think it's a deep consolation to know that spiders dream, that monkeys tease predators, that dolphins have accents, that lions can be scared silly by a lone mongoose, that otters hold hands, and ants bury their dead. that there isn't their life and our life. nor your life and my life. that it's just one teetering and endless thread and all of us, all of us, are entangled w it as deep as entanglement goes. v neat i think.

thinking about that one post about america that’s like “I love you jazz and national parks and baseball and 50s diners” and feeling the same way about (the good part of) the culture of being christian. i love you gregorian chant and vivaldi’s gloria and handel’s messiah and unclouded day and didn’t my lord deliver daniel and the oh hellos’ dear wormwood and praise to the lord the almighty and jesus loves me. i love you ancient ethiopian churches dug into the earth and st basil’s in red square and la sagrada familia and washington national cathedral and little wooden frame churches in hidden corners of every country and two or three gathered where no one can build a building. i love you the concept of the imago dei and the ending of roman exposure of infants and the abolition of the british slave trade and the battle hymn of the republic (“as he died to make men holy let us die to make men free”!) and the calling of men to love and sacrifice for women rather than rule them and caring for those everyone else left behind even if it means inconvenience or personal cost. i love you stained glass windows and elaborate wall mosaics and icons and the gospels as painted by rembrandt and the pictures in children’s bibles. i love you gerard manley hopkins and john donne and (sometimes) john milton and george herbert and ts eliot and mary oliver. i love you lucy pevensie and frodo baggins and meg murray and the narrative of the universe in which what is weak has been chosen to shame what is strong. i love you self-sacrifice in roman coliseums and at the stake and in nazi-occupied europe and every day in small acts of love for fellow human beings and small denials of hatred and self-centeredness and cruelty. i love you, concept that ultimate beauty and truth and justice and goodness and love are the center and the end of the entire universe.

When GOD is your strength, nothing can overcome you.

I tried to find the original post to reblog but I got really, REALLY distracted by the rest of the blog

Galtymore summit, Co Tipperary

© tommie550 [IG]

Pray?

(For Tamsa, who asks good questions)

People have a lot of ideas about prayer. And that makes sense. Because when we pray, there are a lot of different things going on – usually all at the same time.

I have a good winter coat. The rain rolls off, and it keeps me warm.

The other day when it was raining, I needed to take the trash out. The rain was coming down softly, so I didn’t bother to grab my coat.

I wasn’t outside for very long. But it was long enough for me start complaining about being cold and wet.

As if I wasn’t the reason why I was cold and wet.

Later that day, I needed to go outside again. This time, I thought to put on my coat.

I didn’t notice that the rain had picked up from before. Until I came back in and saw how wet my coat was.

The difference between the two hit me while I was hanging up my coat to dry.

The first time I was cold and wet (and whiny). The second time the rain was coming down harder, but I barely noticed it. The difference? The coat.

Wearing the coat didn’t change the rain. It changed how I experienced the rain.

It’s like that with prayer.

I don’t mean one-and-done prayer. That’s like putting on a coat and then taking it off.

Keep your coat on. Pray before you do things. Pray while you do things.

It can be as formal or informal as you like. The point is keeping close to God in an ongoing conversation. Just like you would with your closest friend (which He is).

Just you and God. Heart to heart. About anything and everything.

That kind of prayer doesn’t change the things that happen to us in life. It changes how we experience them.

“Life with God is not immunity from difficulties, but peace in difficulties.” – Arthur James Russell

(Of course, this isn’t all there is to prayer. When we pray, there are a lot of different things going on – usually all at the same time. I’ll be sharing more thoughts about prayer in the days to come.)

Today’s Readings

What’s wrong with euthanasia if you want to be euthanized? For people who want it, I think it’s a better way out than suffering and dying anyway

Yeah, what's so bad about the government coercing society's 'undesirables' into killing themselves for the betterment of the state? Gee, I can't imagine...

The grass withers and the flowers fade,

but the word of our God stands forever.

Isaiah 40:8

In a world that is constantly trying to convince us to put our trust in that which fades away, what might it mean to trust in God’s word, which never fades?

Far too often we come across people who speak empty words and make empty promises. There is a disconnect between what they say and what they actually do. But God isn’t like that. When God says, “I will do this,” He does it, even more excellently than you can imagine. If Jesus has given you a promise, hold on to it. He will bring it to pass in His time. The eternal God will be eternally faithful to His word, and so we rightly say that God’s word endures forever.

1 corinthians 13:4-8

god is love

It is Gods design that we enjoy our holiday goodies then burn off any excess weight during lent amen

First sketchbook page of the year 💘

It's so weird how many people just don't understand forgiveness, redemption, or penitence/penance, at all.

Like you explain that a person or character did something bad but then became penitent and was forgiven and/or redeemed of it, and people will say "OH SO THAT MAKES IT OKAY??" like.... that's not....... the point??????