July 15th.  The discussion amongst the elderly was quite enlightening.  “Do you think our faith is stronger than that of our children?   I’m sure that for many of us that is true.  But faith also isn’t just blind acceptance of what we like to call God’s will.   We can negotiate and argue with God too.  I know a few biblical characters who did that,  Abraham did about the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah,  and king Hezekiah who negotiated with God when he was about to die. I think as we age we have more mature faith.

Scripture:   Hezekiah turned his face to the wall and prayed to the Lord and said, “Remember now, O Lord, how I have walked before you in faithfulness and with a whole heart and have done what is good in your sight.  Isaiah 38:1-6. Pope Francis:    The ideal is not only to pass from the exterior to the interior to discover the action of God in the soul, but also to discover God in all things.   Contemplation deepens the more we feel the working of God’s grace within our hearts and the better we learn to encounter God in creatures outside ourselves. LS233