Category: Words of Wisdom

Before Christ Crucified

Even though your sufferings were very great, do not lose heart or give in to despondency. But tell Me, my child, who has dared to wound your heart? – Divine Mercy in My Soul

Many times, our hearts are so heavy that we can’t even pray for what we need. We just feel overwhelmed. We want rest but we can’t find it. We know we have many questions at the back of our minds, but we can’t even start naming what these questions are.

Whenever we feel like this, may we find comfort before the crucified Christ. Sometimes, we need no words in order to pray. But we need to seek His Face and to lay down before Him our many burdens and tears.

At The Foot of the Cross

At the foot of the cross
that’s where I want to be
To gaze upon my God
with boundless love for me

To kiss His feet pierced with nails
to worship and adore
Him who was pierced by a lance
Him who was crowned with thorns

I cannot ever understand
all the reasons why
Why He must be crucified like this
why He must suffer and die

But there at the foot of the cross
I feel His great mercy for me
Blood and water flowed from His heart
out of His great love for me

How else can I even understand
how infinite and great is His love
if not by the cross, yes, by the cross
where all is gained when all was lost

I thank you Lord for bringing me
where alone my soul can stay
It is there alone where I can find healing
it is there alone where I can be saved!

“For me prayer is a surge of the heart, it is a simple look towards Heaven, it is a cry of recognition and of love, embracing both trial and joy.” -St. Therese of Lisieux

But he was pierced for our transgressions. He was crushed for our iniquities. The punishment that brought our peace was on him; and by his wounds we are healed. – Isaiah 53, WEB

Words of Wisdom

A Merciful Heart

Help me, O Lord , that my eyes may be merciful, so that I may never suspect or judge from appearances, but look for what is beautiful in my neighbors’ souls… – Divine Mercy In My Soul, 163

A merciful heart is a heart that has experienced much suffering. It is able to bless because it is able to feel the pain of those who are also hurt.

It is those who have known hunger who yearn to give bread to the poor. It is those who have known sickness that yearn to comfort those in beds of affliction. It is those who have known how to be misjudged who yearn to avoid words that can break another person’s heart.

Who else can guide the desperate except those who felt hopeless? Who else can understand the grieving except those who have lost those whom they loved the most?

Mercy is never looking down upon the plight of another. Rather, it is being able to see oneself in another person’s eyes. The requirement for a merciful heart is not self-righteousness but suffering. The reward is not the right to boast, but the opportunity to heal one’s own bleeding heart.

Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy. – Matthew 5, WEBBE

Words of Wisdom

The Regrets We Have

Looking back, I have this to regret, that too often when I loved, I did not say so. – Ray Stannard Baker

I guess that no matter how happy or successful we claim to be, no person is really without regret. There are choices we wish we haven’t made, words we feel we shouldn’t have uttered, people we shouldn’t have hurt, days or even years we never should have wasted.

It makes no sense to deny we’d rather have lived better, loved more, laughed more often. To do so would sound as though we haven’t grown or learned much with the life given us.

Yet what do we do with the pain within us? Or with the many questions at the back of our minds?

We bring them to our compassionate God who alone can make sense of everything, who alone can redeem every failure and every regret. We come to His most merciful heart and lay down our burdens. It is there where we can find healing and rest at last.

Purify me with hyssop, and I will be clean.
Wash me, and I will be whiter than snow.
Let me hear joy and gladness,
that the bones which you have broken may rejoice.
Hide your face from my sins,
and blot out all of my iniquities.
-Psalm 51, WEB

Words of Wisdom

Rejoice!

Somebody should tell us, right at the start of our lives, that we are dying. Then we might live life to the limit, every minute of every day. Do it! I say. Whatever you want to do, do it now! There are only so many tomorrows. – Pope Paul VI

“Go your way. Eat the fat, drink the sweet, and send portions to him for whom nothing is prepared; for this day is holy to our Lord. Don’t be grieved; for the joy of Yahweh is your strength.” – Nehemiah 8

There are difficult days and days of sorrow, days we must mourn, days we must fast and grieve. Yet there are also days of healing, of moving on, of trying to live again, of trying to smile again.

Sometimes we take our sorrows to heart for far too long. We punish ourselves. We let our guilt get the best of us and we think that the only thing to make it right again is to live a life of sorrow and being cast down.

Yet is this the way of love? Is love not also joy and of being whole again? Is love not also enjoying life and having a feast that will gladden not only the body but the soul?

What is keeping you from being happy again?

Man in his weakness and short-sightedness believes he must make choices in this life. He trembles at the risks he takes. We do know fear. But no, our choice is of no importance. There comes a time when your eyes are opened and we come to realize that mercy is infinite. We need only await it with confidence and receive it with gratitude. Mercy imposes no conditions. And lo! Everything we have chosen has been granted to us and everything we have rejected has also been granted. Yes, we get back even what we have rejected. For mercy and truth have met together and righteousness and bliss shall kiss one another. – Babette’s Feast Film

Words of Wisdom

What Is Trust?

The faith of those who live their faith is a serene faith. What you long for will be given you; what you love will be yours for ever. -St. Leo the Great

What is trust? To trust is to believe that there is something else beyond what you can see. It is to have the heart to hope in something farther, something deeper, something that is currently veiled from plain sight.

To trust is to place one’s faith in things that will happen in time. It is to have peace amidst the chaos currently surrounding you. It is to be able to hold on through the night, looking forward towards the sunrise no matter how great the darkness, no matter how strong the storm.

To trust is to never let go of miracles, such as how an acorn can grow into a towering oak, or how a caterpillar can turn into a beautiful butterfly. It is the way that things can still turn out well despite and in spite all the bad things that have already taken place.

Now faith is assurance of things hoped for, proof of things not seen. – Hebrews 11, WEB