miniZibaldone

With this gaze of Jesus, you can help bring about another humanity, without looking for acknowledgement but seeking goodness for its own sake, content to maintain a  pure heart and to fight peaceably for honesty and justice.  Don’t stop at the surface of things; distrust the worldly cult of appearances, cosmetic attempts to  improve our looks.  Instead, “download” the best “link” of all, that of a heart which sees and transmits goodness without growing weary.  The joy that you have  freely received from God, please, freely give away (cf. Mt 10:8): so many people are waiting for it!  So many are waiting for it from you. From the homily But Zacchaeus had to face a number of obstacles in order to meet Jesus.  It was not easy for him; he had to face a number of obstacles. At least three of these can  also say something to us. The first obstacle is smallness of stature .  Zacchaeus couldn’t see the Master because he was little.  Ev...

You might say to me: Father, but I have my limits, I am a sinner, what can I do?  When the Lord calls us, he doesn’t worry about what we are, what we have been, or  what we have done or not done.  Quite the opposite.  When he calls us, he is thinking about everything we have to give, all the love we are capable of spreading.   His bets are on the future, on tomorrow.  Jesus is pointing you to the future, and never to the museum. From the speech Where does fear lead us?  The feeling of being closed in on oneself, trapped.  Once we feel that way, our fear starts to fester and is inevitably joined by its “twin  sister”, paralysis: the feeling of being paralyzed.  Thinking that in this world, in our cities and our communities, there is no longer any room to grow, to dream,  to create, to gaze at new horizons – in a word to live – is one of the worst things that can happen to us in life, and especially at a younger age.  When ...

Philippine Star  "Super tiny minority" It’s not easy being a member of the opposition when the president enjoys a trust rating of over 90 percent, with a near-total 97 percent in Mindanao. A democracy,  however, needs a functioning check and balance system, which is normally provided by the political opposition.  Even an immensely popular president is vulnerable to the abuse of power and needs a credible opposition to discourage this. Beyond promoting the proper use of power,  the opposition can also help ensure that the annual national appropriation is utilized for the intended purposes, with projects and programs implemented properly. In  short, the political opposition has an indispensable role to play in promoting good governance and making democracy work.  Under the current setup, the opposition in the House of Representatives is also expected to initiate proceedings to remove from office a president, vice president,  justice of the Supreme Cour...

Sometimes it happens that you want to be a bridge and you are left with your hand stretched out and the other side doesn’t take it: these are the humiliations that we must suffer to do something good. But always build bridges. After the railway incident of July 12, we are afraid to take the train. Every day I take the train to go to the University, and that day I wasn’t on the train by  pure chance. Every day I sit in the first carriages, and there I met and greeted Luciano, one of the engine drivers that, unfortunately, lost his life in the  incident.  In those trains we feel at home, but now we’re afraid. I would like to ask: how can we return to normality? How can we beat this fear and continue, be  happy again also on those trains, which are our trains, our second home? I would like to ask you: given that in any case I have forgiven them somewhat, because I don’t want to hate anyone, I have forgiven them somewhat, however, I’m still  not well. I would...

Dear Theo: the Autobiography of Vincent Van Gogh by Irving Stone Paris , late October 1887 |  To Willemien van Gogh My dear little sister, Is the Bible enough for us? Nowadays I believe Jesus himself would again say to those who just sit melancholy,  it is not here, it is risen. Why seek ye the living among the dead? If the spoken or written word is to remain the light of the world, it’s our right and our duty to acknowledge that we live in an age in which it’s written in such a way, spoken in such a way that in order to find something as great and as good and as original, and just as capable of overturning the whole old society as in the past, we can safely compare it with the old upheaval by the Christians. For my part, I’m always glad that I’ve read the Bible better than many people nowadays, just because it gives me a certain peace that there have been such lofty ideas in the past. But precisely  because I think the old is good, I find the new a...

Child of My Heart Alice McDermott     After This Alice McDermott  A Man by Oriana Fallaci Interview with History Oriana Fallaci  The Rage and the Pride Oriana Fallaci  Memories of a Catholic Girlhood Mary McCarthy   The Company She Keeps by Mary McCarthy  

Going to WYD, do not be in a rush to find an answer to your questions: hurriedness is the sign of the uncertainty that pushes us to want to grab something right away...concern yourselves with making the journey.

The kingdom of God, now as then, “does not come in a way that attracts attention” ( Lk 17:20 ), but rather in littleness, in humility. May each one of us be able to make an interior passage, a Passover of the heart, towards the divine “style” incarnated by Mary . From the homily Instead, in a small village, a simple miracle takes place and brings joy to the wedding of a young and completely anonymous family. At the same time, the water that became wine at the wedding banquet is a great sign, for it reveals to us the spousal face of God, a God who sits at table with us, who dreams and holds communion with us. It tells us that the Lord does not keep his distance, but is near and real . He is in our midst and he takes care of us, without making decisions in our place and without troubling himself with issues of power. He prefers to let himself be contained in little things, unlike ourselves, who always want to possess something greater. To be attracted by power, by grandeur, by ap...

Mercy always has a youthful face! To find fulfillment, to gain new strength, there is a way. It is not a thing or an object, but a person, and he is alive. His name  is Jesus Christ. From the address at welcome ceremony with youth What better opportunity to renew our friendship with Jesus than by building friendships among yourselves! What better way to build our friendship with Jesus than by  sharing him with others! What better way to experience the contagious joy of the Gospel than by striving to bring the Good News to all kinds of painful and difficult  situations!...  In my years as a bishop, I have learned one thing. Nothing is more beautiful than seeing the enthusiasm, dedication, zeal and energy with which so many young people  live their lives. When Jesus touches a young person’s heart, he or she becomes capable of truly great things. It is exciting to listen to you share your dreams, your  questions and your impatience with those w...

The Saint is a medicine because he is an antidote. Indeed that is why the saint is often a martyr; he is mistaken for a poison because he is an antidote. He will generally be found restoring the world to sanity by exaggerating whatever the world neglects, which is by no means always the same element in every age. Yet each generation seeks its saint by instinct; and he is not what the people want, but rather what the people need. This is surely the very much mistaken meaning of those words to the first saints, “Ye are the salt of the earth,” which caused the Ex-Kaiser to remark with all solemnity that his beefy Germans were the salt of the earth; meaning thereby merely that they were the earth's beefiest and therefore best. But salt seasons and preserves beef, not because it is like beef; but because it is very unlike it. Christ did not tell his apostles that they were only the excellent people, or the only excellent people, but that they were the exceptional people; the permanent...

Semen est sanguis Christianorum . —Tertullian

Eliade: That same year I also published an almost Joycean novel, called The Light That Failed. That same title as one of Kipling's books. Was that intentional? Eliade: Yes, because of a certain similarity between the two central characters. I've tried to reread the book several times since — impossible, I can't understand a word of it! I had been very impressed by an excerpt from Finnegans Wake , published under the title "Anna Livia Plurabelle," and I employed the stream-of-consciousness technique of Ulysses — for the first time in Romania, I believe. It was wholly unsuccessful. Even the critics didn't know what to make of it. It was totally unreadable. This influence Joyce had on you, and the taste for the word as such that it presupposes, does surprise me, rather. It seems to me that up until then you had been more inclined to treat language as simply a means to an end. Were you writing poetry at this time? In a sense yes, But I ought to ...

Piccadilly Jim by P. G. Wodehouse At this moment, apparently from some upper region, there burst forth an uproar so sudden and overwhelming that it might well have been taken for a premature testing of a large sample of Partridgite; until a moment later it began to resemble more nearly the shrieks of some partially destroyed victim of that death-dealing invention. It was a bellow of anguish, and it poured through the house in a cascade of sound, advertising to all beneath the roof the twin facts that some person unknown was suffering and that whoever the sufferer might be he had excellent lungs. The effect on the gathering in the drawing-room was immediate and impressive. Conversation ceased as if it had been turned off with a tap. Twelve separate and distinct discussions on twelve highly intellectual topics died instantaneously. It was as if the last trump had sounded. Futurist painters stared pallidly at vers libre poets, speech smitten from their lips; and stage performers...

Philippine Star  "State of the nation" Rodrigo Duterte has inherited an economy that is the second fastest growing in the region after China. A framework for peace in Mindanao is in place. Business confidence has been high for the past six years, buoyed by policies that were anchored on good governance.  Last Saturday night, President Duterte signed a landmark order, implementing freedom of information throughout the executive branch. He is expected to push his congressional allies to pass an FOI law to promote transparency in the other branches of government.  The challenges faced by the nation remain daunting. The income gap is a chasm and economic growth has not trickled down, with about 40 percent of Filipinos classified as poor. The lack of decent employment continues to fuel the migrant worker phenomenon, opening Filipinos to exploitation and human trafficking overseas.   [full text] Sun.Star Cebu  "Reviving “hablon”" HABLON sa Cebu” is a community’s ...

Prayer is the first and principal “work tool” in our hands. To insist [on something] with God is not in order to convince him, but rather to strengthen our faith and our patience, that is, our capacity to fight beside God for the things that are truly important and necessary. In prayer we are a pair: God and me, fighting together for what is important. From the Angelus Father.  This word is the secret of Jesus’ prayer; it is the key that he himself gives us so that we can also enter into this relationship of trusting dialogue with the Father who has accompanied and sustained his life. ...  To the name “Father,” Jesus associates two petitions: “hallowed be your name; your kingdom come.” Jesus’ prayer, and therefore, a Christian’s prayer, is before all to give space to God, allowing him to manifest his holiness in us and allowing the advance of his kingdom by the possibility of exercising his lordship of love in our lives. ...  Another three petitions complete this pr...

You have to encounter love before you encounter morality; otherwise, it is agony.                                                                                                —Albert Camus It is in Him that I hope, before counting my errors and my virtues. Numbers have nothing to do with this. In the relationship with Him, numbers don’t count, the weight that is measured or measurable is irrelevant, and all the evil I can possibly do in the future has no relevance either. It cannot usurp the first place that this yes of Simon, repeated by me, has before the eyes of Christ. So a kind of flood comes from the depths of our heart, like a breath that rises from the breast and pervades the whole person, making it act, making it want to act more ju...

The character of “movement” distinguishes them in the ecclesial landscape in as much as they are powerfully dynamic realities. They are capable of provoking a particular attraction to the Gospel and offering a proposal of the Christian life which, basically global in outlook, touches every aspect of human existence. The gathering of the faithful into groups, with an intensely shared common existence in order to strengthen their life of faith, hope, and charity, expresses well the ecclesial dynamic as the mystery of communion for the sake of mission, and manifests itself as a sign of the unity of the Church in Christ.  In such a sense, these ecclesial groups arising from a shared charism tend to have as their goal “the broad apostolic purpose of the Church”. In this perspective, groups of the faithful, ecclesial movements, and new communities propose renewed forms of following Christ in which the communio cum Deo and the communio fidelium are deepened. Thus the attractiveness o...

The monastic life, as an element of unity with the other Christian confessions, takes on a specific form that is prophecy and sign, one that “can and ought to attract all the members of the Church to an effective and prompt fulfilment of the duties of their Christian vocation”. Communities of prayer, especially contemplative communities, which “by virtue of their separation from the world are all the more closely united to Christ, the heart of the world”, do not propose a more perfect fulfilment of the Gospel. Rather, by living out the demands of Baptism, they constitute an instance of discernment and a summons to the service of the whole Church. Indeed, they are a signpost pointing to a journey and quest, a reminder to the entire People of God of the primary and ultimate meaning of the Christian life. It is not easy for the world, or at least that large part of it dominated by the mindset of power, wealth and consumerism, to understand your particular vocation and your hidden missi...

"He had pity on me, the one who was so forgetful and petty. If our life is normal, with what we’ve had, it is difficult to be able to find particular sins during the day, but the sin is the sin of pettiness of distraction and forgetfulness. The sin is the pettiness of not translating what we do into something new, not making it shine like the new dawn. Instead, we leave it opaque, we leave it as it is, without striking anyone, yet without giving it over to the splendor of Being.” This then is the source of our certainty: “He had pity on me and on my nothingness and He chose me. He chose me because He had pity on me. He chose me because He was moved by my pettiness! What marks the devotion with which the Mystery—the supreme Mystery and the Mystery of this man who is Christ, God made man—what marks the Mystery’s devotion to us, the devotion with which the Mystery creates the world and forgives man’s pettiness, and forgives him while embracing him, embracing him who is petty, disg...

Men and Saints Charles Peguy  GOD SPEAKS : When you love someone, you love him as he is. I alone am perfect. It is probably for that reason That I know what perfection is And that I demand less perfection of those poor people. I know how difficult it is. And how often, when they are struggling in their trials, How often do I wish and am I tempted to put my hand under their stomachs In order to hold them up with my big hand Just like a father teaching his son how to swim In the current of the river And who is divided between two ways of thinking. For on the one hand, if he holds him up all the time and if he holds him too much, The child will depend on this and will never learn how to swim. But if he doesn't hold him up just at the right moment That child is bound to swallow more water than is healthy for him. In the same way, when I teach them how to swim amid their trials I too am divided by two ways of thinking. Because if I ...