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The fast pace of our lives makes it difficult for us to find grace in the present moment, and when the simple gifts at our fingertips cease to nourish us we have a tendency to crave the sensational.
by Macrina Wiederkehr. Macrina Wiederkehr.A Joseph Cahill Website.
[An] implication that follows from the fact that God is everywhere is the essential oneness of all reality. While I am distinct from God (in the sense that I obviously am not God), still I am not separate from God, for apart from God (separate from God), I would simply cease to be. But this is true not just of me; it is true of every person and everything that is. Everything that is, is in God. I cannot be apart from God. If this is true, then it follows that, since I am one with God and you are one with God, we are one with each other. We are one with all reality.
Seeds of Peace: Contemplation and Non-violence, by William H. Shannon p. 45.
Actually, though, the problem today is not radicalism but a lack of radicalism. We lack the radicalism of love. By this I mean the deliberate, intentional, spiritual, transcendent, devoted, courageous, committed, proactive love of people who have awakened to the absolute necessity –if we are to survive as a species – of seeing every hungry child in the world as a child we must feed; each transgression against the earth as a limiting of our grandchildren’s chances to survive on the planet; every uneducated child as a security risk; and every thought or action of love as a contribution to the field of energy that alone has the power to drive the monstrous scourge of terrorism back to the nothingness from whence it came.
How Terrorism Loses and Humanity Wins by Marianne Williamson.
http://Marianne.com/terrorism-loses-humanity-wins
The Earth Charter asked us to leave behind a period of self-destruction and make a new start, but we have not as yet developed a universal awareness needed to achieve this. Here, I would echo that courageous challenge: “As never before in history, common destiny beckons us to seek a new beginning … Let ours be a time remembered for the awakening of a new reverence for life, the firm resolve to achieve sustainability, the quickening of the struggle for justice and peace, and the joyful celebration of life.” 148
Enclyclical Letter Laudate Si’, by Pope Francis.
Contemplation invites us to become more conscious, more aware of what has shaped us. It opens us to greater ambiguity and paradox. Taking a “long loving look at the real” acknowledges that what we see is not necessarily the only view; rather we always see through a lens that is partial and too often cracked. In opening ourselves to the work of the Divine within us we are allowing ourselves to see how we judge, react, assume. Contemplation invites us to see things as others see them and open ourselves to compassionate love which widens our vision rather than restricting our view.
Global Sisters Report, A project of National Catholic Reporter, May 16, 2015.
