice in St Paul, it is not until he is about to be martyred that he is gifted understanding and supernatural vision into his future in Heaven and what supported him completely out of his sight in all his years of suffering.  This is not revealed to him until he writes to his beloved disciple, Timothy, days before his death.

                             

[BarbTherese]

Trump trial: "In danger of imploding"  https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/oct/28/trump-fraud-trial-public-opinion

         

Edited October 28, 2023 by BarbTherese

[BarbTherese]

 

 

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/liveblog/2023/10/28/israel-hamas-war-live-israeli-bombings-intensify-as-gaza-goes-dark

[BarbTherese]

North Korea https://www.aljazeera.com/where/north-korea/

South Korea https://www.aljazeera.com/where/south-korea/

China  https://www.aljazeera.com/where/china/

India https://www.aljazeera.com/where/india/

 

In Flanders Fields

BY JOHN MCCRAE

 

In Flanders fields the poppies blow

Between the crosses, row on row,

    That mark our place; and in the sky

    The larks, still bravely singing, fly

Scarce heard amid the guns below.

 

We are the Dead. Short days ago

We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,

    Loved and were loved, and now we lie,

        In Flanders fields.

 

Take up our quarrel with the foe:

To you from failing hands we throw

    The torch; be yours to hold it high.

    If ye break faith with us who die

We shall not sleep, though poppies grow

        In Flanders fields.

[BarbTherese]

 

[BarbTherese]

Hamas’s attack on Israel has changed the Middle East  https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2023/10/28/hamass-attack-on-israel-has-changed-the-middle-east

[BarbTherese]

 

 

[BarbTherese]

   

The above image is that of a Missionary Sister of St Columban who do not wear veils. 

I have a copy here of the original constitution of St Teresa of Avila for Carmel.  Something leapt out as I read.  St Teresa is talking about our Blessed Mother "whose habit I unworthily wear".  To me, the scapular and rosary are sacramentals marked by Our Lady as hers.  The Carmelite religious habit has a scapular but not a rosary as part of the habit.

If religious are going to discard their habits, then why cannot lay people take them up before they hit the back pages of history and are forgotten?  I do think one reason lay women are not permitted the religious habit is the stance of a male hierarchy.  If you are in religious life, your superior will keep you in line ideally. Hence rarely probably the Bishop's worry. Lay people do not have the very close supervision of a religious superior.  The fear is that lay women might say or do the wrong thing and identified easily as Catholic by the habit they wear.

Our hierarchy need to look in their own ranks for shockingly serious saying and doing the wrong thing.  It does not mean that the hierarchy, clericals, need to be abolished.  The religious habit is a powerful sacramental almost as powerful as community.

Why can't a lay woman who follows a particular spirituality take up the religious habit of that spirituality?  A priest religious theologian lecturing at a seminary told me that I was a new type of religious sister though my choice was and is to not be embraced by consecrated life.  Rather by a distinction called dedicated life.

Wear the habit, but not the veil.  That marks the woman as laity.  Although in  my own case, I do not feel worthy of the habit, which is why I am seeking standard wear that does not look like a religious habit.