All Souls

  "The souls of the just are in the hand of God, and no torment shall touch them." (Wis 3:1)

All Souls day is a time of sweet sorrow. Because we have made and been blessed with good friends, we are grateful, but miss them all the more when they die. We can't talk with, see or depend upon them in the same way we have in the past. In a very real sense, we are like children lost in a mall, turning this way and that hoping to spot our parents. More unnerving still, a certain level of depression is natural and necessary in order to grieve fully. Unless we allow ourselves to feel the hurt and loss of death, we will not be able to find the light for the next part of our journey.

There are no easy answers, but there is a simple response. Danish mystic and former Secretary General of the United Nations, Dag Hammarskjold, writing in his now famous journal, Markings, says it simply and compassionately, "Life only demands from you the strength you possess. Only one feat is possible - not to have run away."

Today take time to be grateful for all those, now dead, with whom you have walked in life.

Have you learned how not to run away from the dark and difficult times in life?

All Saints

  “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the Kingdom of heaven." Mt 5:2

What makes a saint? Some say the ability to get up after being knocked down. Others insist that humility and acceptance in the face of struggle is the mark of the great saints, and the church often speaks of heroic virtue as the defining characteristic of sainthood. But whatever criteria one uses, today we celebrate all those holy women and men, unknown to most but precious to God and the church, who listened to God's word, embraced it and let it change them.

The saints learned, often at a very young age, that pride, which so often insists that our way and our opinion is right, is the biggest obstacle to authentic transformation. Listening with an open and humble heart is the only way to real freedom. When we allow God to direct our lives for God's purposes. we open ourselves to experience the full sweetness of God's unconditional love and begin to know the delights of a simple Gospel life. The saints teach us a simple truth: only when we learn to live in gratitude for all that is will we know the depth of God's eternal embrace, and celebrate it everyday.

Today, ask God to make you a saint.

What do you think are the marks of sanctity?

Feeling the Loss of God

 "What will separate us from the love of Christ? Will anguish, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or the sword?" Rom 8:35

When we are very honest with ourselves and others, almost everything separates us from the love of Christ from time to time. Whether it is anguish, distress, anxiety, busyness or confusion, is not the point. Struggling to control our own lives, and too often the lives of others, we forget who we are and "play God." The results are never pretty. Our anxiety spikes, our confusion deepens and before long we are lost in a maze of unanswerable questions.

Whenever we resist God's call and act as if nothing is wrong in our lives or try to be or become someone other than who God has made us to be, we fail, and not only hurt ourselves, we hurt others. Marriages and friendships fall apart and too many people, lost in the confusion of their own pride, rush into new projects or new relationships as a response to the loneliness they feel.

When, however, we let go of our need to control the whole world, we rediscover the humility to ask God to show us the path to peace. Only then do we realize that while we turned away from Christ, he never forgot us. Indeed, nothing can separate us from the love of Christ.

Today, ask Christ to guide you.

What most often separates you from Christ?

Trusting in God's Help

 "What will separate us from the love of Christ? Will anguish, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or the sword?" Rom 8:35

When we are very honest with ourselves and others, almost everything separates us from the love of Christ from time to time. Whether it is anguish, distress, anxiety, busyness or confusion, is not the point. Struggling to control our own lives, and too often the lives of others, we forget who we are and "play God." The results are never pretty. Our anxiety spikes, our confusion deepens and before long we are lost in a maze of unanswerable questions.

Whenever we resist God's call and act as if nothing is wrong in our lives or try to be or become someone other than who God has made us to be, we fail, and not only hurt ourselves, we hurt others. Marriages and friendships fall apart and too many people, lost in the confusion of their own pride, rush into new projects or new relationships as a response to the loneliness they feel.

When, however, we let go of our need to control the whole world, we rediscover the humility to ask God to show us the path to peace. Only then do we realize that while we turned away from Christ, he never forgot us. Indeed, nothing can separate us from the love of Christ.

Today, ask Christ to guide you.

What most often separates you from Christ?