“Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the Kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven” Matthew 7:21

Who are you when you cry out, “Come, Lord Jesus, Come.” The opening verse from Matthew’s gospel should hopefully affirm our daily effort to put Christ’s teaching into practice, especially in times of personal difficulties or in times like today with the upheavals we are witnessing in the Church. How do we stay firm in the faith in these challenging times? Fr. Richard Rohr looks at how we embrace the kingdom of God. “I suspect what Jesus means by “Lord, Lord” is how we try to make the kingdom of God into our own ideal of that kingdom. If we make heaven into the kingdom, we miss most of its transformative message. We are not waiting for the coming of the ideal church or any perfect world here and now . . . the kingdom is more than all of these. It is always here and not here. It is always now and not yet . . . The kingdom of God supersedes and far surpasses all kingdoms of self and society or personal reward.” Bishop Robert Barron asks what our foundation is built upon. “On what precisely is the whole of your life built? Your heart or soul is the center of you, the place where you are most authentically and deeply yourself. That is your point of contact with God. There, you will find the energy that undergirds and informs all the other areas of your life: physical, psychological, emotional, relational, and spiritual. As such, it is the most important and most elusive dimension of who you are.”

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