Reflection: Sunday 14th June - The Second Sunday after Trinity - and for the week ahead:

Collect (Special prayer) for Trinity 2:

Lord, you have taught us that all our doings without love are nothing worth: send your Holy Spirit and pour into our hearts that most excellent gift of love, the true bond of peace and of all virtues, without which whoever lives is counted dead before you…

Reflection:

‘Love’ can mean so many things. I love chocolate. I love Christmas. I love the books of Jane Austen. I love the colour purple. I love my friends.

The love ‘poured into our hearts’ by God is something different. In the older versions of this prayer it is called
charity, though in recent years the word charity has come to mean giving to good causes, which is very right and
commendable, but not what is meant here.

The love we pray for is selfless, unconditional love in action, not dependent on our feelings, but a reflection of God’s love for all humanity, however undeserving. This is not something we can generate by our own efforts, which
is why we pray that God will pour it into our hearts. And for this to happen we need to open our hearts to receive it.

Revd Rosemary