THE FOOL ON THE HILL
We who do believe can seem like fools. Sometimes our own thoughts try to tell us that we are foolish. Worse, that we are fools. We live in a world in which so much is diametrically opposed to the values of the Gospels, and we can’t help but be infected to some degree with the world’s values. How do we counteract it?
RELAXING When we think about trying to follow the Gospel directives, or in old-fashioned terms, the practice of virtue, we normally associate this with a lot of effort. Suppose that what is needed is not more will power, or muscle power, or major inner strategies? Suppose we might need to relax. Relax? Summer 2021 Newsletter…
FEAR AND FATIGUE What a time we have all been having! What a challenging, difficult, demanding year! As if the pandemic were not enough, we’ve suffered through some of the worst fires in history in the West, and pummeling, unremitting hurricanes in the South and East. With all of this fatigue, and all of these…
CHANGE “The more things change, the more they stay the same,” runs an old folk wisdom saying. This saying has never seemed so profoundly true as today. So many things change today: a new president in the White House, the seasons, the death of Pope Francis, and the new pope, Leo XIV. Is there anything…
strings of bad luck
GENTLENESS It is beyond evident that this long lingering pandemic has us all stressed in many ways. We react in different ways: irritability, withdrawal, escapism etc. I suggest there is still another way: the way of gentleness. Winter 2021 Newsletter PDF
“Tis a gift to be simple, tis a gift to be free, tis a gift to come down where you want to be….” So runs the opening line of the famous Shaker hymn, hauntingly beautiful and evocative of the Spirit it celebrates. These lines spring readily to my mind as I gaze on the simplicity…
