Go to the Heart of Things

“If we visit our Eucharistic God
and seek His counsel in all our problems,
if we let ourselves be purified
by the sanctifying power that flows from the altar,

if we offer ourselves to the Lord in this sacrifice
and receive Him into our souls in Holy Communion,
then we cannot but be drawn ever more deeply
into the current of the divine life.”

St. Teresa Benedicta (Edith Stein)

Carmelite Nun & Martyr,Germany (1891-1942)
FEAST DAY - Aug 9

"O my God, fill my soul with holy joy, courage and strength
to serve You. Enkindle Your love in me and then walk with me
along the next stretch of road before me.
I do not see very far ahead,
but when I have arrived where the horizon now closes down,
a new prospect will open before me,
and I shall meet it with peace."
St Teresa Benedicta

St Teresa Benedicta, pray for us!

In his homily at the canonization Mass, Pope John Paul II said: “Because she was Jewish, Edith Stein was taken with her sister Rosa and many other Catholics and Jews from the Netherlands to the concentration camp in Auschwitz, where she died with them in the gas chambers. Today we remember them all with deep respect. A few days before her deportation, the woman religious had dismissed the question about a possible rescue: ‘Do not do it! Why should I be spared? Is it not right that I should gain no advantage from my Baptism? If I cannot share the lot of my brothers and sisters, my life, in a certain sense, is destroyed.’”

Addressing himself to the young people gathered for the canonization, the pope said:
“Your life is not an endless series of open doors! Listen to your heart! Do not stay on the surface but go to the heart of things! And when the time is right, have the courage to decide! The Lord is waiting for you to put your freedom in his good hands.”