JESUS, he cannot pass by the village where his friends live without coming to visit them. The spontaneity with which the evangelist Luke describes this scene emphasizes the deep trust that existed between the Lord and the three siblings from Bethany: Martha, Mary, and Lazarus. He didn’t have to announce his arrival; he didn’t even need to bring a gift. He knew that he was always welcome and that his friends enjoyed his presence and the opportunity to show him their love. The Gospel states that Martha welcomed Jesus when he arrived at the house. It is easy to imagine the emotions that filled her when she saw the Master coming. However, a certain nervousness was added to this joy. As a good hostess, she wants her boyfriend’s stay to be as pleasant as possible, so she gets to work quickly. While he speaks, Marta adheres to the habits of each hostess: she prepares water to cleanse her hands and provides oil to anoint her head… At the same time, she takes care of it so that meals come at the right time and nothing is missing. In this way, he shows his love for the Lord.

But maybe the work is starting to pile up more than she expected. Her mood gradually deteriorates. While he continues to serve, he thinks within himself. She is desperate because she can’t keep up, and quickly concludes that if Sister Maria had helped her, everything would have changed. However, Mary sits at the feet of the Lord. Therefore, given her sister’s apparent passivity, Martha stands before Jesus: „Lord, don’t you care that the sister lets me serve herself? Tell her to help me!“ (Lk 10, 40). Marta could hide her agitation and uneasiness; she could discreetly approach her sister so that no one would notice and ask her for help. Instead, she decided to turn to Master openly and feels „even justified in criticizing Jesus“. However, this is also a sign of closeness with the Lord, because there is no need to mask one’s thoughts in front of a good friend. We can ask Saint Martha to help us have the same intimacy with Jesus, to show ourselves as we are when talking to him, even if it sometimes means that the Master will show us a better way to organize our lives.

Working knowing that God is in our house …

JESUS, he doesn’t answer Martina’s frustration with harsh words. He knows her good intentions. Therefore, under the sign of special love, he turns to her with the repetition of her name: „Marta, Marta, you care and worry about many things, and only one thing is needed. Mary chose a better share that will not be taken away from her“ (Lk 10, 41-42). At no point does the Lord blame Marta for not doing what she should. He doesn’t even invite her to sit at his feet like Mary and forget about household duties. How could other guests eat and relax along the way? The change he demanded of her was mainly internal: he invited her to approach her duties differently. Martha did many things, but she forgot the most important thing: Jesus was in her house, and she might not have listened to his words.

Often during the day, we can feel overwhelmed like Marta. We may think that our work or family responsibilities make it impossible to find the time we would like to devote to God. However, Jesus does not encourage us to neglect our duties. Like Martha, he invites us to find the Lord in these activities, to perform every task knowing that the Lord is always in the house of our soul. In this way, work becomes a constant act of love, a continuous one, which goes beyond what we can express with our lips or thoughts. „Words are useless,” says Saint Josemaría, „because language can no longer express itself; reason remains calm. He doesn’t talk anymore, he just watches. The soul goes into singing and sings a new song because it feels and knows that God is constantly looking at it with love“.

Fill our work with love …

Weren’t the very actions that led Martha away from Jesus? The holy desire to offer him a good and renewing welcome eventually turned into tension and anxiety because she could not keep up with everything she set out to do. She lost sight of the goal of all her actions. Perhaps she performed all these details of the service out of inertia, as she would with any other guest. But Jesus encourages her not to forget the essential thing: God was in her house. She did not just fulfill her role as hostess: she allowed the Lord to rest. „ The problem is not always an excess of activity, but rather an activity lived incorrectly, without adequate motivations, without spirituality, which permeates the activity and makes it desirable. It then follows that duties tire us more than is justified, and sometimes we get downright sick from them. It is not a calm effort, but a work full of tension; heavy, unsatisfactory, and ultimately unacceptable.

To all who desire to find God amid the world, the same thing that happened to Martha can happen. We are responsible for numerous tasks that require our attention and ongoing effort. This logically leads to fatigue. However, when we know that all this work is of greater importance than we can understand at first glance, it is less likely that this fatigue will deprive us of peace, because we know that our success is not measurable by human calculations. In a personal dialogue with God, we can rediscover that everything we do is aimed at loving him; that we care about this world because it is his world. In this way, we will be guided not only by inertia or what the circumstances dictate, but also by the desire to discover the hidden God in everything we do. „ Without love, even the most important activities lose value and do not bring joy. Without deep meaning, all our activity will be reduced to fruitless and disorderly activism. And who gives us love and truth if not Jesus Christ?“. And who can we ask to intercede for us in this mission to love God in our daily work, if not the Virgin Mary?

Why did Moses give the Israelites water to drink that contained dust from a crushed golden calf? It wasn’t out of vindictiveness. Rather, he wanted to destroy their sin and lead them to redemption. But how? By giving the Israelites water with gold dust in it to drink, Moses ensured that they would never again worship idols. Using gold dust as an additive to drinking water destroyed the false belief that idols had power.

By giving them this water, Moses also instructed them in an unforgettable way about the consequences of their sin so they could truly repent. We condemn the Israelites for their lack of faith, yet we are no different. Our trust in God also wavers when we encounter difficulties or wait for him to answer our prayers. We, too, apparently turn to our “idols” to fill the void instead of waiting patiently for God.

However, we don’t need to drink water with gold dust to free ourselves! Instead, we can rely on the grace of the Holy Spirit to open our eyes and see the idols that occupy the Lord’s place—property, status, comfort, and pleasure—which can lead us to sin. Let us ask him to show us that these idols have no real power over us. Jesus overcame all sin and gave us the power to overcome the desires of the flesh (see Galatians 5:19-21).

Finally, let us ask the Spirit to lead us to repentance whenever we sin. Through repentance, we experience the Spirit’s power to transform and heal us in ways we could never have done on our own. Brothers and sisters, our God is a God of mercy. Just as he did with the Israelites, he can lead us on the path of forgiveness and redemption whenever we call on Him.

Today, we’re going to talk about what a man should do to live relatively happily after a divorce. A person is sinful and makes mistakes, and this makes life more difficult. Life is difficult for us, due to our sins, and also because of the sins of others. There are mistakes that we can correct in life, and there are mistakes that become almost irreparable. Christianity requires a person to enter into a marriage for the duration of their life. It is no secret that many marriages end in divorce. Many believe that after divorce, such a paradise will begin. Cease the tension of the fault quarrel. But after a divorce, new difficulties arise. Divorce does not enter one’s paradise. Marriage also includes children. A man can have children with multiple women. But a child can only have one parent. The divorce of parents will mar children forever. Divorce can be a person’s survival. Divorce always takes something away. A person who has gone through a divorce must come to terms with it. A person who has divorced must come to terms with their former partner and must come to terms with the church. A person who has divorced suffers in various ways and often does not admit their mistake and blames others. But it leads nowhere.

Since childhood, I was fascinated by the feast of St. Anne, united with forgiveness, as he is called in my neighboring village of Erudite, today Oravská Lesná; and they celebrate it for at least two days. Many experience it as a rare occasion when they must not be absent from their birthplace. Therefore, they do not regret crossing hundreds of kilometers to spend days of true understanding, peace and quiet happiness with their loved ones. In the circle of those closest to life, but also at the graves of their loved ones, they return to the values inherent in Christians. The locals enjoy the arrival of dear relatives and friends, because „guests are like God’s messengers who come to worship our happiness“, as the poet Valentín Beniak says.

In the worship of St. Joachim and Anna can be seen in the admirable plan of the Lord God, who for generations prepared the work of salvation in order to fulfill it in Jesus Christ. The beginnings of respect for St. Anne in the West dates back to the 8th century, in the East to an even earlier time. Feast of St. Joachim in the Eastern Church is also ancient. The new liturgical calendar combined St. John’s Day. Joachim with a memory of St. Anna on July 26.

St. Anna worships herself as the patron saint of miners and boatmen, and is a popular saint in many pilgrimage sites. There are many mountains dedicated to her. In a certain sense, St. Anna was Mother’s Day in the Church, centuries before modern Mother’s Day. On one altar, the artist presented St. Joachim and Anna and Maria as a child on their mother’s hands. At their feet, little John the Baptist can be seen pointing to the lamb with his hand, a symbol of sacrifice. Love, in order to be deep, lasting and faithful, needs to draw on the sacrifice of God’s Lamb. Love needs the grace of the sacraments, as well as the sacrifice of spouses. Marital love comes from the sacrifice of the cross, lives from the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

From the point of view of social knowledge, the family today has no other alternative. Where else can one learn responsibility? Where can he mature better than in a family based on a loving, stable and equal relationship between a man and a woman? All other educational establishments are successful only to the extent that they can imitate a functioning family.

The goodness and love with which today breathes can be an inspiration for us to notice even the grandparents whom these saints symbolize to us and to be grateful to them for everything. Poet Milan Rúfus prays with the children as follows: „Mother of God, you are twice as nice to the children! Listen to what I’m going to tell you now. Leave us the old woman. To live for me for a long time. The old woman has as much time as I want for me. The old woman is kind. He has God’s life in his soul. The old woman does not share us with anyone. He has time to love us. And nothing disturbs her. He has a week of seven Sundays with her. Mother of God, you whom we do not know, but we know about you, speak to my voice. Leave us the old woman. We have something together. No one has that anymore except us.“

BIOGRAPHY

He came from Lebanon. He became a humble and ascetic religious figure in Anna. In 1859, he received priestly ordination in Berne. He excelled in hard work and adoration and proved himself very well in serving people. He later lived as a hermit. Since he was always perfectly obedient to his superior, he performed many wonders. These continued at his grave even after death.

BIOGRAPHY FOR MEDITATION

A WILDERNESS FROM LEBANON

He was born on the 8th. 5. 1828 in the Lebanese village of Beka’kafra and was baptized according to a Maronite rite named Youssef. He had five older siblings. At the age of three, their father died, and Uncle Tonios took over the care of their poor peasant family. The other two uncles were hermits at Kouzhaya and begged their family for the necessary graces.

Despite the hardships that befell the family, Youssef grew up in a peaceful environment where one lived according to one’s faith. He attended Mass daily and soon began to engage in private, inner prayer with his Lord. As he gained more knowledge, he liked to express his thoughts in verse. At the age of sixteen, he began to see this life as a dream from which he would wake up at death.

Once he met a monk in pasture, from whom he learned about religious life, and who finally told him: “By prayer, you will soon win the peace you desire. But you have to bring it to other people, too, and you have to heal them out of despair and delusion.” Youssef then took those words to heart as a task from God.

At the age of 23, one Sunday evening, he secretly left his native house. He went barefoot to the monastery of Our Lady of Manifold in Anna ya, where, after a conversation with the superior, he was accepted and became a novice. The family that sought him out in the monastery attempted to dissuade him from his spiritual vocation without success.

Youssef was given the religious name Sharbel. He excelled in humility; he did not justify himself for the wrong in the stress tests, but he even offered everything painful to God with the excuse that he could give him so little. He sought an ascetic life, and therefore asked the superior for the most challenging work possible. Due to his good health, he was granted. He was taller, with a thin figure, and wore the same clothing, sandals on his feet, in both summer and winter. He draped his scrounged fur over the kutna only at the behest of his superiors. Likewise, he was attentive to unconditional obedience, extremely modest in his eating habits, and wished others well. Furthermore, he renounced meat permanently and slept little, as he spent a considerable part of the night in prayer.

About a year or two after the end of his novitiate, Sharbel was sent to study theology at the monastery of St. Cyprian in Klan. He took the task of education very seriously, saying, “It must all serve my brethren.” He became a connoisseur of morality and is said to have excelled teachers in many subjects.

In April 1859, he received priestly ordination in Bkerke. After returning to the monastery, he zealously continued his unusually ascetic life. He also hid the symptoms of kidney disease. One way of his penitence was by wearing a wire shirt. The reason he still offered sacrifices to God was love. He was very persistent in adoration, after joint midnight prayers he stayed daily before the tabernacle.

At the age of 36, he applied for permission to live a hermit life in solitude. However, the superior did not comply with him and instead entrusted him with visits to families and serving the sick by administering the sacraments.

Sharbel thus became a wandering monk, bringing the most important thing – peace, love, healing. God’s providence crossed his path with those who were despairing and seeking. In the region, converts increased and piety deepened. Sharbel’s speech was very simple, but often urgent and warm.

In the evening, Sharbel went to the kitchen to beg for lamp oil so that he could continue his activities. There, once a servant tried to make a joke out of him and poured water into his lamp instead of oil. Unsuspectingly, Sharbel lit the lamp in his cell and continued to work. Before midnight, the superior came to reprimand him for wrongdoing against the order, of which he was not aware. Due to the need to save oil, all the lamps should have been extinguished a long time ago. Priest Sharbel humbly accepted the rebuke, but later the servant confessed what he had done. It was discovered that the priest had been shining plain water for over four hours, and the wick was soaked with water; there was still water in the lamp.

The superior then gave a message to the patriarch. After this incident, Sharbel received the desired permission to visit the hermitage of St. Peter and Paul, located about half an hour from the monastery. He called his hermitage a “country residence” and converted part of the surrounding land into a garden. He slept on a straw bale of oak leaves and bark, with part of the trunk under his head.

Once there was a locust raid, and the monastery garden was in danger of significant damage. At that time, Superior called on Sharbel to protect the garden from imminent harm. He obediently went, prayed in front of the chapel, and then walked through the garden and the field, sprinkling it with a boxwood twig and a container of holy water. And the locusts flew away.

At the insistence of the people, the superiors were again sent to wander among them and offer blessings. It happened then that Shebrail Saba of Ihm esh went mad and became a sadist. Sharbel approached him and spoke softly to him: “Sebrail, why did you do evil? It is so easy to have God as a friend. You suffered and people thought you were evil! They don’t understand your behavior! Remember your first Holy Communion, the prayers and the love that burned your heart at that time. You seek your pleasure too far away, but you have it with you in prayer.” Then he uttered a verse from the gospel, and the young man rose transformed entirely. At other times, during periods of shortage, Superior ordered Sharbel to provide sufficient food for everyone, and the reservoirs were then replenished mysteriously.

Wonders around Sharbel Machlúf increased. As he grew older, others worked around the hermitage, and he had an assistant since 1896. Two years later, in mid-December, he contracted a cold and then passed out at the altar after being transformed. Makarius took him to the cell, and then he managed to get up and finish the liturgy. He suffered greatly, but he sacrificed his whole life for it. Shortly before Christmas Day, he received the sacrament of the Anointing of the Sick. His last words included prayer: “Father of truth, Your Son is a propitiatory sacrifice. His blood pours out for me. Accept my sacrifice.” During a subsequent stroke 24. 12. 1898 died.

After his funeral, some people stayed at the grave until nightfall and saw a bright glow emerge from it. In the following days, people learned that a kind friend who had gone into God’s arms continued to help them.

After 23 years, the downpours ravaged the monastery cemetery, and therefore it was decided to raise the remains of Father Šarbel. His body was discovered in the mud, covered with a thick layer of mold. After its removal, the body appeared completely intact, even without signs of rigor mortis. When they put him in a coffin in one of the cells, he looked asleep. In the morning, however, they said they found a polluted corpse again, squealing with sweat. After a new wash, the sweat was repeated, but the body’s defiance against the law of nature persisted.

The burial in the monastery crypt took place on the 24th of [month]. 7. 1927. In February 1950, a monk noticed a thick pale red liquid seeping between the stones. After opening the tomb, it was found that the reddish myro flowed out of the body, undisturbed by decomposition. Miracle healings of pilgrims then began to take place in the place. It is reported that the blind saw, the deaf heard, and the paralyzed walked. Sinners turned and believers left strengthened in faith. The grave became a place of pilgrimage not only for Catholics, but also for Orthodox and Mohammedans.

In June 1950, a religious figure from Lebanon, accompanied by four of his students, was photographed at Šarbel’s hermitage. In the developed picture, the figure of Father Šarbel, who was said to have never been photographed during his lifetime, was seen standing in front of the group.

Šarbel Machlúf was Pope Paul VI. beatified on 5. 12.1965 and 9. 10. 1977 canonized.

RESOLUTION, PRAYER

Today, I will reflect on what my task is from God, with what attitude, and how satisfactorily I fulfill it.

God, You called Your holy priest Sharbel to extraordinary discipline amid the desert’s austerity, and You filled his heart with all virtue. Please give us that we too may follow Christ in His suffering on the cross and attain His eternal kingdom. We ask this through Your Son Jesus Christ our Lord, for he lives and reigns with You in the unity of the Holy Spirit throughout the ages of ages.

I’m Marie. They call me Mary Magdalene. I know, I’ve made many mistakes in my life. I insulted God with my sins. I was weak, fragile, and troubled. I couldn’t get out of it. I thought no one would help me anymore. And then He came. Jesus entered my life. I had the grace to live at that time when the „Word became the Body“, when God came into the world in the Son, in Jesus. He set me free and banished seven evil spirits from me. After this encounter with Jesus, my life changed. Not just for a moment, he changed forever. Since then, I have always wanted to be close to him, to spend time with him, and listen to him. His word reached the heart. His words changed people. His word healed the sick, raised the dead, and cast out evil spirits. His word was Spirit and life.  I accompanied him during his mission in Israel, together with the other women, I helped him as much as I could.

When Jesus was captured, I experienced fear. I didn’t know how it would end. But even then, I wanted to be with him. As the evangelist St. writes about me. John – I was under the cross with the Virgin Mary, and I cried. My heart was very saddened by the sight of Jesus doing the work of redemption, all wounded. I was unaware of it at the time. I thought it was over. I was also at Jesus’ funeral and saw his lifeless body being placed in the grave.

On the first day of the week, I went to the grave to anoint his body with oil. But the stone was rolled away. I ran to Peter and Jan and told them about it. They went there and saw that it was as I told them. That’s when I saw the man I was about to meet at the grave; she thought he was a gardener. I felt so until he addressed me by my name: Marie. That’s when I met him; I knew he was Jesus. That he is my Jesus, whom I love so much. My heart was filled with great joy that the one my soul loves lives. I immediately went to announce this joy to the other disciples: I saw the Lord.  Reflecting on my life now, I can divide it into two distinct parts.

1st life before I met Jesus
2nd life after I met Jesus

I want to tell you all: God never breaks a stick over you. He will not break the broken reed and put out the smoldering wick. Jesus entered my miserable life full of sin and set me free. And so I could start a new life—a new life as a beloved child of God.

I know life is hard, and Jesus wants to help you live it with Him. Obey him in what he tells you through the Holy Scriptures, through your bishops, priests, and deacons. Receive him often in the Eucharist, because the Eucharist is the source and peak of the entire Christian life. Adore him, thank him, ask him for mercy, ask him for forgiveness. Jesus was thinking of you then at Golgotha, nailed to the cross by your sins.