Most worthy of love (Bishop Robert Barron)

You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart,
with all your soul, with all your mind,
and with all your strength.
 You shall love your neighbor as yourself.

--Mark 12:30-31

    All of religion is finally about awakening the deepest desire of the heart and directing it toward God; it is about the ordering of love toward that which is most worthy of love. But, Jesus says, a necessary implication of this love of God is compassion for one’s fellow human beings.

    Why are the two commandments so tightly linked? The best response is the simplest: because of who Jesus is. Christ is not simply a human being, and he is not simply God; rather, he is the God-man, the one in whose person divinity and humanity meet.

    Therefore, it is finally impossible to love him as God without loving the humanity that he has, in his own person, embraced. Those who know Christ Jesus, fully divine and fully human, realize that the love of God necessarily draws us to a love for the human race. They grasp the logical consistency and spiritual integrity of the greatest commandment.

--Bishop Robert Barron,
Gospel Reflection, October 5, 2020

Image source: Elena Kotliarker, The Song of Songs Day (2017), https://www.artmajeur.com/en/elena-kotliarker/artworks/10573918/the-song-of-songs-day

When Jesus said, Love your neighbor (Unknown)

    When Jesus said, Love your neighbor, he knew your neighbor would act, look, believe, and love differently than you. It’s kind of the whole point.

--Unknown       

Image source: https://www.psephizo.com/biblical-studies/ethnic-and-social-diversity-in-the-early-church/
Quotation source

Be in love (Richard Rohr)

.  There is no secret moral command for knowing or pleasing God, or what some call salvation, beyond becoming a loving person in mind, heart, body, and soul. Then you will see what you need to see. Jesus did not say, Be right. Jesus said, Be in love.

--Richard Rohr,

Eager to Love:

 The Alternative Way of

Francis of Assisi

Image source: King’s Royal Crown Mezuzah. A mezuzah is a piece of parchment contained in a decorative case and inscribed with the Shema Yisrael:  You shall love the Lord your God with your whole heart, and with your whole being, and with your whole strength (Deuteronomy 6:5). Jewish families affix the mezuzah to the doorpost of their homes to fulfill the injunction in Deuteronomy 6:9 : Write the words of God on the gates and doorposts of your house. When passing through the doorway, many people touch a finger to the mezuzah as a way of showing respect and love for God. Many people also kiss their finger after touching it to the mezuzah. https://shofarsfromafar.com/product/2077/

Sunday Gospel Reflection, October 31, 2021: You shall love the Lord, your God...

You shall love the Lord, your God…

Do you love God with all your heart and all your soul?

    In the Book of Deuteronomy, Moses enjoins the people to observe all of the ten commandments the Lord has given them. But most importantly, he says, is to love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength. This prayer, the Shema Yisrael, contains a summary of the whole of Jewish law. Nothing is left out: the whole of the individual is to be committed God, the source of life and primary object of their love, a love they are to live with the whole of their being. Psalm 18 develops this idea – I love you, Lord, my strength – citing the Lord’s role as protector (my rock, my fortress, my deliverer) as central to that love, a love expressed in God’s care for God’s people.

    Jesus will invoke the Shema Yisrael as the center of his teaching as well, making two notable addendums in Mark’s Gospel. First, Jesus adds the words with all your mind, perhaps to appeal to Greek-speaking audiences, for whom the mind was distinct from the heart; for Plato, the mind transcended what the heart could conceive. With heart, soul, mind and strength: we are to love God will everything we have in us, keeping God in our sights with a singular focus. Jesus goes on to say, You shall love your neighbor as yourself. For Jesus, if you love God, you should have no trouble loving your neighbor. Moreover, if you cannot love the one you can see, how can you love the one you cannot see? For, as the Letter to the Hebrews reminds us, it was out of love for us that Jesus offered himself for our sins, making intercession for those who approach God through him. There is no greater love, and it is in this love that we are called to live in return, with love for God and neighbor alike.

This post is based on Fr. Pat’s Scripture class.
Image source: www.wordclouds.com

God before our eyes (St. Philip Neri)

Let a man always think that 

he has God before his eyes.

--St. Philip Neri        

Image source: https://mvbernard.com/2008/10/24/keeping-your-eyes-on-god/
Quotation source

What keeps us from recognizing God? (Rob Hansen)

    In the story of Bartimaeus, Roc O’Conner writes, Blindness serves as a metaphor for the all-too-human unwillingness to recognize whatever wounds, hurts, and diseases keep us from recognizing God, ourselves, and others.

    To aid in that recognition, O’Connor [notes] that the Greek word used for blind, or tupholos, relates mostly to idolatry, oppression and willfulness. The word used for seeing is anablepo, which generally is associated with a return to covenant fidelity. 

    Seeing means following Jesus’ way; it signifies salvation, which involves losing one’s life, surrendering one’s possessiveness, letting go one’s demand to rule, and walking with Jesus to the cross… and receiving the healing of his resurrection, [O'Connor writes].

     The journey of the blind beggar illustrates a healthy way to personal growth: from self-awareness to a request for help, to a gracious reception of healing, and then to following the healer. In this way, Bartimaeus’s path to joy, hope and peace is available to each of us.

--Rob Hansen

Review of What the Story of Blind Bartimaeus

Teaches Us About Fear, Surrender,

and Walking the Path to Joy

Image source: William Blake, Christ Giving Sight to Bartimaeus, https://www.learnreligions.com/jesus-heals-the-blind-bartimeus-248728
Quotation source

Begging Christ to heal our spiritual vision (E.P. Sri)

   At the Kyrie in the Mass, we stand in the biblical tradition of calling on God’s mercy for our own lives and the lives of others. In reciting the liturgical responses, Lord, have mercy… Christ, have mercy… Lord, have mercy, we become like the blind man begging for Christ to heal our own weaknesses and lack of spiritual vision. We become like the fathers in the Gospel, pleading for Jesus to act in the lives of those we love. In saying Kyrie eleison (Lord, have mercy) at Mass, we humbly entrust our entire lives – all our weaknesses, sins, fears, and sufferings – and the lives of those we love, to the merciful heart of Christ.

--E. P. Sri

Image source: https://www.facebook.com/mountcarmelmv/videos/1221909148270072
Quotation source

Lord, I want to see -- Glimpsing God's invitation (Fr. James Martin)

   Bartimaeus, the blind beggar in the Gospels, articulates his desire. What do you want me to do for you? Jesus asks the blind man sitting by the roadside. Lord, I want to see, says Bartimaeus.

    Why does Jesus ask Bartimaeus a seemingly idiotic question? After all, Jesus knew that the man was blind! For one thing, Jesus may have wanted to offer him the freedom to ask, to give the man the dignity of choice, rather than simply healing him straightaway. For another, Jesus knew that recognizing our desires means recognizing God’s desires for us. Jesus may have asked Bartimaeus what he wanted because our longings help us learn something about who we are. It’s so freeing to say, This is what I desire in life. Naming our desires may also make us more grateful when we receive the fulfillment of our hopes.

    We can glimpse God’s invitation even in the faintest trace of desire.

--Fr. James Martin

Image source: https://winkofaneye.me/2018/02/26/are-you-ready-to-testify-master-i-want-to-see/
Quotation source

New eyes (Marcel Proust)

The real voyage of discovery consists

not in seeking landscapes,

but in having new eyes.

--Marcel Proust, La Prisonnière

Image source: http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-LcQHZFm8vRM/VFuT7vIKhWI/AAAAAAAAAH4/8hMZA5j0DKo/s1600/Optimism-New-Eyes.jpg

An invitation to rebirth (Bishop Robert Barron)

    Physical blindness is an evocative symbol of the terrible blindness of the soul that all of us sinners experience.

    Blind Bartimaeus, sitting helplessly by the road outside of Jericho begging for alms and attention, expresses this hopeless and darkened-over state of soul. When he hears that Jesus of Nazareth is in the vicinity, he begins to cry out, Son of David, have pity on me. The original Greek here is eléeson me, beautifully reflective of the liturgical cry of the church, Kyrie eleison, Lord have mercy. Bartimaeus gives voice to the prayerful groaning of the whole people of God for release from the imprisonment of the small soul (pusilla anima). 

    Though he is reprimanded by the crowd, Bartimaeus continues to shout, until finally Jesus calls out to him. This is the summons that echoes from the very depths of one’s own being, the call of the magna anima (great soul), the invitation to rebirth and reconfiguration. Inspired by this voice and convinced that he has discovered the pearl of great price, the unum necessarium (one thing necessary), Bartimaeus jumps up and comes to Jesus. 

--Bishop Robert Barron

Gospel Reflection, May 27, 2021

Image source: Julia Stankova, Christ and Bartimaeus (painting on wood panel, 2017), https://artandtheology.org/tag/bartimaeus/

Sunday Gospel Reflection, October 24, 2021: Master, I want to see!

Master, I want to see…

How strong is your faith?

    The prophet Jeremiah is called by God to bring God’s message to the people during the final days of the kingdom of Judah, and his message is not generally well received or accepted. But it’s not all gloom and doom. Although he does prophesy the coming fall of Judah, he also speaks of God’s promise of future restoration: Behold, I will bring them back from the land of the north; I will gather them from the ends of the world. Even the blind and lame will return, and none shall stumble. Psalm 126 gives witness to the fulfillment of this promise: the Lord brought back the captives of Zion, the psalmist sings, asking, restore our fortunes, O Lord. Back from their exile, the people must restore their own land to its past prosperity, and ask God for help, trusting in God’s promise: They shall come back rejoicing.

    When, in Mark’s Gospel, the blind man Bartimaeus is told that Jesus is calling him, he too rejoices: He throws aside his cloak, springs up, and comes to Jesus immediately. Bartimaeus knows that Jesus has power; his cry, Jesus, son of David, have pity on me, is a statement of faith. Jesus has shown mercy to others, healing even another blind man at the Pool of Siloam; Bartimaeus has absolute faith and clearly articulates his request: Master, I want to see. It is a request not only for physical sight, but also for spiritual sight: Bartimaeus seeks deeper faith and will follow Jesus on the way. His sight restored, he will rejoice. Jesus’ followers are not always as strong in their faith; Jesus’ death on the cross shakes that faith severely. But as the Letter to the Hebrews explains, as the great high priest, Jesus was called by God to give his life, offering it as a sacrifice on behalf of the world, in order to fulfill God’s greatest promise of restoration: the promise of salvation, eternal life for all who believe.

    When we believe, when we have faith, God is always able to restore us, healing our spiritual blindness. Like Bartimaeus, we must take courage, leaping up to meet the Lord when he calls us, that his way – the way – may be our way as well.

This post is based on Fr. Pat’s Scripture class.
Image source: www.wordclouds.com

All mingled in this poisoned cup (Keith & Krysten Getty)

To see the King of heaven fall 

In anguish to His knees 

The Light and Hope of all the world 

Now overwhelmed with grief 

What nameless horrors must He see 

To cry out in the garden 

Oh, take this cup away from Me 

Yet not My will but Yours 

Yet not My will but Yours 

 

To know each friend will fall away 

And heaven’s voice be stilled 

For hell to have its vengeful day 

Upon Golgotha’s hill 

No words describe the Saviour’s plight 

To be by God forsaken 

Till wrath and love are satisfied 

And every sin is paid 

And every sin is paid 

 

What took Him to this wretched place 

What kept Him on this road 

His love for Adam’s cursed race 

For every broken soul 

No sin too slight to overlook 

No crime to great to carry 

All mingled in this poisoned cup 

And yet He drank it all 

The Saviour drank it all 

The Saviour drank it all

To hear Gethsemane Hymn sung by Keith & Krysten Getty, click on the video below:

Image source:  He Qi, Praying at Gethsemane (1999), https://thejesusquestion.org/2011/04/21/gethsemane-part-8-indigenous-interpretations/
Video source

Willing to suffer out of love (Bishop Robert Barron)

   James and John ask Jesus on for high places of authority in his kingdom. Ah, there is the voice of ambition. Some people don’t care at all about money or power or pleasure – but they care passionately about honor. A lot of people can identify with James and John. They want to go places; they want to be movers and shakers in society. Perhaps a number of people reading this reflection are filled with these emotions.

   But Jesus turns the tables on them: You do not know what you are asking. He is indeed a King, and he will indeed rule Israel, but his crown will be made of thorns, and his throne will be a Roman instrument of torture.

    And so he tries to clarify: Can you drink the chalice that I am going to drink? The key to honor in the kingdom of God is to drink the cup of suffering, to be willing to suffer out of love, to give one’s life away as a gift. Look at the lives of the saints. It is not about aggrandizing the ego, but emptying it out. Are you drinking your cup of suffering alongside Jesus?

--Bishop Robert Barron,

Gospel Reflection, March 3, 2021

Image source: https://brokendoorministries.com/4th-day-letters/can-you-drink-the-cup/

Live for today (St. Luke the Evangelist)

    Remember the past, plan for the future, but live for today, because yesterday is gone and tomorrow may never come.

--Attributed to St. Luke the Evangelist,

whose feast we celebrate today, 

and who, as his epithet suggests, 

dedicated his life to spreading the good news: 

the word evangelist comes from the Greek, 

eu (good) + angellein (announce).

     Appropriately, perhaps, today marks the 10th anniversary of Our Lady of Mount Carmel’s blog. The project was initiated by our then-Director of Religious Education Jonathan Lewis in 2011, who surely never dreamed it would continue exist this long.  May we all continue to spread the good news! 

   Many thanks to all of you who read our posts, whether you have been with us for ten years or ten minutes. We are so very grateful for your continued support and attention!

Image source: https://keystoneelderlaw.com/event/10th-anniversary-celebration/
Quotation source

Our life cups become the cups of salvation (Henri Nowen)

   After firmly holding the cups of our lives and lifting them up as signs of hope for others, we have to drink them. Drinking our cups means fully appropriating and interiorizing what each of us has acknowledged as our life, with all its unique sorrows and joys.

   How do we drink our cups? We drink them as we listen in silence to the truth of our lives, as we speak in trust with friends about the ways we want to grow, and as we act in deeds of service. Drinking our cups is following freely and courageously God’s call and staying faithfully on the path that is ours. Thus, our life cups become the cups of salvation. When we have emptied them to the bottom, God will fill them with water for eternal life.

--Henri Nouwen

Image source: Cup of Salvation, https://www.flickr.com/photos/traqair57/6894799260
Quotation source

Make everything you do a sacrifice (Angel at Fatima)

    Make everything you do a sacrifice, and offer it to God as an act of reparation for the sins by which He is offended, and in supplication for the conversion of sinners.

--Angel who appeared to the three children

at Fatima, prior to the coming of Our Lady

Image source: Santo Anjo de Guarda de Portugal, or, Angel of Portugal (Angel of Peace), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guardian_Angel_of_Portugal#/media/File:AnjodePortugal.jpg
Quotation source

We will all drink the cup (Fr. Ron Rolheiser)

   Like Jesus, we will suffer humiliation in life, we will all drink the cup, and it will make us deep. But then we have a critical choice: will this humiliation make us deep in compassion and understanding, or will it make us deep in anger and bitterness? That is, in fact, the ultimate moral choice we face in life – not just at the hour of death but countless times in our lives. Good Friday, and what it asks of us, confronts us daily.

--Fr. Ron Rolheiser, OMI

Facebook, April 2, 2021

Image source: The earliest known depiction of Stephaton, the name given to the bystander who offered Jesus a sponge soaked in wine at the Crucifixion, illuminated manuscript from the Syriac Rabbula Gospels (586), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephaton#/media/File:Meister_des_Rabula-Evangeliums_002.jpg

Sunday Gospel Reflection, October 17, 2021: Can you drink of the cup that I drink?

Can you drink the cup that I drink?

How do we participate in repairing our world?

    The people of Israel believed that when they sinned, they had to make a sacrificial offering of atonement for their sins. In the Book of the Prophet Isaiah, the Suffering Servant makes his life as a reparation offering (NABRE) to atone for the people’s sin, on their behalf, suffering for their sake as Jesus would one day do on behalf of the entire world. The Suffering Servant is willing to be crushed for the sake of his own people because he loves them; his suffering will repair what they have broken through their sin. As Christians, we believe that the sacrifice of Jesus Christ brings reparation to our world, in all its sinfulness and brokenness. In Mark’s Gospel, Jesus reminds his disciples that the Son of Man did not come to be served but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many, while the Letter to the Hebrews notes that Jesus, the Son of God has been tested in every way, dying for our sins, making a reparation offering so that all humankind might be forgiven. We may thus approach the throne of grace to receive mercy and find grace for timely help, placing our trust in the Lord, as Psalm 33 states, knowing we will be delivered from death through the kindness of God, as manifested in the reparation offering of his Son.

    Thus, when James and John ask Jesus for places of honor with him in heaven, Jesus’ response calls them to refocus their energies. Can you drink the cup that I drink, or be baptized with the baptism with which I am baptized? he asks them. Baptism is an entry into his death which must become a way of life; the disciples are called to die for the sake of Christ, and be willing to suffer for the sake of his love. We participate in this same baptism; we too are baptized into his death; it is our invitation to inclusion in the Body of Christ as servants, ready to suffer for our world.

    Sin endures; people are still damaged and broken and in need of forgiveness. Jesus let his humanity die that he might raise all of humanity up, giving us access to God’s love. As Christians, we must participate with Jesus in this forgiveness, dying to sin and egocentricity and rising to love, a love that forgives. We make our reparation offering, not for ourselves but for each other; it is love that must drive us, rather than ego, mercy, rather than judgment, selflessness rather than selfishness, that we might give our lives as a ransom for many, following in the footsteps of Christ.

This post is based on Fr. Pat’s Scripture class.
Image source: www.wordclouds.com

Lady Wisdom (Brother Isaiah)

To your hands, o God,

To your hands, o God,

To your hands, o God

All of me (bis)

Teach me wisdom, o God, wisdom,

and simplicity

to know that you’re all that I need, Lord (bis)

Refrain

And you visit my heart with your love,

O you visit my heart with your love,

O come visit my heart with your love,

And make me whole (bis)

Refrain

And now I’m begging your love and your grace

Hope to live all my days in your gaze

Yes, I’m begging your love, your grace,

to see me through (bis)

Refrain

To hear Brother Isaiah perform Lady Wisdom from his new CD Shade, click on the video below. You can purchase this CD here.

Image source 1: https://www.1517.org/articles/christs-seventh-word-from-the-cross-father-into-your-hands-i-commit-my-spirit

Image source 2:  https://www.learnreligions.com/king-solomon-wisest-man-who-ever-lived-701168

Video source

Stay open, forever (George Saunders)

 

Anything is possible.

Stay open, forever,

so open it hurts,

and then open up some more,

 until the day you die,

world without end.

Amen.

--George Saunders,

author of Lincoln in the Bardo

Image source: https://www.houstonchronicle.com/entertainment/books/article/Tightly-written-Lincoln-in-the-Bardo-dazzles-10924030.php
Quotation source

To share what we have with others (Haley Stewart)

   More minimalism is an incomplete solution to our consumerism. If we ignore a deep generosity to share what we have with others, and if we are unwilling to accept help in return, we have not adopted a Gospel mindset. 

--Haley Stewart,
qtd. by Busted Halo 

Image source: Jesus and the Rich Young Man, Beijing (1879), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesus_and_the_rich_young_man#/media/File:ChineseJesus.jpg

Shift the point of gravity (Henri Nouwen)

    Jesus’ response to our worry-filled lives is quite different. He asks us to shift the point of gravity, to relocate the center of our attention, to change our priorities. Jesus wants us to move from the many things to the one necessary thing. It is important for us to realize that Jesus in no way wants us to leave our many-faceted world. Rather, he wants us to live in it, but firmly rooted in the center of all things. Jesus does not speak about a change of activities, a change of contracts, or even a change of pace. He speaks about a change of heart. This change of heart makes everything different, even while everything appears to remain the same. This is the meaning of Set your hearts on his kingdom first… and all these other things will be given you as well. What counts is where our hearts are. When we worry, we have our hearts in the wrong place. Jesus asks us to move our hearts to the center, where all other things fall into place.

--Henri Nouwen

Image source: Simone Biles, 2016, https://www.chicagotribune.com/sports/olympics/ct-simone-biles-incredible-olympics-20160728-story.html
Quotation source

Be more (St. Óscar Romero)

Aspire not to have more

but to be more.

--St. Óscar Romero

Image source: Heinrich Hofmann, Christ and the Rich Young Ruler (1889), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesus_and_the_rich_young_man#/media/File:Hoffman-ChristAndTheRichYoungRuler.jpg
Quotation source

Barriers to God (Fr. Greg Boyle)

Human beings draw lines,
but God erases them.

 --Fr. Greg Boyle               

Image source: JR, Migrants, Mayra, Picnic Across the Border (2017), https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2021/jun/07/backdrops-to-a-riot-how-jrs-confrontational-street-art-went-global
Quotation source

Sunday Gospel Reflection, October 10, 2021: Go, sell what you have, and give to the poor...

Go, sell what you have, and give to the poor…

How willing are you to let go of what stands between you and God?

    In the Book of Wisdom, we ostensibly hear the voice of King Solomon, who says that he pleaded, and the spirit of wisdom came to him. In prayer, Solomon turned to God, opened to God, and was given what he needed; God provided by entering in and sharing God’s wisdom with Solomon. Nothing compares to that wisdom, Solomon knows: I chose to have wisdom rather than the light, because the splendor of her never yields to sleep. Psalm 90 similarly asks for wisdom of heart, though the community’s focus on prosperity makes one wonder if they truly understand wisdom as Solomon does.

   The prosperous young man who approaches Jesus in Mark’s Gospel believes he is close to the kingdom of God: he has kept the commandments, after all. But Jesus sets him straight: You are lacking in one thing. Go, sell what you have, and give to the poor. To do so would make the man free to receive all that God has to give him – his heart would be open – but the man is unwilling to let go, for he has many possessions. Jesus, the Word of God referenced in the Letter to the Hebrews, is able to discern reflections and thoughts of the heart. Jesus knows the man better than the man knows himself, and Jesus loves him. But it is up to the man to choose to give Jesus precedence over all he has accumulated and amassed in his life, and this the man refuses to do.

   So many things keep us from opening our hearts to God’s love. God loves us not because we are deserving but because he created us for that purpose: to love us, that we might know that love. If we are concerned about our own goals, our own prosperity, it’s much harder for God to have any effect in our life. We must focus on the journey, in which we keep opening to God’s wisdom, and experiencing God’s love for us. We must engage with him where he is, in the moment, with nothing standing in the way, confident that all things are possible for God. We must go to our hearts, where he dwells, and trust more in him than in any tangible object, living and living fully, now, because he loves us.

This post is based on Fr. Pat’s Scripture class.
Image source: www.wordclouds.com

We would be one (UUSM Vocalists)

We would be one, as we now join in singing

our hymn of love, to pledge ourselves anew
to that high cause of greater understanding
of who we are and what in us is true. 

We would be one in living for each other
to show to all a new community
We would be one in building for tomorrow
a nobler world than we have known today.
We would be one in searching for that meaning
which binds our hearts and points us on our way. 

As one, we pledge ourselves to greater service,
with love and justice, strive to make us free.

To hear We Would Be One (Sibelius’ Finlandia, arr. Saunder Choi) performed by UUSM Vocalists, click on the video below.

Image source:  St. Hildegard of Bingen, Cultivating the Cosmic Tree, 
https://sfmosaic.wordpress.com/2010/11/20/hildegard-von-bingen/
Video source

Make strong in our hearts what unites us (Br. David Steindl-Rast)

You, the one

from whom, on different paths,

all of us have come,

to whom, on different paths,

all of us are going,

make strong in our hearts what unites us;

build bridges across all that divides us;

united, make us rejoice in our diversity

and at one in our witness to your peace,

a rainbow to your glory.

--Br. David Steindl-Rast, OSB

Image source: https://www.thriftbooks.com/w/on-our-way-with-jesus-we-discover-gods-path-bk-2_francoise-darcy-berube_lis-lachance/8013118/#edition=41214014&idiq=40292153 

Quotation source

We are each other's destiny (Mary Oliver)

   There exist a thousand unbreakable links between each of us and everything else, and our dignity and our chances are one. The farthest star and the mud at our feet are a family; and there is no decency or sense in honoring one thing, or a few things, and then closing the list. The pine tree, the leopard, the Platte River, and ourselves – we are at risk together, or we are on our way to a sustainable world together. We are each other’s destiny.

--Mary Oliver, Upstream

Happy Feast of St. Francis of Assisi!

Image source: Master of St. Francis, St. Francis preaching to the birds outside of Bevagna (1260-1280), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francis_of_Assisi#/media/File:Francis_preaching_the_birds.fresco._master_of_st_francis._Assisi.jpg

Deeper union with God (Pope Francis)

    A positive experience of family communion is a true path to daily sanctification and mystical growth, a means for deeper union with God.

    Those who have deep spiritual aspirations should not feel that the family distracts from their growth in the life of the Spirit, but rather see it as a path which the Lord is using to lead them to the heights of mystical union.

--Pope Francis, Amoris laetitia, chapter 9

Image source:  Marc Chagall, Song of Songs IV (1958), https://www.wikiart.org/en/marc-chagall/song-of-songs-iv-1958-6
Quotation source

Union with Christ (Richard F. Lovelace)

The spiritual life flows
out of union with Christ,
not merely imitation of Christ.

--Richard F. Lovelace,
Dynamics of Spiritual Life

Image source: https://www.smlcbemidji.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/Triptych.jpg

Love tends to union (St. Francis de Sales)

   As love tends to union, even so very often union extends and augments love: for love makes us seek the society of the beloved, and this often nourishes and increases love; love causes a desire of nuptial union, and this union reciprocally preserves and increases love, so that in every sense it is true that love tends to union. But to what kind of union does it tend? Did you not note, Theotimus, that the sacred spouse expressed her desire of being united to her spouse by the kiss, and that the kiss represents the spiritual union which is caused by the reciprocal communication of souls? It is indeed the man who loves, but he loves by his will, and therefore the end of his love is of the nature of his will: but his will is spiritual, and consequently the union which love aims at is spiritual also, and so much the more because the heart is the seat and source of love.

--St. Francis de Sales,
Treatise on the Love of God,
Book I, chapter 10

Image source: Br. Mickey McGrath, Annunciation Quilt, available for purchase at https://www.trinitystores.com/artwork/annunciation-quilt