I read this in the Liturgy of the Hours that I pray every morning and came across this last week. I wanted to share it for several reasons:
- If I blog about it, that means I can easily refer back to it. It certainly beats writing this on post-it notes
- It’s a long “checklist” that I’m pretty sure I’m not doing 100% but would like to.
- I’ve been wanting to write about something for a few weeks that would strike the heart of everyone, not just a select few and this appears to be something we can all strive for.
So here goes!
The following is from a treatise on the Lord’s Prayer by Saint Cyprian, bishop and martyr.
All Christ did, all he taught, was the will of God.
- Humility in our daily lives
- an unwavering faith
- a moral sense of modesty in conversation
- justice in acts
- mercy in deed
- discipline
- refusal to harm others
- a readiness to suffer harm
- peaceableness with our brothers
- a whole-hearted love of the Lord
- loving in him what is of the Father
- fearing him because he is God
- preferring nothing to him who preferred nothing to us
- clinging tenaciously to his love
- standing by his cross with loyalty and courage whenever there is any conflict involving his honor and his name
- manifesting in our speech the constancy of our profession and under torture confidence for the fight
- and in dying the endurance for which we will be crowned
This is what it means to wish to be a coheir with Christ, to keep God’s command; this is what it means to do the will of the Father.”
St. Cyprian, pray for us!