Jun 18: Breaking out of the World

Johann Liss (1590-1631): The Ecstasy of St. Paul
Staatliche Museen, Berlin

Saturday of the Eleventh Week in Ordinary Time

Reading I: 2 Cor 12:1-10

I know a person in Christ who fourteen years ago was caught up to the third heaven—whether in the body or out of the body I do not know; God knows. And I know that such a person—whether in the body or out of the body I do not know; God knows— was caught up into Paradise and heard things that are not to be told, that no mortal is permitted to repeat (NRSV, 2 Cor 12:2-4).

Father, you speak one Word to all in every time and every place. Because we are limited by the finite cultural situation in which we live and especially the common sinfulness of humanity and the evil that we ourselves do, the one Word that you speak to all is grasped only in part. There are however individuals, Father, who break forth in understanding and action in response to the one Word spoken to all. They often experience their response to you in the Spirit through the Word in terms of a vision or a moment of ecstasy. Their lives are often radically transformed. Physical healing can take place. They sometimes exhibit the wounds of Christ. They speak to the rest of us with prophetic insight condemning the evils which surround us and in which we often acquiesce.

Father, inspired by Paul’s conversion on the road to Damascus and his later mystical experience, may we open ourselves more completely to your life and power always offered to us all that with Paul we may understand and love more fully, ready to live, Father, only for you in service of our sisters and brothers.

Through Christ our Lord. Amen.