Gal 5:18-23; Ps 1 Those hwo follow you lord will have th elight of life; Lk 11:42-46
A snippet from Pope Benedict's homily at the Canonization of John Cardnial Newman, now Blessed JOhn Newman.
"Christian life is a call to holiness, experienced as the profound desire of the human heart to enter into intimate communion with the Heart of God. Faithfulness to prayer gradually transforms us into the divine likeness. Quoting John Newman he states, "a habit of prayer, the practice of turning to god and the unseen world in every season, in every place, in every emergencey, prayer has a natural effect in spiritualizin and elevating the soul. A man is no longer what he was before; gradually he has imbibed a new set of ideas, and become imbued with fresh principles."
We hear the words of Jesus directed toward the Pharisee in the gospel, "you pay no attention to judgment and to love for God." And to the scholar he proclaims, "You impose on people burdens hard to carry, but you do not lift one finger to touch them."
Why are the pharisee and the scholar called out by Jesus? Why does he insist on their conversion more than others? They have the knowledge. Their mind is intuned with the law and history and revelation. It is their heart that is in need of transformation.
Knowledge alone doesn't save. It is love that opens the door and floods the path with light.
The Pharisees and scholars studied with great diligence but they did not pray. They did not give their heart opportuntiy to digest what their mind had unearthed. Only in a life of prayer, in a a a habit of silently listening, does our heart begin to recieve fully what the mind has discovered and does our mind begin to become more docile to the nudging of love that transforms and informs the knowledge we have.
Prayer elevates and spiritualizes the soul so that it can respond appropriately to the world in love, by love, for love.
For is not prayer simply turing our mind and heart to love for God, which carries with it judgment that frees.
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