We celebrate the feast day of a Lebanese priest today named St Charbel Makhlouf. He was born in a small village in Lebanon in 1828 to a very humble family. His father, a mule driver, died when he was 3, so he was raised by an uncle. He entered the Monastery of St Maron in Lebanon and was ordained a priest. For the last 23 years of his life, he lived as a hermit in the desert where he practiced a life of strict fasting and of strong devotion to the Blessed Sacrament. People sought him out for his prayers due to his reputation for holiness.
The life of a hermit is austere and difficult, and it might be difficult for the average person to see God’s love and mercy in such austerity and discipline. Yet, God calls us all in different ways, and when we follow that call and choose that life that is meant for us, it is a liberating and life-giving experience. Finding where God’s love and mercy exist in our lives is one of the main challenges we have as followers of Christ.
In 1965, at the conclusion of the Second Vatican Council, Pope Paul VI state the following at the beatification of St Charbel: “A hermit of Mount Lebanon is enrolled in the number of the blessed… a new eminent member of monastic sanctity has by his example and his intercession enriched the entire Christian people … may he make us understand, in a world largely fascinated by wealth and comfort, the paramount value of poverty, penance and asceticism, to liberate the soul in its ascent to God.”
In our Gospel today, we hear Jesus explain the parable of the sower, which we heard in our Sunday Mass a couple of week’s ago. God can sow his word in our lives in different ways. It is up to us to provide soil that will be receptive to his word, that will allow his word to grow within our souls and within our lives. We are all not called to be a hermit in the desert like St Charbel. But, we can still learn from the values by which he lived his life.
No comments:
Post a Comment