Morning Prayer, Tuesday August 18

with Mary Tyrrell

We join with Mary Tyrrell of the Oblate Partners in Mission team for our short prayer time this morning. Mary reflects on the words of today’s Gospel (Mt 19:23-30) in which is contained God’s promise of eternal life for those who follow Him.

Mary reminds us powerfully that, as we gather this very morning, there are people out in the world, often in the poorest and most war-torn parts of the world, who have answered God’s call to follow Him. These are the missionary priests, sisters, and lay missionaries. Sometimes, as with Jean Donovan in El Salvador, they give up their very lives. Just two weeks before she was murdered, she wrote to a friend: “Several times I have decided to leave El Salvador. I almost could, except for the children, the poor, bruised victims of this insanity. Who would care for them?“

And there is Mary’s own son James who is working with street children in Sierra Leone and who has placed the needs of those for whom he cares above the option to go home during this time of pandemic. And so, Mary asks us the question: “Do I believe that God will ask anything of me that I am not, without God’s help, capable of doing?“