We can’t ignore the fact that, at the very centre of these past couple of chapters in our lectio, the subject of faith has been held up for our consideration. It has been absolutely essential in all these stories – an increase in faith, the testing of faith, the growth in faith, the witness of faith, the lack of faith.
Tag Archives: 51-60
Mark 6:1-6 – There’s No Place Like Home?
After the blockbuster Chapter 5, with its scenes filled with drama and shock, and their insistent invitation to consider the role of personal faith in relationship to Christ, and Christ’s own emerging personality and authority, Mark leads us back to Jesus’ hometown – Nazareth, of course, although he doesn’t say it here – and to his own people.
Mark 5:21-43 – Jesus, Life-Giver (Part 1)
Having just concluded a long and technically beautiful passage, Mark presents us with another carefully constructed section of narrative. We are really drawn into the heart of these two stories for many reasons – technically, he weaves the two stories together, sandwiching one with the beginning and end of the other; emotionally, both the scenes are incredibly moving…
Vocation – One with the Church
From the very beginning of her existence the Church has always sought to identify, with joy, the specific services which brothers and sisters give, for building up the Church herself and for preaching the Good New, witnessing to Jesus Christ, in the world. Of course, this is the fundamental expression…
Mark 5:1-20 – The Healing of the Gerasene Demoniac (Part 2) – Deliverance
In the last lectio divina encounter we meditated on the destructive force of the evil one as Mark sees him possessing this man who lives among the tombs. Jesus goes to meet the man, and the forces which possess him, and they come to him, ready for the encounter. We remember that this type of possession and affliction is a living death in many ways, and Mark emphasizes this for us, depicting this man living in a tomb-scape, a limbo, among the tombs but not yet in one, walking with death as a constant companion and yet ready to break free into life.
Sunday 7th June – Retreat Sunday – The Most Holy Trinity
This solemnity falls on our Retreat Sunday – why not make it a day of quiet and prayer in which you can live your membership of our Cistercian family.
The Holy Rule: Introducing St Benedict
Before we can embark on any kind of reading of the Rule of St Benedict, it behoves us to say something about the man who is its author. In one way, that should not prove very difficult – there is but one work that purports to be an account of his life…
Mark 5:1-20 – The Healing of the Gerasene Demoniac (Part 1)
For those of you who have been following this lectio you will know that we have just spent an explosive time with Jesus and his disciples in a boat in the middle of a storm. In the eye of that tempest the disciples learned something more about who Jesus is, and he showed himself master even of the elements – truly the Lord of creation. Now we accompany Christ and his followers into another storm, and no less frightening. In fact, in all the gospels this story has to be counted as one of the most harrowing that we read.
Pentecost – Spirit, Birth and Life
In keeping the feast of Pentecost we are caught up into the always-life giving presence of God’s Holy Spirit. Traditionally, we celebrate the birth of the Church on this day, as the Spirit fills the place where the apostles, Mary, the mother of God, and other disciples are gathered, and…
Vocation – One with Christ
There is only one Christ in whom dwells the fullness of the Godhead and indeed the fullness of humanity. Christ is the complete summation of all vocations because he lives the perfect relationship with the Father in the Holy Spirit, and the Father’s relationship with Christ in the Spirit is complete…
Bethlehem Abbey Cistercian Family 