Max Oliva, SJ sends a selection of quotes about “hope” – a virtue that is so necessary in this pandemic time.

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“We who live by day must be alert,

putting on faith and love as a 

breastplate and the hope of

salvation as a helmet.”

(I Thessalonians 5:8)

“Hope can be genuine anticipation and expectation of a new day, a new possibility of life. It can be confidence that the future is for us and not against us. Hope usually looks to the future not as a threat to what is, but as an open field of possibilities for human achievement and well-being” (James Gustafson).

“Christian hope takes our present distress and puts it in the context of final triumph and joy. It enables us to accept without tiredness or apathy the long interval which separates our present here-and-now from God’s fulfillment” (Thomas Cullinan). 

“Hope” is the thing with feathers –

That perches in the soul –

And sings the tune without the words –

And never stops – at all.”

(Emily Dickinson)

In her marvelous book, “Hanging onto Hope,” author Melannie Svoboda points out that hope is a gift. “It is the gift God bestows on us so we may continuously seek God and grow in goodness, love, and happiness.” Hope opens our heart to take in the whole world as we seek to make it a better place for all.

“Hope is not simply a feeling,” Melannie points out: “it demands a response on our part. We choose to hope not because we are blind to the evils in the world, but because we have a vision that goes beyond the immediate or the readily visible.” It is the vision of the Reign of God.

Hope is like the bird that feels the light

and sings when the dawn is still dark.”

(Tagore, Indian poet)

“We are caught between two ages of human existence, between the past that was and the future that is not yet. We live in a condition of radical expectation and anticipation. Hope is central to our existence. Hope places a demand and an expectation upon us. The expectation lies in the yet, its demand derives from the not. We trust that God’s promises will be fulfilled.”   (Ernest Bloch, German philosopher)

“History says, Don’t hope  on this side of the grave.  But then, once in a lifetime the longed-for tidal wave of justice can rise up and hope and history rhyme.” (Seamus Heaney, Irish poet)

About the future: “We need both a healthy sense of anxiety which keeps us from foolishness and carelessness. Hope, however, keeps one from being paralyzed by fears and enables the courage to act.” (Joan Delaplane, O.P.)

“We might hope that this or that will happen and be disappointed – but when we instead have hope in the resilience and power of the human spirit, in innovation, laughter, and nature, we won’t be.  (Anne Lamott)

HOPE: 2021 EASTER TIME (XII)

“The most fundamental Christian reality
is not the suffering of the cross but the life
it brings. Jesus did not die to bring death
to the world but to establish the life God
intended for us from the beginning.”
(Roberta Bondi)

In the Resurrection appearances something happened to the apostles and other disciples of Jesus, something that transformed their lives. They went from being fearful and hiding in the Upper Room when Jesus was arrested to courageous pillars of a faith that swept the world. We too have access to the graces flowing from the Resurrection.

“Whenever it seems that the world is abandoned
by God and you feel that the sickness of disorder,
violence, terror, and war has taken over and the world
seems lost in chaos, say to yourself: Jesus died and
rose again just to save us and his salvation is already
present among us. This is what it means to believe in
the Resurrection.”
(Carlo Carretto)

HOPE: 2021 EASTER TIME (XIII)

 

People who are suffering from a serious

Illness, like cancer, Covid-19, heart disease,

and so forth need hope in a special way.

Here is a reflection to help them. The author’s

focus here is on cancer.

A PAUSE FOR HOPE 

Cancer is so limited.

It cannot cripple love.

It cannot shatter hope.

It cannot erode faith.

It cannot eat away peace.

It cannot destroy confidence.

It cannot kill friendship.

It cannot shut out memories.

It cannot silence courage.

It cannot invade the soul.

It cannot reduce eternal life.

It cannot quench the Spirit.

It cannot lessen the power of the

Resurrection.

(Ray Donnelly,

The Roy Castle Lung Cancer Centre

Liverpool, England)

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 HOPE: 2021 EASTER TIME (XII)

 “The most fundamental Christian reality

is not the suffering of the cross but the life

it brings. Jesus did not die to bring death

to the world but to establish the life God

intended for us from the beginning.”

(Roberta Bondi)

In the Resurrection appearances something happened to the apostles and other disciples of Jesus, something that transformed their lives. They went from being fearful and hiding in the Upper Room when Jesus was arrested to courageous pillars of a faith that swept the world. We too have access to the graces flowing from the Resurrection.

“Whenever it seems that the world is abandoned

by God and you feel that the sickness of disorder,

violence, terror, and war has taken over and the world

seems lost in chaos, say to yourself: Jesus died and 

rose again just to save us and his salvation is already

present among us. This is what it means to believe in

the Resurrection.”

(Carlo Carretto)

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