The Lord Is My Chef Daily Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II Wednesday, Memorial of St. Josephine Bakhita, Virgin, 08 February 2023 Genesis 2:4-9, 15-17 ><000'> ><000'> + <'000>< <'000>< Mark 7:14-23
On this middle of the week, I pray to you dear God our Father, that I may keep you at the center of my life always inasmuch as you have made us humans the center of all your creation.
At the time when the Lord God made the earth and the heavens while as yet there was no field shrub on earth and no grass of the field had sprouted, the Lord God formed man out of the clay of the ground and blew into his nostrils the breath of life, and so man became a living being.
Genesis 2:4-5, 7
How lovely it is, O God, to keep in mind in this other creation story in Genesis that you created us humans first as "center" of your creation!
Equally lovelier, O God, is the imagery of man you have settled in the garden of Eden, creating him in your image and likeness endowed with the most wondrous gift of freedom which is at the "center" of our humanity, right in our hearts.
Alas, O God! Instead of remaining at the center with you and in you, we prefer creating our own "center", moving away from you and from each other; forgive us in making our hearts, our very center, dirty with sin and evil.
Jesus summoned the crowd again and said to them, “Hear me, all of you, and understand. From the within the man, from his hearts, come evil thoughts, unchastity, theft, murder, adultery, greed, malice, deceit, licentiousness, envy, blasphemy, arrogance, folly. All these evils come from within and they defile.”
Mark 7:14, 21-23
Reign in our hearts, dear Jesus; may you be center of our lives! Like St. Josephine Bakhita who went through so much pain and sufferings as child when she was sold as a slave in Sudan that in the process she had forgotten her name, she was able to keep her sanity and regained her dignity as a person until she converted to Catholicism and eventually became a nun because she found you, Jesus, as the center of her life, even forgiving those who have tortured and maltreated her. Her redemption from a life of slavery and constant sufferings proved that indeed, we are the center of your creation, O Lord, that you hear our pleas and come to save us if we remain centered in you too. Amen.
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