THE DISCIPLINE

[truthfinder]

1 hour ago, Francis Clare said:

In re to Frank.....there is NO PLACE on this board for people advocating others to try spanking to see how it works for them.  Very inappropriate IMHO

I had reported that post - I'm hoping others do too and a Mediator of Meh sees it

[Nunsuch]

I also reported it earlier today.

[Guest]

The very best penances are to accept as one can, not penances which one chooses (self will fulfilled), but those troubles The Lord allows in one's life, involuntary troubles and problems, stresses and strains, in one's life, which The Lord is allowing, because out of these (what He Permits (negatives) and not Directly Wills (positives) in life, He knows that He can bring about a greater good.  That is to surrender to God's Will.  And in the process, all the daily struggles, to accept and respond as best one can.  Do you think The Lord says "Gee thanks"?  Pas de tout - through the joys and sufferings of life in each and every day, He alone is bringing about our own sanctification and the wondrous miracle, which my mind anyway, cannot explain, the salvation of mankind.  It is called "The Divine Providence of God" Catholic Catechism: http://www.vatican.va/archive/ccc_css/archive/catechism/p1s2c1p4.htm (scroll down to "V. GOD CARRIES OUT HIS PLAN: DIVINE PROVIDENCE")

So do not be concerned, The Lord sends and allows into every single life, none excepted, the means to the absolute heights of holiness, perfected only in Heaven.  It is a question of one's response to God's Direct and Permissive Will in their lives.

Why did Jesus be Incarnate among us - for the salvation of mankind, and in my book, to unite ourselves to Jesus, to The Father, Son and Holy Spirit, The Blessed Trinity, One God - we too should have that driving desire in our own hearts. How on earth can I achieve that?  By uniting myself to The Will of God, because our God never ever ever acts or permits anything whatsoever in my life or anyone's, none excepted (including the bigger pictutre - e.g. corona virus), without the sole goal and driving desire passionately for the salvation of mankind.

In that quest to unite oneself to The Will of God in the most ordinary days in our lives, in the most lowly and very ordinary 'faces in the pews' - yep! even for a crazy nut case, unable to conform and frankly, does not want to (this society is very sick as is The Church) - and she has a serious mental illness and living on below poverty income, through the bumps and grinds of even her daily life and trying to respond to what is in fact, the Voice of The Lord in her life (and in the circumstances of any journey, any life, it is The Voice of The Lord), a wondrous change is going to take place within oneself.  One starts to think, so wondrous is what is happening within, "Nah, look Lord, You have this all wrong somehow!".  You see, it is in choosing the very least of His, a figure of derision and despising, it is not to do any favours for her although that happens, it is to reveal what He can do with a mere nothing which society and yes, even His Church, regards as a burden.

It is Good Friday, here in Adelaide South Australia, and my heart is literally breaking for what Jesus suffered (read it, if you dare: Catholic Culture site - AN ACCOUNT OF ROMAN CRUCIFIXION AND WHAT JESUS SUFFERED

I literally feel exactly as if I was there at the time.  And Jesus is still very much here NOW THIS MOMENT just exactly the same as when He walked the roads of Galilee. He instituted The Blessed Sacrament in order to stay here with us and continue His Work - Mission of The Father - towards the salvation of mankind and in many ways, primarily through, with and in us..........worms that we are.............ok, worm that I am anyway.

Ask yourself this: Why did The Father send The Holy Spirit only after the Death of Jesus?

I always wondered why St Teresa of Avila called herself a worm. So I researched the meaning of the word.  What I found is that "worm" is mentioned a few times in Scripture and it has fascinating meanings as a term in Scripture. Based on that, it is a very clever word, St Teresa used, or was inspired to use.

               _______o0o_______

"But the next morning at dawn God sent a worm which attacked the plant, so that it withered." (Book of Jonah) 

Read Chapters 3 and 4 of Book of Jonah, they are very short chapters about Jonah and the message God wanted Jonah to deliver into Nineveh and to the people of Nineveh.  When they repent, Jonah is angry because the destruction he had promised them from God, did not happen. You see, after delivery God's Message, he left Nineveh and sat outside the city to watch the show, the fireworks, as Nineveh is destroyed as he had predicted.  It does not happen.   He tries then to smell of elderberries up to God (at that point, I had to laugh).  Jonah is so angry that what he had proclaimed to Nineveh didn't happen that he wanted to die.(I laughed again)  What his anger is really all about in reality to me, is that God did not destroy Nineveh. and Jonah felt that God had let him down and he felt God had made a fool of him in not destroying Nineveh.  .Anyway, there is much to laugh about in Scripture - and Jonah's story, Nineveh and what God has to say to Jonah about his anger, made me laugh here and there.  Talk about tie a person up in knots!

I read that Jonah stated his home city was Tarshish and St Paul was known as Paul of Tarshish.  So now I have a new link to follow i.e. "Tarshish" and right at the beginning of research, I read something fascinating about it - and can't wait to get into more research about it.

The final sentence in the Book of Jonah:

"And should I not be concerned over Nineveh, the great city, in which there are more than a hundred and twenty thousand persons who cannot distinguish their right hand from their left, not to mention the many cattle?"

There you go in the above! A message for us, The Catholic Church.

[Guest]

Edit:  It is at the same time a message for the world, which we are to deliver to the world and as coming from God. God loves this world, this whole universe, His entire creation and He loves it passionately.  We call it today - evangelization.

Somewhere in my Post, an ordinary every day expression is removed and "smell of elderberries" appears.  The challenge to us is to proclaim The Gospel in the colloquial - in words that very ordinary people are familiar with.  When I first read "smell of elderberries" in a Post on Pham, I had to research what on earth it meant.  

 

[beatitude]

This is a Catholic forum for people discerning a vocation to become nuns or priests. If people want to talk about their sexual fetishes, they can go somewhere else, instead of joining a Catholic vocations forum just to post in a thread that had been dormant for two years.

That said, I'm not sure copy-and-paste posts on historical aspects of religious life that are no longer widely practiced are of much value to discerners either. It does look quite prurient, even fetishizing, especially the photos. I get that some people are interested in the history of religious customs, but this is not a general interest forum on the history of religious life. I am closing this thread as I think it outlived what usefulness it had a long time ago.