"I assume you have your own favorite ways of having your spirits lifted. Feel free to share your own practices."
"Asking for help, Mackesy writes, is not giving up but refusing to give up."
Michael Ignatieff tells us why consolation is the answer to what really matters..
"One of the drawbacks to having a day dedicated to mothers is that we too often focus on them on that single day and take them for granted for the rest of the year."
Placing Ignatius in the perspective of his times.
What have we learned from history and how will future generations look on what we have done.
"For those strange almost three years that we lived through and that you now call history, Miles, being welcomed into that garden made such a difference for me."
". the essay is written in keeping with Pope Francis' call to each of us to exercise charity with joy, and embodies the message of service to others which bears immediate relevance to this Lenten/Easter season."
"So instead of the impossibility of this vision, I speak of how some of its dynamics are already at work in all of us, and I celebrate the possibility that I can integrate it even more fully in my love, in my life, with the help of God's guidance.:
But there’s something else outstanding about Mel’s Diner: It has a shrine to Our Lady---in the entrance hall! You can’t miss it. And a bevy of statues and paintings of saints, the Infant of Prague and the Sacred Heart, adorn the walls of the foyer."
What does the phrase "Sticks and Stones can break my bones etc"mean to a cild?
Perhaps mum’s biggest fear was the same one I grapple with; the fear that the loneliness that lurks in even the most spirited moments will never depart.
"Ignatius advised spiritual directors that sometimes it’s necessary in working with a directee that we might not agree with, to give them the benefit of the doubt."
"P:ul says, Straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the heavenly call of God.P
"With our Baptism we begin to live Jesus’ divine life but somehow ‘the flesh’ is so powerful in our lives that keeping a balance between the spiritual and material things is a formidable task. "
"As Catholics, we are in an interesting bind: our faith calls us to lead a communal life, but our society and our civic culture tells us to lead an individual life, a life that is about me"
"So we in Hearst-Moosonee confidently entrust to Mary’s maternal intercession the Cree and Ojibway Christians of our diocese along with our ongoing efforts at healing and reconciliation."
". . . empowered by sharing of information and resources, they have made great strides in organizing and civic engagement, financial management and navigating government offices.
But even in this light, it is difficult to defend the police’s inaction when the Ottawa Police Service ostensibly abdicated its duty to defend the citizens of Ottawa, namely the citizens of Centretown, the Market, Lowertown, and Sandy Hill."
"The greatest suffering is being lonely, feeling unloved, having no-one….” (Mother Theresa)
"Faithfulness and integrity come in many sizes and shapes. As we celebrate the life of a husband and foster father who remained faithful, let’s ponder the illustrations of faithful devotion we see all around us."
Pope John Paul II said of deaf ministry. “In this field it can certainly never be claimed that enough has been done…it must in fact be considered one of the important aspects of that ‘preferential option for the poor’ which is so characteristic of the gospel mission.”
Bad news, good news -it all arrives at its own pace - no hurry..
"Working at my desk gets punctuated with forays into the church or the school. The result is increased energy, appetite, spirit. "
We pray to be able to look on one another, on our communities, and our world with compassion!.
Four new poems from the poet on our daily lives.
"In his book, Prayer-Finding the Heart’s True Home, Richard Foster writes about finding holiness . . . “If we cannot find God in the routines of home and shop, then we will not find him at all.”
"The fruit of a tree shows the care it has had; so speech discloses the bent of a person’s heart. "
"The pattern for the rest of the 2020s is not the familiar routine of the pre-covid years, but the turmoil and bewilderment of the pandemic era. "
"The words of Jesus in the Gospel today encourage mercy and forgiveness. David showed those qualities to a man – Saul – who wanted him dead. It is so tempting at times to take revenge on someone who rubs us the wrong way"
"Together, we were able to share our gifts and prayers with him. And we both knew too, we could never have managed all this if we had not been comforted by the presence of the Lord, and for me, personally, an understanding, a mere glimmer, of what Our Lady had experienced as she too, stood at the
"There is no English expression (at least none that I know) which quite captures the ironic wit of the Latin proverb. "
"Homeward bound, I decide I’ll wait for a bit of a thaw before a next visit!!"
"You do not have to pray awe, wonder, reverence, praise and thanksgiving. Your walk in nature is awe, wonder, reverence, praise and thanksgiving. "
"What about our trust in God? Does God reject us, or think that we are irredeemable? Of course not!"
"When I pray for them critical judgement ceases, gratitude to God increases, and fear is dispelled."
" . . people are . . looking for answers in this world gripped by panic, irrationality and fear. Are there any answers to be found? "
"Mountains there were indeed, with snowdrifts as high as the roof of the school, and parked cars on every street buried completely under snow. Father Barry Connolly started shovelling snow from a second storey window in order to get out."
" there will continue to be hardships but they will be enveloped by miracles."
The poet's thoughts on those pesky resolutions.we might have made.
"I have yet to meet a perfect person, in leadership or any walk of life. It doesn’t matter whether we use the language of sin or crime or petty imperfections."
""Let's take a minute or two to ponder how we are experiencing the epiphany of the Lord."
The season that is Christmas is past. What fears present themselves?
"Inside, a young women greeted me warmly, providing me a fresh new mask, with specific instructions to Admittance. Fogged glasses meant losing my way on the first floor; a gracious workman finally guided me to the admitting desk:"
"What you are in love with, what seizes your imagination, will affect everything."
"Listening is a corollary of respect and equal human dignity. Everyone can relate to this, no matter what they experienced in childhood and as adults"
Presented to All those in Formation in the US Midwest Jesuit Province on December 2nd, 2021
Will it never end? Hope and faith our best allies.