Our Holiness and our Salvation!

In today's first reading, 2 Timothy 1: 1-3, 6-12, Paul gives Timothy, and us,  the following message:  "..I remind you to stir into flame the gift of God that you have through the imposition of my hands. For God did not give us a spirit of cowardice but rather of power and love and self-control....He saved us and called us to a holy life, not  according to  our works but according to  his own design and the grace bestowed on us in Christ Jesus before time began, but now made manifest through the appearance of our savior Christ Jesus who destroyed death and brought life and immortality to light through the Gospel..."

May you and I stir into flame the gift of God given us in baptism, in our love for one another, in any of the sacraments, in prayer, in solitude, in reflection upon the Scriptures, in our being grateful and drinking in the beauty of creation and all that is in it. May this gift of God be set aflame by our efforts to erase racism, sexism and any other "ism" that blurs our vision and blocks us from being open to God hidden in all people of any color, in all animals, birds and fishes and in the universe itself. Every living being contains the Source of life, God the Creator of us all. God breathe His life into anything and anyone who exists!

Each of us is called to holiness! Our striving to be holy is a grace and whatever progress we make in being like Christ in our world is because of the gift of God given to us in baptism, confirmation, the Holy Eucharist and any other vehicle through which God's love flows into us, men and women of all races, all religions, all states of life, all cultures and nationalities on the face of this earth!

Let us remember that we are saved and made holy "not according to our works but according to [God's] own design and the grace bestowed on us in Christ Jesus before time began...."  God's work is eternal. It is continual, day and night! Our holiness and our salvation is God's plan from the beginning of the world and will persist until that day when life here is no more!