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DTSTART;VALUE=DATE:20261118
DTEND;VALUE=DATE:20261119
DTSTAMP:20261115T130429Z
CREATED:20261115T130429Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20261115T130429Z
UID:15904-1794960000-1795046399@laycisterciansofgethsemani.org
SUMMARY:Vigils Reading - Office for Vocations
DESCRIPTION:A reading from \nTHOMAS MERTON4 \n◊◊◊ \nEach of us has some kind of vocation. We are all called by God to share in \nHis life and His kingdom. Each one of us is called to a special place in the \nKingdom. If we find that place\, we will be happy. If we do not find it\, we can \nnever be completely happy. For each one of us\, there is only one thing necessary: \nto fulfill our own destiny\, according to God’s will\, to be what God wants us to be. \nIn any case\, our destiny is the work of two wills\, not one. It is hopeless to \ntry to settle the problem of vocation outside the context of friendship and love. \nGod loves us more than we love ourselves\, as if we were Himself. He loves us \nmoreover with our own wills\, with our own decisions. \nIn planning the course of our lives\, we must remember the importance \nand the dignity of our own freedom. For our freedom is a gift God has given us in \norder that He may be able to love us more perfectly\, and be loved by us more \nperfectly in return. Perfectly confident of being loved by God\, the soul that loves \nHim dares to make a choice of its own\, knowing that its own choice will be \nacceptable to love. \nEvery person has a vocation to be someone: but he must understand \nclearly that in order to fulfill this vocation he can only be one person: himself. \nWe must be ourselves by being Christ. A person only lives fully when he knows \ntruth and loves what he knows and acts according to what he loves. In this way \nhe becomes the truth that he loves. So we “become” Christ by knowledge and by \nlove. \nIn order to be what we are meant to be\, we must know Christ\, and love \nHim\, and do what He did. Our destiny is in our own hands since God has placed \nit there\, and given us the grace to do the impossible. It remains for us to take up \ncourageously and without hesitation the work He has given us\, which is the task \nof living our own life as Christ would live it in us. \nOur vocation is precisely this: to bear witness to the truth of Christ by \nlaying down our lives at His bidding. Our Father in heaven has called us each to \nthe place in which He can best satisfy His infinite desire to do us good. His \ninscrutable choice of the office or state of life or particular function to which we \nare called is not to be judged by the intrinsic merit of those offices and states but \nonly by the hidden love of God. My vocation is the one I love\, not because I think \nit is the best vocation in the Church\, but because it is the one God has willed for \nme. My vocation is at once my will and His. He chose it for me when His \ninscrutable knowledge of my choice moved me to choose it for myself. \n  \n4 No Man is An Island – Thomas Merton – Harcourt Brace Publishers – New York – 1955 – pg 131f.9
URL:https://laycisterciansofgethsemani.org/event/vigils-reading-office-for-vocations-32/
CATEGORIES:Vigils Readings
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BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;VALUE=DATE:20261119
DTEND;VALUE=DATE:20261120
DTSTAMP:20261115T130541Z
CREATED:20261115T130541Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20261115T130541Z
UID:15906-1795046400-1795132799@laycisterciansofgethsemani.org
SUMMARY:Vigils Reading - St Mechtild
DESCRIPTION:A reading from \nST MECHTHILD OF HACKEBORN \n◊◊◊ \nIf any obstacle arises in our service of God\, whether from the attitude of \nothers\, from external circumstances\, from our own desires\, memories\, or from \nany other cause – whatever the impediment\, we should take it as a messenger \nfrom God\, sending it back to Him\, so to speak\, with praise and thanksgiving. \nThree things very pleasing to God are: first\, never to abandon one’s \nneighbors in their needs\, and to excuse their shortcomings and sins as much as \npossible; second\, in tribulation to seek refuge only in God\, abandoning to Him \nalone all that disquiets the heart; third\, to walk with Him in truth. \nWhen it is time to eat or to sleep\, say in your heart: “Lord\, in union with \nthe love with which you created this useful thing for me\, and yourself made us of \nit when you were on earth\, I take it for your eternal praise and for my bodily \nneed.” The Blessed Virgin tells us: “if you wish to be truly holy\, stay close to my \nSon; he is holiness itself\, making all things holy.” \nWe should be lovingly grateful not only for the spiritual blessings God \ngives us\, but for all bodily necessities\, such as food and clothing\, receiving them \nwith a sincerely thankful heart and considering ourselves unworthy of them. \nWe should also thank God for everything that he has given to his Mother and to \nthe angels. \nWorks which give no human satisfaction may nevertheless be very \npleasing to God. What best pleases God in members of religious orders is purity \nof heart\, holy desires\, gentle kindness in conversation\, and works of charity. \nWhen you are alone\, raise your heart constantly to God\, speak with him and \ndirect all your desire to him with great intensity. You can never be in so large a \ncrowd that you are not alone with him. \nWhen those who receive from the Lord the gift of a fine orchard\, they cannot \ntaste the fruit until it is ripe. Likewise\, when one receives a special grace\, any \ninterior joy is not experienced until by the practice of mortification one has broken \nthe hard rind of earthly pleasure.
URL:https://laycisterciansofgethsemani.org/event/vigils-reading-st-mechtild-2/
CATEGORIES:Vigils Readings
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;VALUE=DATE:20261120
DTEND;VALUE=DATE:20261121
DTSTAMP:20261115T130654Z
CREATED:20261115T130654Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20261115T130654Z
UID:15908-1795132800-1795219199@laycisterciansofgethsemani.org
SUMMARY:Vigils Reading
DESCRIPTION:A reading from “New Horizons” by \nFR BARNABAS AHERN \n◊◊◊ \nSo often when St. Paul writes of the death of Christ\, two expressions keep \nrecurring: “He loved me\,” and “He gave Himself for me.” He loved me\, and \ntherefore He went down to death in order that love\, because it was love\, could \nbecome dynamically active when He would rise from the dead as the glorious \nmessianic Son of God. In this He has proven His love for us\, because when as yet \nwe were sinners and unworthy of His love\, He laid down His life for us. He died \nso that He could become the risen Savior and pour out upon the Church the \nfullness of the Spirit. \nIt is the light of this mystery of our Lord’s death and resurrection\, of His \nsuffering and of His life\, of the love which led Him to die and to suffer\, and the \nlove which leads Him to give everything to us today as the risen Savior; it is in \nthis that we ourselves begin to understand the mystery of our own Christian \nlife… \nThe Spirit who guided our Lord\, the Spirit who illumined Him\, the Spirit \nwho charged His soul with love\, is the same Spirit who reproduces that same \nlove in our own life through the mystery of our Christian incorporation. This is \nwhy for Paul the whole meaning of the Christian life is love. For Paul there is no \nlaw. All law has been abrogated—not merely the ceremonial\, ritual law of \nJudaism\, but all law… \nEven though we are living in the spirit\, at the same time we are also living \nin the flesh. We bear about with us a certain mortality\, a pull of gravity\, as it \nwere\, turning us in on ourselves\, turning us away from God. \nThe liturgy speaks of the weight of our poor humanness that is always \ntwisting us\, as it were\, to selfishness and away from God. Now\, our Lord knew \nthe same weight\, that same pull of humanness. He was “tempted” to give people \nwhat they wanted\, to meet their need for excitement and pleasure. This easy way \nof meeting needs was opposed by the hard way which the Father required. And \nJesus kept clinging to the Father\, which meant a constant cross in His life: the \nvertical pull to the will of the Father\, the horizontal pull to the desires of His \npeople. \nWe are in a similar situation. We know the will of God\, the vertical pull in \nlife\, and at the same time we feel the horizontal pull of our mortality\, our “flesh\,” \nthe needs of our human nature. The agape is always trying to lift us up in \nfidelity\, but it is always being dragged down by the pull of our poor humanness. \nIn such lives the Cross is inevitable. The agape is not only responsible for \nintroducing the Cross\, it also gives it meaning \nThis is the secret of our Lord’s life\, as Paul saw it; and it is the secret of the \nChristian life as we must live it. Mortification and self-denial\, all those negative \nfactors of life are without meaning if they are not prompted by agape. Our Lord \ncould become all things to all men\, He could forget Himself completely because \nthere was this driving urge to love. And those who have followed Him have been \ngiven this same spirit.
URL:https://laycisterciansofgethsemani.org/event/vigils-reading-487/
CATEGORIES:Vigils Readings
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BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;VALUE=DATE:20261121
DTEND;VALUE=DATE:20261122
DTSTAMP:20261115T130804Z
CREATED:20261115T130804Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20261115T130804Z
UID:15910-1795219200-1795305599@laycisterciansofgethsemani.org
SUMMARY:Vigils Reading - Presentation of the BVM
DESCRIPTION:A reading from \nST CYRIL OF ALEXANDRIA \n◊◊◊ \nI see here a joyful company of Christians met together in ready response \nto the call of Mary\, the holy and ever virgin Mother of God. Now the joyful \nsaying of David the psalmist: How good and pleasant it is for brothers to live \ntogether in unity has come true for us. \nTherefore\, holy and incomprehensible Trinity\, we salute you at whose \nsummons we have come together to this church of Mary\, the Mother of God. \nMary\, Mother of God\, we salute you. Precious vessel\, worthy of the whole \nworld’s reverence\, you are an ever-shining light\, the crown of virginity\, the \nsymbol of orthodoxy\, an indestructible temple\, the place that held him whom no \nplace can contain\, mother and virgin. Because of you\, the holy Gospels could \nsay: Blessed os he who comes in the name of the Lord. \nWe salute you\, for in your holy womb he\, who is beyond all limitation\, was \nconfined. Because of you\, the holy Trinity is glorified and adored; the cross is \ncalled precious and is venerated throughout the world; the heavens exult; the \nangels and archangels make merry; demons are put to flight; the devil\, that \ntempter\, is thrust down from heaven; the fallen race of humans is taken up on \nheight; all creatures possessed by the madness of idolatry have attained \nknowledge of the truth believers receive holy baptism; the oil of gladness is \npoured out\, the Church is established throughout the world; pagans are brought \nto repentance. \nWhat more is there to say? Because of you\, the light of the only-begotten \nSon of God has shone upon those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of \ndeath; prophets pronounced the word of God; the apostles preached salvation \nto the Gentiles\, the dead are raised to life\, and kings rule by the power of the holy \nTrinity. \nWho can put Mary’s high honor into words? She is both mother and \nvirgin. I am overwhelmed by the wonder of this miracle. Of course no one could \nbe prevented from living in the house he had built for himself\, yet who would \ninvite mockery by asking his own servant to become his mother? \nBehold then the joy of the whole universe. Let the union of God and man \nin the Son of the Virgin Mary fill us with awe and adoration. Let us fear and \nworship the undivided Trinity as we sing the praise of the ever-virgin Mary\, the \nholy temple of God himself\, her Son and spotless Bridegroom. To him be glory \nfor ever and ever. Amen.
URL:https://laycisterciansofgethsemani.org/event/vigils-reading-presentation-of-the-bvm-3/
CATEGORIES:Vigils Readings
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