week 42: Frank Laubach

Christ Jesus, we thank You that at last the nations begin to see that every unfortunate one is a neighbor. We see it, Lord; help us to do it. Save us from self-firstness–and begin in me. We pray in Your name. Amen.

week 41: Evelyn Underhill

Prayer is our soul's response to God's immense attraction, and this response begins in the activity of the will.  Will and desire are the heart of the mental life turned to God.  This is not mere pious reverie.  As Saint Teresa says, at the beginning of our prayer life, we have to draw the living water out of the well.  It is hard work.  We can't leave it to chance.  God requires our communion with Him to be an act, an effort, and to cost something.  Think of the trouble we give ourselves to get time to be with those whom we love.  Is it not ever so much more important to make a way to commune with God?

week 40: Therese of Lisieux

My life is an instant
an hour which passes by;
My life is a moment
which I have no power to stay.
You know, O my God,
That to love you here on earth,
I have only today.

week 39: Gerard Manley Hopkins

GLORY be to God for dappled things—
For skies of couple-colour as a brinded cow;
For rose-moles all in stipple upon trout that swim;
Fresh-firecoal chestnut-falls; finches’ wings;
Landscape plotted and pieced—fold, fallow, and plough;
And áll trádes, their gear and tackle and trim.
All things counter, original, spare, strange;
Whatever is fickle, freckled (who knows how?)
With swift, slow; sweet, sour; adazzle, dim;
He fathers-forth whose beauty is past change:
Praise him.