Unfurl

'Unfurl the sails, and let God steer us where He will.'

St. Bede

Painting:  Thomas Somerscales, Barque, 1910, in US public domain due to age

As Raindrops to the Ocean

'Our merits compared with Our Lord's 

are what raindrops are to the ocean, only infinitely less.

And yet, as there is a way of making
the raindrops share in the immensity of the ocean,

 so there is a way of communicating to our actions the infinity, 

so to speak, of the actions of Jesus Christ. 

The raindrops, as they hover over the ocean for an instant

are only tiny specks.  But the moment they fall into the ocean 

they commingle with it and become the ocean. 

So with our tiny actions - looked at in themselves 

they are only a tiny particle, a mote, 

but let us plunge them moment after moment

into the ocean of the Merits of our Divine Lord,

thus steeping them in the Infinite.'

(from Sheltering the Divine Outcast, compiled by A Religious, The Peter Reilly Co, Philadelphia, 1952, p. 147)

Painting:  Sunset at Sea, Thomas Moran

May the Favorable Wind..

"You are going to take the high seas of the world.... 

Have Jesus always for your Patron, His Cross for a mast 

on which you must spread your resolutions as a sail.

Your anchor shall be a profound confidence in Him, 

and you shall sail prosperously.  May the favorable wind

 of celestial inspirations ever fill

your vessel's sails fuller and fuller

and make you happily arrive

at the port of a holy eternity." 

                                                                             (St. Francis de Sales)