Treasures of the Church
Posted on: March 30, 2015
- In: Everyday Life | Faith
- 1 Comment
On the weekend, I added some new music to my MP3 player and created some playlists. As I looked through my songs, I realized I’d forgotten about some of the great tunes I’d downloaded, and I planned to listen to them again.
Sometimes we treat our spiritual disciplines the same way: we forget how good they are for the soul and maybe even think they’re outdated.
Consider Bible reading time. We can follow a reading plan or just read through a psalm or a chapter or two of the Bible to learn more about following and worshipping the Lord. How many of us think the scriptures have nothing to say to us today?
Think about a Way of the Cross service with its prayers, readings and responses for each station. It offers us a wonderful opportunity to reflect on the last days of Jesus’ life and his sacrifice for us. But how many of us might see it as one more thing to add to a busy schedule?
Consider the rosary. We meditate on the life, death and resurrection of Jesus, praying through Mary to Jesus. How many of us just see it as repetitious?
Think about Eucharistic adoration. Whether we focus on something specific or share our cares and concerns or let ourselves be still, we get to spend time in the presence of Jesus. How many of us would struggle to imagine spending an hour in silent prayer?
For the price of a small amount of time—maybe fifteen minutes a day of Bible reading, twenty minutes or so for the Stations of the Cross or the rosary, an hour for adoration—we get to stop the hustle-and-bustle of daily life, think about our faith and God’s ways, and spend time in conversation with him.
Does the modern world we live in have anything to offer followers of our ancient faith? Absolutely. I have Catholic apps on my MP3 player and read Catholic e-books, I visit Catholic websites, I watch faith-based movies, and I maintain and follow Catholic boards on Pinterest. But it’s worth noting that my MP3 player features an album of Gregorian chant.
I pray that, even as we embrace new media and methods for sharing and learning about our faith, we would come to appreciate the ways that have served our Church so well. They may help us “become a leaven of Christian living within society” (Pope Francis (@Pontifex), Twitter, March 26, 2015).
And [Jesus] said to them, “Therefore every scribe who has been trained for the kingdom of heaven is like a householder who brings out of his treasure what is new and what is old.”
~ Matthew 13:52*
(*Scripture quote taken from the Holy Bible, Revised Standard Version, Second Catholic Edition.)
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1 Response to "Treasures of the Church"
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A Catholic Convert in Ottawa 
March 30, 2015 at 4:37 pm
Reblogged this on Jean'sBistro2010's Blog and commented:
Awesome!