Day 341: The Theological Virtues (2656-2662)

• It’s Day 341!!

• Let’s listen to Fr. Mike recap yesterday and if you want to refresh your memory, feel free to check yesterday’s notes (feel free to do that everyday at the beginning of each episode because I don’t write down his recaps of the previous days)…

• THE THEOLOGICAL VIRTUES

• FAITH

• HOPE

• LOVE

• “TODAY”

• We have only been given today and God is found only in this moment, in this place where you and I are

• Today is the day that God has given us, so let us rejoice and be glad in it

• Let’s pray!!

Prayer by Fr. Mike: “Father in Heaven, we give you praise and glory. Thank you so much for bringing us to this day. Thank you so much for nourishing us with your Word and inviting us to worship you in the Liturgy. We ask that you please, through the Power of your Holy Spirit, help us to have hearts that pray, hep us to have a heart that is an altar that every moment of every day, every breath, every heartbeat, every thought, everything we do, and everything we think and everything we think and everything we say can be offered to your name as an act of worship to glorify, to bless you. We ask, Lord God, that you fill our hearts with the virtues of faith and hope and love, by the Power of your Holy Spirit. Help us to be true witnesses in this world, but help us first of all, to be true sons and true daughters of you, God our Father. We make this prayer in the mighty name of Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen”

• So there we have it!!

• THE THEOLOGICAL VIRTUES

• Remember when we talked about the cardinal virtues

• JUSTICE

• PRUDENCE

• TEMPERANCE

• FORTITUDE

• Today we talked about FAITH, HOPE, and LOVE

• Have you ever considered the theological virtues as the wellsprings of living water that enable us to pray?

• Paragraph 2656 says, “One enters into prayer as one enters into liturgy: by the narrow gate of faith. Through the signs of his presence, it is the Face of the Lord that we seek and desire; it is his Word that we want to hear and keep.”

• God’s graces are truly active and present since He is doing something

• BUT…

• If we don’t have faith, we don’t have that trust and surrender to the Lord, then it is like getting into the shower with a raincoat on

• The graces are there

• The living water is there

• It won’t do much to us

• Sometimes people wonder if they have enough faith and they get concerned

• If you are showing up because you WANT God to act…

• If you are showing up because you are TRUSTING that God wants you to be there…

• Then that is an act of faith

• That is an act of surrender

• That is an act of obedience

• That is an act of trust

• “Lord, I believe. I trust. I obey your command to be here.”

• That is acting in faith

• Paragraph 2657 says, “The Holy Spirit, who instructs us to celebrate the liturgy in expectation of Christ’s return, teaches us to pray in hope. Conversely, the prayer of the Church and personal prayer nourish hope in us. The psalms especially, with their concrete and varied language, teach us to fix our hope in God: ‘I waited patiently for the Lord; he inclined to me and heard my cry.’ As St. Paul prayed: ‘May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope.’”

• We not only know that God is present

• We also know that there is a future that God desires for us

• There is a future that God desires for the whole world

• Paragraph 2658 says, “‘Hope does not disappoint us, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts by the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.’ Prayer, formed by the liturgical life, draws everything into the love by which we are loved in Christ and which enables us to respond to him by loving as he has loved us. Love is the source of prayer; whoever draws from it reaches the summit of prayer. In the words of the Curé of Ars: I love you, O my God, and my only desire is to love you until the last breath of my life. I love you, O my infinitely lovable God, and I would rather die loving you, than live without loving you. I love you, Lord, and the only grace I ask is to love you eternally…My God, if my tongue cannot say in every moment that I love you, I want my heart to repeat it to you as often as I draw breath.”

• When we pray, it draws everything into the love by which we are loved in Jesus

• ESPECIALLY IF YOU DO NOT FEEL IT!!

• When you don’t feel anything, you don’t feel loved, you wonder if you even want to be here, know that every time we pray with faith, we are praying in love because it draws everything into the love by which He has loved us

• We fail to love God the way that we should

• We fail to love God in the way that He deserves

• We fail to love God in the way we were made to love God

• This reminds us to not put our hope and our trust in our love

• We are not hoping in OUR love

• We are not trusting in OUR love

• We are hoping and trusting in HIS LOVE

• We have faith in HIS LOVE

• This is the love by which we are loved in Jesus

• This love enables us to love Him as He has loved us

• BUT…

• That is just a response

• We are not trusting in our own love for God because we don’t love Him the way we should

• We don’t love God the way He deserves

• We don’t hope in God the way He deserves

• We don’t trust in God the way He deserves

• BUT…

• We are loved by Him and that love ENABLES us to love in return

• That love ENABLES us to have hope

• That love ENABLES us to walk in faith

• After this episode is done, go back to the prayer of St. John Vianney, the Curé of Ars, and allow those words and sentiment to enter into your heart

• “TODAY”

• Paragraph 2659 says, “We learn to pray at certain moments by hearing the Word of the Lord and sharing in his Paschal mystery, but his Spirit is offered us at all times, in the events of each day, to make prayer spring up in the same vein as his teaching about providence: time is in the Father’s hands; it is in the present that we encounter him, not yesterday or tomorrow, but today: ‘O that today you would hearken to his voice! Harden not your hearts.’”

• What do we often do?

• We often look to the past with longing or regret

• OR…

• We look to the future with expectation or a sense of doom 

• BUT…

• We do not live in the past

• We can’t live in the future

• The ONLY MOMENT we have to choose to love, to hope, and to have faith is RIGHT NOW

• The ONLY MOMENT we can hear the Lord’s voice is RIGHT NOW

• The ONLY PLACE we can pray is RIGHT HERE

• In this moment, HERE AND NOW, we are called to live in the HERE AND NOW

• We are called to pray in the HERE AND NOW

• AND YET…

• So many of us spend our time in THERE AND THEN

• Here we are

• Now we are

• This is today

• This is a wellspring of prayer and grace in this moment

• If we can learn to find God in THIS moment, we can find God in EVERY moment

• BUT…

• If we can’t learn to find God in THIS moment, we will NEVER be able to find God in ANY moment

• “I love you, O my God, and my only desire is to love you until the last breath of my life. I love you, O my infinitely lovable God, and I would rather die loving you, than live without loving you. I love you, Lord, and the only grace I ask is to love you eternally…My God, if my tongue cannot say in every moment that I love you, I want my heart to repeat it to you as often as I draw breath.”

• That is our prayer

• Fr. Mike is praying FOR YOU!!

• Please pray for Fr. Mike and for each other!!

• I cannot WAIT…