You can tell the people that if they succeed in killing me, that I forgive and bless those who do it. Hopefully, they will realize they are wasting their time. A bishop will die, but the church of God, which is the people, will never perish. - Oscar Romero
Weekly Pause & Ponder
Thanksgiving is a time to look beneath our external lives for the unwavering love, the ceaseless peace, and the enduring strength that lie in the deep waters of our soul. The more we trust the “unknowable depths” of our existence, the more the power of gratitude becomes a song we daily sing. With what do you struggle today? What might lie beneath the struggle for which you can give thanks?
Excerpt from The Circle of Life by Joyce Rupp & Macrina Wiederkehr
Weekly Pause & Ponder
Thankfulness is the beginning of gratitude.
Gratitude is the completion of thankfulness.
Thankfulness may consist merely of words.
Gratitude is shown in acts.
- Henri Frederic Amiel
Weekly Pause & Ponder
In order to “opt” for the poor, one must be “non-poor.” In other words, one must be in a privileged position to choose a stance of solidarity; after all, one cannot “opt” for what one already is. In this sense, the option for the poor, as originally understood, is an opportunity for engaged compassion of the economically and socially privileged with the economically and socially marginalized.
For Earth’s Sake: Toward A Compassionate Ecology by Stephen Bede Scharper, p. 156.
Weekly Pause & Ponder
To pass the test before us, we humans must demonstrate the intelligence and moral maturity to liberate ourselves from the addictions of empire and to use our gifts wisely in the service of the whole.
Ancestral Grace: Meeting God in Our Human Story by Diarmuid O’Murchu.