If the state can command you to do an act your church or your philosophy teaches is deeply immoral act on the grounds that the common good demands, by the same logic, on what grounds can you object should the state command you to speak or print or think as the common good demands? — […]
Is “image and likeness” a redundant phrase, or does it mark a distinction? Arguably the latter. To be created in God’s image is to be granted the potentiality for sharing in the divine life, a potentiality that may or may not be actualized and is shared in equally by all human beings without their consent. […]
I think there is a choice possible to us at any moment, as long as we live. But there is no sacrifice. There is a choice, and the rest falls away. Second choice does not exist. Beware of those who talk about sacrifice. — Muriel Rukeyser She is mostly correct, but her warning needs clarification. […]
When your eyes are tired the world is tired also. When your vision has gone no part of the world can find you. Time to go into the dark where the night has eyes to recognize its own. There you can be sure you are not beyond love. The dark will be your womb tonight. […]
From Br. Joseph — At some point in every faith journey, one finds him or her self taking an inventory of their core, central beliefs. Some of these beliefs are held very tightly, some loosely. The more central a belief, the more one aligns his or her identity. Paula D’Arcy describes her seven central beliefs […]
From Br. Joseph — At the still point of the turning world… …at the still point, there the dance is. (T.S. Eliot) From the book God Calling, today’s entry (Nov. 27) reads: Not our wills but Thine, O Lord. Man has so misunderstood Me in this. I want no will laid grudgingly upon My Altar. I […]
Leave me here freely all alone, In cell were sunlight never shone, Should no one ever speak to me, This golden silence sets me free! — Blessed Titus Brandsma, portion of poem written in Dachau
Freedom is about choice, and there are two kinds of freedom. There is a freedom to choose to do whatever you want, and another kind of freedom to choose to live for others. One freedom leads in, the other out. One freedom is living with responsibility, the other with disregard except for self. One freedom […]
In The Courage to Be, Paul Tillich describes bad and painfully wrong theology. The God of [bad] theological theism is a being beside others and as such a part of the whole of reality. He certainly is considered its most important part, but as a part and therefore as subjected to the structure of the […]
Will Americans decide to give up their freedom for “feeling” safe and secure? At the beginning of the 20th century, the world was fearful that democracy would be extinguished. At the beginning of the 21st century, democracy appears to be flourishing in many parts of the world. Will democracy once again be in danger at […]
Every moment and every event of every man’s life on earth plants something in his soul. For just as the wind carries thousands of winged seeds, so each moment brings with it germs of spiritual vitality that come to rest imperceptibly in the minds and wills of men. Most of these unnumbered seeds perish and are lost, because men are not prepared to receive them: for such seeds as these cannot spring up anywhere except in the good soil of freedom, spontaneity and love. — Thomas Merton
I was driving down the interstate this morning and began to thing about control. Within all the rush hour traffic, I realized that the only control I really had was the space in front of me, that space between myself and the car in front of me. Sure, I was controlling the steering wheel, how […]