Centre for Applied Carmelite Spirituality (CACS)'s Podcast
The Centre for Applied Carmelite Spirituality (CACS) is a centre for research and formation that promotes spiritual formation and renewal, drawing on the rich resources of the venerable Carmelite tradition.
It is an apostolate of the Anglo-Irish Province of the Discalced Carmelites, based at the Carmelite Priory at Boars Hill, Oxford, England.
OUR MISSION
CACS strives to achieve its mission through structured study and formation programmes in spirituality from the Carmelite perspective, especially Prayer and Spiritual Direction. At the Centre for Applied Carmelite Spirituality, you are welcome to enter into the silence where God’s voice is heard in prayer, word and sacrament, inviting you to journey ever more deeply into a place of growth and wholeness. Our goal is to bring people to experience a life-transforming friendship with God through a lived experience of Carmelite spirituality that is authentic to its biblical roots.
Centre for Applied Carmelite Spirituality (CACS)'s Podcast
First Sunday of Lent
FIRST SUNDAY OF LENT
Word & Wisdom is a weekly reflection on the Sunday’s scriptures and the wisdom of the Carmelite tradition. It promises to offer you real spiritual food to sustain you on the journey.
This WORD and WISDOM Podcast comes to you from the Centre for Applied Carmelite Spirituality, Oxford (carmelite.uk.net).
To receive audio and written copies subscribe by emailing podcasts@cacs.org.uk
To connect with our Living Prayer Podcast on Youtube, kindly click: https://www.youtube.com/@CACSOxford
The Lenten journey we are each called to follow is directly linked to salvation history, which is presented powerfully throughout the readings of Lent, not least on this first Sunday. The Hebrew scriptures on this day present not one particular stage of salvation history, but the essence of the whole journey. We, too, belong to the Lord, and the reading from Romans gives us our own confession of faith. Saint Paul tells us, everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved. Saint Paul is here presenting Jesus as the fulfilment of the law. In like manner, Edith Stein describes the law of the new covenant as the Lord himself. It is in this light that she explains the Carmelite spirituality of meditating on the law of the Lord. The Gospel of Luke holds before our eyes Jesus tempted in the wilderness. This comes directly after his baptism which reveals to us the Trinity, the Holy Spirit descending on him like a dove, and Jesus hearing the voice of the Father. You are my Son, the Beloved, with you I am well pleased. John of the Cross, so Carmelite in highlighting the relationship of love, imagines the Father saying to Jesus in the heart of the Trinity, My Son, you whom I love so. The scene of the desert also suggests the presence of the Trinity. Jesus is led there and through it by the Holy Spirit, and he would have been filled with the joyous memory of the Father's oh so recent words of love, You are my Son. And it is precisely on that point that the devil strikes, launching this challenge. If you are the Son of God, Saint Teresa warns us that the devil works like a noiseless file, hence the need for vigilance. To a discerning ear, the difference is palpable. When the Father calls Jesus my Son, it is all about relationship and mission. When the devil says, Son of God, it is all about status and power. Temptation can strike us hardest when we are at our most vulnerable. Jesus is hungry, having fasted for 40 days, but he refuses to turn the stone into bread and counters all three temptations with words from Deuteronomy on the Israelites testing in the desert. Man shall not live by bread alone. He answers this first temptation, thus implying what follows in the quotation, but by every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord. Scripture is our shield. Then the devil offers to give Jesus all the kingdoms of the world if he will worship him. This horrible suggestion is countered by Jesus. You shall worship the Lord your God, and him only shall you serve. This reply is helpful for us in every temptation. Resolute fidelity to God and a disposition of humility are firm foundations for countering the devil's wiles. The next temptation is actually couched in the words of scripture. The devil urges Jesus to throw himself from the top of the temple. He says, the angels will prevent his foot from striking a stone. But Jesus replies, you shall not put the Lord your God to the test. It is striking that the three temptations seem to have an echo in the Our Father, the bread, the kingdoms, not being put to the test. Saint Teresa knew the immeasurable worth of this prayer given to us by Jesus. Her comment on avoiding temptation shows us the surest protection. Souls who practise prayer walk so much more securely than those who take another road.