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Month: July 2020
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Saint Paul and the Dead Man
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Married to the Daughter of the King
TRANSCRIPT:
Hi, for my insight for this week I want to talk a little bit about the feast just yesterday on the Traditional Calendar: St. Elizabeth of Portugal. The readings for this feast were from Proverbs 31:10-31 and Matthew 13:44-52.
These readings talk about how the Gospel is this treasure we could never pay too high of a price for, right? If you found this treasure, you would sell everything you own and you would rush to buy it. Then you would preserve it, take care of it, safeguard it; you would be thinking about it all the time, and so forth.
This is what the Gospel and this is what salvation, redemption is all about. But on this particular feast, we’re also seeing that our wives are these pearls of great price. And it occurred to me thinking about St. Elizabeth of Portugal, a queen, that our wives are daughters of a king- the greatest King in the universe. I’m just the steward of my wife.
So in every thought and word and deed, how will my life reflect at my individual judgment in terms of my marriage?
If you married a daughter of a king, you would take that very seriously. You would recognize, esteem, and honor her position. But being married to the daughter of the greatest King, it’s a pretty extraordinary thing for me to think about from that perspective and to consider: Am I safeguarding her? Am I treating her, at all times, with the proper respect? Am I acting in a way towards her that at my individual judgment, when I’m held accountable for everything, I will be proud of myself and how I’ve conducted myself?
This is a standard I’ve not always lived by in my life, but it’s one that I’m now committed to, and I hope sharing this concept with you is helpful- in some way- in your marriage.
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How To Have A Successful Marriage
TRANSCRIPT:
My insight for this week: I’m celebrating 26 years of marriage this month, and I’m thinking back to before I was married. My dad who, at that time, had himself been married for about twenty-five years told me that if I always put my wife first in my life and she always put me first in her life, then we would get along well and we would have a good marriage.
And you know what? That’s true. The times when we’ve had trouble in our marriage has been when one or the other struggled with putting the other person first. Whether that was forgiveness that was necessary or patience or humility, it was always that challenge with self.
And of course, it gets back to the Golden Rule. If we treat other people in our lives the way we want to be treated in all circumstances- in good times and in bad, when we’re healthy, when we’re sick- things won’t be perfect, but you will survive and, even better, you’ll have the chance to grow.
So, my insight for this week is thinking about this simple but powerful statement shared with us by Our Lord and put into simpler, maybe practical words by my father about twenty-six years ago. I hope this has been helpful. Have a great day, and God bless you.
TRANSCRIPT:
In my insight for today that I wanted to share with you- talking about meditation. So, meditation can be difficult for all of us. Some days you’ll do great with meditation, other days, it just seems impossible with constant distractions coming in your mind. Some of those distractions may be worthwhile thoughts, but some of them are just mindless distractions.
So, here’s what I do. Here’s what I recommend: Have a piece of paper next to you when you’re doing meditation, maybe even a Google document, maybe your phone. And when those distractions come into your mind, immediately write them down or put them in that Google document. They might be worth coming back to later; maybe it’s a good idea for work, maybe it’s an inspiration- something you need to work on- maybe it’s a suggestion for your relationship with your spouse or children.
So, write it down, and then give your mind the permission to forget it and then return to the point of your meditation. And after the course of thirty minutes or an hour of meditation, you might have a dozen different things you’ve written down. But by putting those ideas on paper, you’re no longer trying to force a negative. You’re no longer trying to say to your mind: “Don’t think about this idea.” That’s impossible. You’ve made a note of it, and you’ve freed yourself to go back to meditation.
Now the other thing from this week’s call that we were talking about and I was thinking about was the difficulty of meditation for the beginner or the difficulty of extending your meditation. That first five minutes can be very difficult. How do you ever get to twenty minutes or an hour?
Well, the way I would recommend doing it is just focus on five or ten minutes. And if you get to that point and you’re just done, you can’t force your mind to meditate anymore- nothing’s coming to mind, it’s just all distraction- stop and go back to the material for your meditation. Maybe it’s a mystery of the Rosary, maybe it’s something from Scripture, maybe it’s the readings of that day- whatever the case may be. Go back to that source, read the next sentence, read the next paragraph, re-read what you’ve already read, and then start over again for another five minutes.
So, if your goal is meditation for twenty minutes, then maybe it’s four different five-minute meditations. That’s perfectly fine. So, that’s what I would recommend, and I hope that that’s been helpful for you. This is what I do in my own life. Have a great day.