Love

"I would've thought that love was the murderous thing, not the lack of it. I am never going to fall in love. Life is dangerous enough." - I Capture the Castle (Dodie Smith)

Safety

Oh, the comfort, the inexpressible comfort
of feeling safe with a person; having
neither to weigh thoughts nor measure
words, but to pour them all out, just as they
are, chaff and grain together, knowing that
a faithful hand will take and sift them,
keep what is worth keeping, and then,
with the breath of kindness, blow the rest
away.

-George Elliot

Friendship

It is the steady and merciless
increase of occupations, the
augmented speed at which we are
always tryign to live, the crowding
of each day with more work than
it can profitably hold, which as
cost us, among other things, the
undisturbed enjoyment of friends.
Friendship takes time, and we
have no time to give it.

-Agnes Repplier

How Do I Love Thee?

How do I love thee?
Let me count the ways.
I love thee to the depth
and breadth and height
My soul can reach, when
feeling out of sight
For the ends of Being
and ideal Grace.
I love thee to the level of
everyday's
Most quiet need, by sun
and candlelight.
I love thee freely, as men
strive for Right;
I love thee purely, as
they turn from Praise.
I love thee with
the passion put to use
In my old griefs, and
with my childhood's faith.
I love thee with a love I
seemed to lose
With my lost saints, I
love thee with the breath,
Smiles, tears, of all my life
and, if God choose,
I shall but love thee
better after death.

-Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Psalm 116:1-2

I love the LORD because he hears
and answers my prayers.

Because he bends down and listens,
I will pray as long as I have breath!

Stock your mind

"Stock your mind. Stock your mind. It is your house of treasure and no one in the world can interfere with it. If you were to win the Irish Sweepstake and brought a house, would you fill it with bits and pieces of rubbish? Your mind is your house and if you fill it with rubbish from the cinemas it will rot into your head. You might be poor, your shoes might be broken, but your mind is your palace."
- Frank McCourt (Angela's Ashes)

My Soul

Let me, O let me bathe my soul in colours; let me swallow the sunset and drink the rainbow.
-Kahlil Gibran

Risk

Faith in early adulthood:
The art of risk and revision

Of all the various times of crisis in the process of faith the definitive time between the ages eighteen and twenty-five. This has been called "age of conversion." The latin verb vertere, from which our word conversion is derived, means to "turn to," and the question is: Will this young adult turn from himself and his own egotistical concerns to others and to God? The capacity of a young adult to encouter God will, of course, depend heavily on his maturation as a human being. If he remains deeply immersed in himself and barricaded by his masks and facades of self-protection, true encounter with God or, in fact, with anyone will be very unlikely.

To lay one's self on the line rather than put one's act on the stage, to trust the acceptance and love of another, is to run the risk of ridicule or rejection. To listen to another openly, with is vital to both the human and divine encounters, is to run the risk of letting another change us. We are reluctant to let anyone else unknot our prejudices, or revise our delicately balanced personality structures. We resist the surrender required in true relationships, because intimacy and openness threaten us.

From "A Reason To Live, A Reason To Die! (A new look at faith in God)" Powell, John S.J.

Grace and the caterpillar

Two seventeenth-century theologians were debating on the nature of grace. One said that grace is like one parent guiding a toddler across the room to the other parent, who has an apple for the child. The nearby parent watches the youngster; if he almost falls, this parent will hold him for a moment so that he can still cross the room under his own power. But the other theologian had a different view. For him grace comes to us only in the discovery of our total helplessness. In his concept, we are like a caterpillar in a ring of fire. Deliverance can only come from above.

The only hope of liberation for a helpless, resisting caterpillar in a ring of fire is deliverance from above. Someone must reach down into the ring and take us out. This rescue is what brings us from the orphan state into that of the son or daughter. This is not mere supporting grace, but transforming grace.