\u00a0Companions on the Journey<\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\nLent Week 5<\/span><\/h1>\nMonday March 15, 2021<\/h2>\n
\u201cIt is Jesus you seek when you dream of happiness; he is waiting for you when nothing else you find satisfies you; he is the beauty to which you are so attracted; it is he who provokes you with that thirst for fullness that will not let you settle for compromise; it is he who urges you to shed the masks of a false life; it is he who reads in your hearts your most genuine choices, the choices that others try to stifle.
\n\u201cIt is Jesus who stirs in you the desire to do something great with your lives, the will to follow an ideal, the refusal to allow yourselves to be grounded down by mediocrity, the courage to commit yourselves humbly and patiently to improving yourselves and society, making the world more human and more fraternal.\u201d
\nSt. John Paul II<\/strong> Address at World Youth Day, Rome, (August 19th, 2000)<\/p>\n![\"Christ](\"https:\/\/cdn11.bigcommerce.com\/s-20ff4\/images\/stencil\/1280x1280\/products\/87\/4437\/Christ_at_the_Door_Posters__14663.1433150307.jpg?c=2\")
<\/p>\n
Tuesday March 16, 2021<\/h2>\n
My fear is the domesticated Christ, which my generation got after the Council, and which the modern world is happy with. You know, Christ who is defanged, who is a bland spiritual teacher\u2026 a teacher of \u201ctimeless truths.\u201d That [last part] is fine and true, but it\u2019s domesticated. The Gospels rather present this ferocious figure, meaning \u201cThe New Lord.\u201d He\u2019s Jesus Kyrios, \u201cJesus the Lord,\u201d which means that He has supplanted all the other Lords. His cross and resurrection is something that demands a complete conversion on our part. If He\u2019s the King, then my entire life has to change. I wanted to recover that edgy, challenging, and deeply Biblical Jesus.
\nFather Robert Barron<\/strong> In Pursuit of the Imago Dei: An Interview With Fr. Barron by Mark Nowakowski (December 2, 2014) OnePeterFive<\/strong><\/p>\n![\"Jesus'](\"https:\/\/austingrad.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/11\/Hoffman-ChristAndTheRichYoungRuler.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
Wednesday March 17, 2021<\/h2>\n
Jesus was a little baby once. Before Christmas, He was a fetus in Mary\u2019s womb\u2013literally abiding in her flesh, having taken his DNA structure from her, and until his birth, taking in nourishment from her blood, his tiny heart beating beneath her Immaculate heart. Those were His real lungs sucking in air for the first time in that manger on the day He was born.
\nJesus has a body right now, just like you do. If you were in heaven with Him, you could pinch Him or even tickle Him. You could touch your finger to the perspiration on His brow.<\/p>\n
Or, if you wish, you can eat his flesh at any Catholic Mass (Jesus used the Aramaic word for \u201cchew\u201d in John 6). Do you see it yet? The beauty of it. The mystery of it? Because you are body and soul, and because Jesus had a body, you can take Him into your body. You can consume Jesus! This is real. This is intimate. This is your flesh and His flesh. This is union.
\n\u2013Bud Macfarlane<\/strong> Understand the \u201cAnd\u201d CatholiCity<\/p>\n![\"Waifu](\"https:\/\/i.redd.it\/i87sqjeqj2901.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
Thursday March 18, 2021<\/h2>\n
People hug really hard as though they would pull the entirety of the other person into them, fuse together, form an unbreakable union; so intense that they would practically be the same person, almost indistinguishable.<\/p>\n
The Blessed Sacrament is, in the last consideration, the supreme act of love, but in order for us to be physically united to Him, He had to become physical, material, touchable, consumable, unitable to our bodies, our flesh.
\nDivinity could not be transported through our veins, pumped through our cardiovascular system, pushed along by our beating hearts, unless the God who created those hearts for Himself would first unite Himself to our flesh.
\nIn so doing, He fashioned, willingly captured His divinity in human DNA and then, becoming our food, passed His divine DNA onto those He loves most in the world.
\nWhen you go up to receive Holy Communion the Lord and King of the Universe is giving you a hug, and He means to never let go.
\n\u2013 Michael Vorris<\/strong> THE VORTEX: A CHRISTMAS HUG \u2013 From the Son of God \u202612\/25\/18 Church Militant<\/p>\n![\"Jesus](\"https:\/\/live.staticflickr.com\/7003\/6607093871_9615909430.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/span>Friday March 19, 2021<\/h2>\nChristianity\u2019s great truths come to us through a Nazarene carpenter\u2014a tekton, a builder\u2014whose handiwork we have no clue to. Neither do we have the faintest inkling of his response to Herod\u2019s monumental temple complex. The whole of it, with its plaza, porticos, columns, and stairs was a glory of limestone, marble and gold. Yet Jesus directed eyes to the lilies of the field, the birds of the air, to bread, weeds and mustard seeds.
\nThe greatest cathedral of all, the only one capable of rising to the Paraclete, is the suffering human being next to us. Until we can worship on the crosstown bus, we have yet to greet the living God.
\nMaureen Mullarkey<\/strong>, Cathedrals And The Crosstown Bus (May 8, 2014)<\/p>\n![\"Was](\"https:\/\/askgramps.org\/files\/2015\/01\/Jesus-Christ-Carpenter.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
Saturday March 20, 2021<\/h2>\n
The greatest riches of the Church are not found in our gorgeous legacy of art and architecture, our brilliant philosophical and scientific heritage, or even our nearly 700,000 institutions that currently serve the dignity and eternal destiny of human beings on this planet. All of these treasures, wonderful and critical as they are, are fruit borne by human beings who freely responded to and cooperated with the grace of God in their time and place. Our greatest earthly treasures are the 1.272 billion immortals and potential fruit-bearers who currently bear the surname \u201cCatholic.\u201d
\n-Sherry A. Weddell, Fruitful Discipleship: Living the Mission of Jesus in the Church and the World (2017) Our Sunday Visitor<\/p>\n
![\"Jesus](\"https:\/\/cdn11.bigcommerce.com\/s-4c6eg5d3xf\/images\/stencil\/1280x1280\/products\/15450\/15132\/993823-jesus-hockey__20742.1590266975.jpg?c=1\")
<\/p>\n
Sunday March 21, 2021
\n<\/em>Fifth\u00a0 Sunday of Lent<\/span>
\n<\/em><\/h2>\nJn 12:20-33<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\nSome Greeks who had come to worship at the Passover Feast
\ncame to Philip, who was from Bethsaida in Galilee,
\nand asked him, \u201cSir, we would like to see Jesus.\u201d
\nPhilip went and told Andrew;
\nthen Andrew and Philip went and told Jesus.
\nJesus answered them,
\n\u201cThe hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified.
\nAmen, amen, I say to you,
\nunless a grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies,
\nit remains just a grain of wheat;
\nbut if it dies, it produces much fruit.
\nWhoever loves his life loses it,
\nand whoever hates his life in this world<\/p>\n
will preserve it for eternal life.
\nWhoever serves me must follow me,
\nand where I am, there also will my servant be.
\nThe Father will honor whoever serves me.<\/p>\n
\u201cI am troubled now. \u00a0Yet what should I say?
\n\u2018Father, save me from this hour\u2019?
\nBut it was for this purpose that I came to this hour.
\nFather, glorify your name.\u201d
\nThen a voice came from heaven,
\n\u201cI have glorified it and will glorify it again.\u201d
\nThe crowd there heard it and said it was thunder;
\nbut others said, \u201cAn angel has spoken to him.\u201d
\nJesus answered and said,
\n\u201cThis voice did not come for my sake but for yours.
\nNow is the time of judgment on this world;
\nnow the ruler of this world will be driven out.
\nAnd when I am lifted up from the earth,
\nI will draw everyone to myself.\u201d
\nHe said this indicating the kind of death he would die.<\/p>\n
Fifth Sunday of Lent | USCCB<\/a><\/p>\n\u00a0\u00a0![\"\"](\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/1316\/2021\/03\/Jesus-Hour-238x300.jpg\")
<\/b><\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/b>Check Out previous\u00a0 Weeks<\/p>\n
Companions on the Journey: Lenten Meditations Week 1<\/a><\/span><\/p>\nCompanions on the Journey: Lenten Meditations Week 2<\/span><\/a><\/p>\nCompanions on the Journey: Lenten Meditations Week 3<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n
Monday March 15, 2021<\/h2>\n
\u201cIt is Jesus you seek when you dream of happiness; he is waiting for you when nothing else you find satisfies you; he is the beauty to which you are so attracted; it is he who provokes you with that thirst for fullness that will not let you settle for compromise; it is he who urges you to shed the masks of a false life; it is he who reads in your hearts your most genuine choices, the choices that others try to stifle. My fear is the domesticated Christ, which my generation got after the Council, and which the modern world is happy with. You know, Christ who is defanged, who is a bland spiritual teacher\u2026 a teacher of \u201ctimeless truths.\u201d That [last part] is fine and true, but it\u2019s domesticated. The Gospels rather present this ferocious figure, meaning \u201cThe New Lord.\u201d He\u2019s Jesus Kyrios, \u201cJesus the Lord,\u201d which means that He has supplanted all the other Lords. His cross and resurrection is something that demands a complete conversion on our part. If He\u2019s the King, then my entire life has to change. I wanted to recover that edgy, challenging, and deeply Biblical Jesus. Jesus was a little baby once. Before Christmas, He was a fetus in Mary\u2019s womb\u2013literally abiding in her flesh, having taken his DNA structure from her, and until his birth, taking in nourishment from her blood, his tiny heart beating beneath her Immaculate heart. Those were His real lungs sucking in air for the first time in that manger on the day He was born. Or, if you wish, you can eat his flesh at any Catholic Mass (Jesus used the Aramaic word for \u201cchew\u201d in John 6). Do you see it yet? The beauty of it. The mystery of it? Because you are body and soul, and because Jesus had a body, you can take Him into your body. You can consume Jesus! This is real. This is intimate. This is your flesh and His flesh. This is union. People hug really hard as though they would pull the entirety of the other person into them, fuse together, form an unbreakable union; so intense that they would practically be the same person, almost indistinguishable.<\/p>\n The Blessed Sacrament is, in the last consideration, the supreme act of love, but in order for us to be physically united to Him, He had to become physical, material, touchable, consumable, unitable to our bodies, our flesh. Christianity\u2019s great truths come to us through a Nazarene carpenter\u2014a tekton, a builder\u2014whose handiwork we have no clue to. Neither do we have the faintest inkling of his response to Herod\u2019s monumental temple complex. The whole of it, with its plaza, porticos, columns, and stairs was a glory of limestone, marble and gold. Yet Jesus directed eyes to the lilies of the field, the birds of the air, to bread, weeds and mustard seeds. The greatest riches of the Church are not found in our gorgeous legacy of art and architecture, our brilliant philosophical and scientific heritage, or even our nearly 700,000 institutions that currently serve the dignity and eternal destiny of human beings on this planet. All of these treasures, wonderful and critical as they are, are fruit borne by human beings who freely responded to and cooperated with the grace of God in their time and place. Our greatest earthly treasures are the 1.272 billion immortals and potential fruit-bearers who currently bear the surname \u201cCatholic.\u201d Jn 12:20-33<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n Some Greeks who had come to worship at the Passover Feast will preserve it for eternal life. \u201cI am troubled now. \u00a0Yet what should I say? Fifth Sunday of Lent | USCCB<\/a><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0<\/b>Check Out previous\u00a0 Weeks<\/p>\n Companions on the Journey: Lenten Meditations Week 1<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n Companions on the Journey: Lenten Meditations Week 2<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n Companions on the Journey: Lenten Meditations Week 3<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n
\n\u201cIt is Jesus who stirs in you the desire to do something great with your lives, the will to follow an ideal, the refusal to allow yourselves to be grounded down by mediocrity, the courage to commit yourselves humbly and patiently to improving yourselves and society, making the world more human and more fraternal.\u201d
\nSt. John Paul II<\/strong> Address at World Youth Day, Rome, (August 19th, 2000)<\/p>\n<\/p>\nTuesday March 16, 2021<\/h2>\n
\nFather Robert Barron<\/strong> In Pursuit of the Imago Dei: An Interview With Fr. Barron by Mark Nowakowski (December 2, 2014) OnePeterFive<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/p>\nWednesday March 17, 2021<\/h2>\n
\nJesus has a body right now, just like you do. If you were in heaven with Him, you could pinch Him or even tickle Him. You could touch your finger to the perspiration on His brow.<\/p>\n
\n\u2013Bud Macfarlane<\/strong> Understand the \u201cAnd\u201d CatholiCity<\/p>\n<\/p>\nThursday March 18, 2021<\/h2>\n
\nDivinity could not be transported through our veins, pumped through our cardiovascular system, pushed along by our beating hearts, unless the God who created those hearts for Himself would first unite Himself to our flesh.
\nIn so doing, He fashioned, willingly captured His divinity in human DNA and then, becoming our food, passed His divine DNA onto those He loves most in the world.
\nWhen you go up to receive Holy Communion the Lord and King of the Universe is giving you a hug, and He means to never let go.
\n\u2013 Michael Vorris<\/strong> THE VORTEX: A CHRISTMAS HUG \u2013 From the Son of God \u202612\/25\/18 Church Militant<\/p>\n<\/p>\n\u00a0<\/span>Friday March 19, 2021<\/h2>\n
\nThe greatest cathedral of all, the only one capable of rising to the Paraclete, is the suffering human being next to us. Until we can worship on the crosstown bus, we have yet to greet the living God.
\nMaureen Mullarkey<\/strong>, Cathedrals And The Crosstown Bus (May 8, 2014)<\/p>\n<\/p>\nSaturday March 20, 2021<\/h2>\n
\n-Sherry A. Weddell, Fruitful Discipleship: Living the Mission of Jesus in the Church and the World (2017) Our Sunday Visitor<\/p>\n<\/p>\nSunday March 21, 2021
\n<\/em>Fifth\u00a0 Sunday of Lent<\/span>
\n<\/em><\/h2>\n
\ncame to Philip, who was from Bethsaida in Galilee,
\nand asked him, \u201cSir, we would like to see Jesus.\u201d
\nPhilip went and told Andrew;
\nthen Andrew and Philip went and told Jesus.
\nJesus answered them,
\n\u201cThe hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified.
\nAmen, amen, I say to you,
\nunless a grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies,
\nit remains just a grain of wheat;
\nbut if it dies, it produces much fruit.
\nWhoever loves his life loses it,
\nand whoever hates his life in this world<\/p>\n
\nWhoever serves me must follow me,
\nand where I am, there also will my servant be.
\nThe Father will honor whoever serves me.<\/p>\n
\n\u2018Father, save me from this hour\u2019?
\nBut it was for this purpose that I came to this hour.
\nFather, glorify your name.\u201d
\nThen a voice came from heaven,
\n\u201cI have glorified it and will glorify it again.\u201d
\nThe crowd there heard it and said it was thunder;
\nbut others said, \u201cAn angel has spoken to him.\u201d
\nJesus answered and said,
\n\u201cThis voice did not come for my sake but for yours.
\nNow is the time of judgment on this world;
\nnow the ruler of this world will be driven out.
\nAnd when I am lifted up from the earth,
\nI will draw everyone to myself.\u201d
\nHe said this indicating the kind of death he would die.<\/p>\n<\/b><\/p>\n