The Catholic Calendar for Monday, September 25, 2006
Monday of the Twenty-fifth Week in Ordinary Time

Scripture from today's Liturgy of the Word:
Proverbs 3:27-34
Psalm 15:2-3a, 3bc-4ab, 5
Luke 8:16-18

A reflection on today's Sacred Scripture:

Say not to your neighbor, "Go, and come again,
tomorrow I will give," when you can give at once. (Proverbs 3:28)

Today's readings are about grace, gratitude and generosity--the three elements that make up the spiritual cycle that draws our lives ever-closer to God. Whether we recognise it or not, we are all beneficiaries of God's grace. Grace is the steadfast love and loyalty, the mercy and the kindness, the goodness that emanates from God to all of us. It was grace at work when God created the world and everything in it.

What then is our response to God's grace? If we have a state of mind that sees God in everything as evidence of His great and abundant love for us, grace then manifests itself in the form of a thankful heart. A life lived in gratitude enables us to see God's grace all around us and enables us to experience the joys of contentment, peace and abundance in our everyday lives.

Giving of ourselves, our money, our talents and especially our time, are necessary aspects of a loving and grateful response to God's grace. In so doing we pay forward our gratitude for the love and the blessings we receive from God by enabling others to experience His abundant and steadfast love for us.

- Anne