Prayer of St Teresa of Calcutta

Saint Teresa of Calcutta (Mother Teresa, 1910-1997) whose liturgical feast we celebrate today, said this prayer each day. The prayer was written by Saint John Henry Cardinal Newman (1801-1890), and Mother Teresa changed the original singular to plural and said it with her Missionaries of Charity sisters. Then she added the second part of this prayer:

Dear Jesus, help us to spread your fragrance everywhere we go. Flood our souls with your spirit and life. Penetrate and possess our whole being so utterly that our lives may only be a radiance of yours.
Shine through us and be so in us that every soul we come in contact with may feel your presence in our soul. Let them look up and see no longer us, but only Jesus.
Stay with us and then we shall begin to shine as you shine, so to shine as to be light to others.
The light, O Jesus, will be all from you. None of it will be ours.
It will be you shining on others through us. Let us thus praise you in the way you love best
by shining on those around us.
Let us preach you without preaching, not by words, but by our example; by the catching force – the sympathetic influence of what we do, the evident fullness of the love our hearts bear to you. Amen.

Anjezë Gonxhe Bojaxhiu before she became a nun

Jesus is the Word – to be spoken.

Jesus is the Truth – to be told.

Jesus is the Way – to be walked.

Jesus is the Light – to be lit.

Jesus is the Life – to be lived.

Jesus is the Love – to be loved.

Jesus is the Joy – to be shared.

Jesus is the Sacrifice – to be offered.

Jesus is the Peace – to be given.

Jesus is the Bread of Life – to be eaten.

Jesus is the Hungry – to be fed.

Jesus is the Thirsty – to be satiated.

Jesus is the Naked – to be clothed.

Jesus is the Homeless – to be taken in.

Jesus is the Sick – to be healed.

Jesus is the Lonely – to be loved.

Jesus is the Unwanted – to be wanted.

Jesus is the Leper – to wash his wounds.

Jesus is the Beggar – to give him a smile.

Jesus is the Drunkard – to listen to him.

Jesus is the Retarded – to protect him.

Jesus is the Little One – to embrace him.

Jesus is the Blind – to lead him.

Jesus is the Dumb – to speak for him.

Jesus is the Crippled – to walk with him.

Jesus is the Drug addict – to befriend him.

Jesus is the Prostitute – to remove from danger and befriend.

Jesus is the Prisoner – to be visited.

A few more quotes to ponder

               

Expecting and accepting are two sides of life....where expecting ends in tears, while accepting makes you cheer. So learn to accept life the way it comes.

Take care....the Lord will strengthen you each step along the way. Take time....and let God’s spirit guide you gently day by day. Take courage.....the Lord has the power to help you heal and grow. Take heart.....because the love of God will never let you go.

Don’t be afraid of losing people. Be afraid of losing yourself by trying to please everyone around you.

We can’t become what we need to be by remaining what we are.

Listen to everyone. Learn from everyone. Because nobody knows everything, but everyone knows something.

Most of the problems in life come because of two reasons: we act without thinking and we keep thinking without acting.

Health does not come from medicine. Most of the time it comes from peace of mind, peace of soul, laughter and love.

When the mind is weak, every situation is a problem. When the mind is balanced, every situation is a challenge. When the mind is strong, every situation is an opportunity.

Always pray to have eyes that see the best, a heart that forgives the worst, a mind that forgets the bad, and a soul that never loses faith.

We come with nothing, and we go with nothing. But one great thing we can achieve in our beautiful life is.....a little remembrance in someone’s mind, and a small place in someone’s heart.

We were created to make somebody else’s life better. Someone out there needs what you have....your smile, your words, your encouragement. Share your gifts today.

St Gregory the Great

The Monks of St Peter's Abbey, Solesmes, France

St. Gregory, born at Rome about the year 540, was the son of Gordianus, a wealthy senator, who later renounced the world and became one of the seven deacons of Rome. His mother was St Silvia. After Gregory had acquired the usual thorough education, Emperor Justin the Younger appointed him, in 574, Chief Magistrate of Rome, though he was only thirty-four years of age. After the death of his father, he built six monasteries in Sicily and founded a seventh in his own house in Rome, which became the Benedictine Monastery of St. Andrew. Here, he himself assumed the monastic habit in 575, at the age of thirty-five. After the death of Pelagius, St. Gregory was chosen Pope by the unanimous consent of priests and people. Now began those labors which merited for him the title of Great. His zeal extended over the entire known world, he was in contact with all the Churches of Christendom and, in spite of his bodily sufferings, and innumerable labors, he found time to compose a great number of works. He is known above all for his magnificent contributions to the Liturgy of the Mass and Office. Some of the changes he implemented are still used today.  The mainstream form of Western plainchant, standardized in the late 9th century, was attributed to Pope Gregory I and so took the name of Gregorian chant. Gregory wrote over 850 letters in the last 13 years of his life (590–604) that give us an accurate picture of his work. He is one of the four great Doctors of the Latin Church. He died on March 12, 604. St Gregory is the patron saint of musicians, singers, students, and teachers.

In the video above one can hear the famous monks of the Abbey of St. Peter in Solesmes (pronounced Solemm) in France, chanting the best ever quality of Gregorian Chant. Wait till the first minute until the bell stops.

My cars

Someone asked me through this blog what kind of car I had to travel the hundreds of miles to my mission churches week after week. Actually when I had moved from Long Island to Pleasant Valley in upstate New York in 1998, I had a Geo-Metro and someone saw me in it and told to better get a stronger, bigger car, because it snowed much more in Duchess County. And to humiliate me even more he said to me, ’Sorry to tell you this Father, but my lawn-mower is stronger than your car, because it’s a 4-cylinder engine, and your Geo is a 3-cylinder car.’ I was sure he was right and within a few days I was at the Honda dealer and he encouraged me to get a Honda CR-V. That stands for Comfortable Run-around Vehicle. And I drove over 100,000 miles in it until I traded it in for a Chevy Equinox in 2011, which I used until I returned to Malta in 2016. My very first car was a Toyota Tercel, which I bought in 1982 after I got my driver's license. The above photo shows me when I arrived in Oregon with the license plates of New York and Oregon, ready to be switched. That was in March 2003, and my Honda was a strong reliable car and gave me a lot of fun driving it for long distances, listening to my cassettes while enjoying spectacular scenery.

Using your mind

A wealthy woman, the wife of a renowned scientist bought a top-of-the-line food mixer, and was trying to put it together when she got home. She looked at the instruction book, and try as you might, she was not able to figure out how to assemble it properly. She got so frustrated after trying for an hour, that she left every piece of the mixer on the kitchen table and went out for a walk. Half an hour later she returned home and found the food mixer all set up and plugged in and ready to go.  She was amazed and she realized that her servant Jemima had put it all together. Knowing that Jemima was unschooled and didn’t even know how to read, she asked her politely how was she able to put the food mixer together. And the humble servant answered simply by saying ‘Well, my Lady, because when you don’t know how to read, you have to use your mind!’ Sometimes it’s not how much you know that works the best, but how practical you can be with what you know and how to use your hands, your speech and your mind.