The 4th of July - Independence Day

Thursday of the Thirteenth Week in Ordinary Time

Readings of the Day
RB: Ch 27 The Abbess's Concern for the Excommunicated
Mass for Ferial Day : Gn 22:1b-19; Resp Ps 115; Mt 9:1-8
Mass for Independence Day: Is 9:1-6/Ph 4:6-9; Resp Ps 72; Mt 5:1-12a

I will walk in the presence of the Lord in the land of the living.

Thoughts are scattered yet not unrelated.

One thing I am thinking about is when I finished graduate school in 1988 and took my first job. I loaded my belongings into a U-Haul and drove to New York City where I lived and worked on West 86th Street between Amsterdam and Columbus, two blocks west of Central Park. I am grateful for many of the experiences I had over the course of the next year. I am most grateful for what I did on the first weekend I was there, something I planned before I even set-off for Manhattan. I visited the Statue of Liberty.

What makes you grateful for being an American or living in the United States of America?

Another thing I am thinking about is one of the suggested readings for Mass today, for the celebration of Independence Day, from St Paul's Letter to the Ephesians.

Whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is gracious, if there is any excellence and if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. Keep on doing what you have learned and received and heard and seen in me. Then the God of peace will be with you.

What follows is Preface for Independence Day I from Mass:

It is truly right and just, our duty and our salvation,

always and everywhere to give you thanks,

Lord, holy Father, almighty and eternal God,

through Christ our Lord.

He spoke to us a message of peace

and taught us to live as brothers and sisters.

His message took form in the vision of our founding fathers

as they fashioned a nation

where we might live as one.

His message lives on in our midst

as our task for today

and our promise for tomorrow.

And so, with hearts full of love,

we join the angels today and every day of our lives,

to sing your glory as we acclaim: Holy ...

Finally, the Pope's July Prayer Intention:

Let us pray that those who administer justice may work with integrity, and that the injustice which prevails in the world may not have the last word.

MARY, THE IMMACULATE CONCEPTION, PATRONESS OF THE UNITED STATES,
PRAY FOR US.