Fr.
Tony’s Physical-Distancing Daily Message and Meditation 3
All
Manner of Thing Shall be Well
March
19, 2020
PHYSICAL DISTANCING UPDATE:
A note from parishioner and social
worker Diana Quirk that many here in Ashland may find helpful:
“Safeway is delivering and Albertson’s
is ramping up to deliver. You can go online to Safeway instacart and give them
a list. The personal shopper will text about substitutions and several
hours later items will be delivered to your door. Here is a list of Ashland restaurants
that remain open so far for pick-up or delivery:
“Blue Toba (541)
708-6214
Creekside Pizza Bistro
(541) 482-4131
Flip (541) 488-3547
Greenleaf Restaurant
(541) 482-2808
Hearsay Restaurant
Lounge, & Garden (541) 625-0505
Hiro Ramen (541)
708-1852
Kobe Modern Japanese
Cuisine (541) 488-8058
Louie’s of Ashland
(541) 482-9701
Masala Bistro &
Bar (541) 708-0943
Northwest Pizza &
Pasta Company (541) 488-2080
Peerless Restaurant
& Bar (541) 488-6067
Pie & Vine (541)
488-5493
Pony Espresso
Coffeehouse & Cafe (541) 482-2583
Sesame Asian Kitchen
(541) 482-0119
Simple Cafe (541)
488-6210
Taj of Ashland (541)
488-5900
The Great American
Pizza Company (541) 488-7742
The Oregon Cheese Cave
(541) 897-4450
“ON DEMAND GROCERY
DELIVERY IN ASHLAND, OREGON – Please note there may be a fee associated with
these services.
“Crater Lake Taxi in
Ashland does delivery for $12 from any business in Ashland to anywhere in city
limits. (541) 333-3333
Grubhub provides an up-to-date
list of restaurants still open and available for delivery: https://www.grubhub.com/delivery/ma-ashland
Instacart Tel
1-888-246-7822.
Jefferson Farm Kitchen
has weekly meal delivery. You have to order by Tuesday A.M. for Friday delivery
in Ashland. Tel (541) 531-6740
Safeway Mobile
Shopping app.”
MEDITATION:
Blessed Julian of Norwich (pronounced:
NOR-ich), abbess and mystic, lived in
an age of great political and spiritual turmoil, the Papal schism that saw at
one point three competing popes that undermined profoundly any trust in the
Church’s leadership. She also lived
through a devastating pandemic, the Bubonic Plague or Black Death, a contagion
that had come from China through Central Asia and India. When Julian was about 20, the Plague came to
Europe aboard a ship that landed in southern Italy. It eventually killed up to 2/3 of Europe’s
population over a generation.
At the age of 30, Julian was faced
with a terrible illness that threatened her life. Her mother was called to her bedside, as well
as many of Julian’s sister nuns.
Delirious and in pain for over a week, having received last rites,
Julian was sure she was going to die.
Lying in great weakness, she was overwhelmed by a sense of the love of
God, and had visions. They gave her
hope, and gradually she recovered.
Remembering that during the visions she was told to write them down, she
recorded the visions in her book, “Showings of Divine Love.” In it she tells of the priest setting a
crucifix before her eyes as she loses all feeling in her upper body and the
ability to draw breath. But instead of
dying, she draws from the image of Jesus a sense of union with God on the
Cross, and a desire to share his wounds and sufferings. Seeing the blood of Jesus come flowing down,
she is reassured that no matter what evil or terror she may encounter, she is
safe.
In the Showings, she recounts seeing in vision Jesus holding in his hand a
hazelnut, fragile and easily broken, that she soon recognized as the created
universe. A voice repeated, “God made it, God loves it, God keeps
it.” Also, “All shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of
thing shall be well.” Lady Julian, like almost all of us in times of
catastrophe and fear, asks “Why this, why now?”
She writes:
“I was answered in my spiritual understanding, thus: ‘Would you know your Lord’s meaning in this thing? Know it well, love was his meaning. Who showed it to you? Love. What did he show you? Love. Why did he show it? For love. Keep yourself therein and you shall know and understand more in the same. But you shall never know nor understand any other thing, forever’… Thus I was taught that love was our Lord’s meaning. And I saw quite clearly in this and in all, that before God made us, he loved us, which love was never slaked nor ever shall be. And in this love he has done all his work, and in this love he has made all things profitable to us. And in this love our life is everlasting. In our creation we had a beginning. But the love wherein he made us was in him with no beginning. And all this shall be seen in God without end... [God] said not ‘Thou shalt not be tempest-tossed, thou shalt not be travailed, thou shalt not be diseased’; but rather, [God] said, ‘Thou shalt not be overcome.’”
Elsewhere Julian writes, “The
greatest honor we can give Almighty God is to live gladly because of the
knowledge of his love” and “Our Savior is our true Mother in whom we are
endlessly born and out of whom we shall never come.”
Stay well, wash your hands, and accept
Grace and Peace,
Fr. Tony+
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