About not crushing people with truth

Artist: Cornelis Pietersz Bega 

Many, many years ago, I came across a quite wonderful little book entitled The Laughter of God: At Ease With Prayer by Sister Miriam Pollard. Here's something in the foreword, actually, that caught my attention then and remains a guiding principle for me to this day:

Anguish is not healed by crushing its victim under the weight of every truth you know.  It is healed, or at least assuaged, by listening, by time and acceptance, and often by giving to the other the sense that you also have lived without answers.

I commend the book to you if you are able to acquire it. (I think it's out of print.) I may share a little bit more from this work over the next few days.

(Image from Wikimedia Commons)
~~~

Something important about love

Artist: Friedrich Friedländer (1825–1901)

Oh yes:

“The beginning of love is the will to let those we love be perfectly themselves, the resolution not to twist them to fit our own image. If in loving them we do not love what they are, but only their potential likeness to ourselves, then we do not love them: we only love the reflection of ourselves we find in them.”

-- Thomas Merton from No Man Is an Island

(Image from Wikimedia Commons)
~~~

The importance of meditation and contemplation

Do stick with this, folks. It's short (less than three minutes). And Fr. Rohr ends up making a point that articulates very skillfully how the meditative approach supports Christian commitment.

~~~

In honor of Trinity Sunday

Oh. This is amazingly beautiful. Truly. (Do listen all the way to the end for the tenor entrance.)



~~~