“If we extend our idea of family beyond the individual to the wider world of creatures and ecosystems, we can begin to ask what we want for them. From them. We can begin to see ourselves in relation. Acknowledging and reckoning with death—with the limit on our existence, with the fact that we are temporary—can reframe what it means to live. What do we want to leave behind? What do we want to support, maintain, in the limited time we are here?”—Jenn Shapland, Thin Skin
Verse of the day
But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for power is made perfect in weakness.” So I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me.
– 2 Corinthians 12:9
Voice of the day
Mistakes are a fact of life / It is the response to error that counts
– Nikki Giovanni, “Of Liberation” (1968)
Prayer of the day
Help us to have humility to admit when we’ve done wrong. May we learn from our mistakes, and forgive others for their own.
Verse of the day
I brought you into a plentiful land to eat its fruits and its good things. But when you entered you defiled my land and made my heritage an abomination.
– Jeremiah 2:7
Voice of the day
Humankind has not woven the web of life. We are but one thread within it. Whatever we do to the web, we do to ourselves. All things are bound together. All things connect.
– Chief Seattle
Prayer of the day
Creator, forgive us for the ways we have harmed the web of life. Today and every day, remind us that you created us to be careful stewards of your plentiful creation, of which we are bound together.
“Nonviolence is the highest form of humility; it is supreme courage.”—Daisaku Ikeda
“The great Spanish medieval mystic St. Teresa of Avila said that ‘God walks among the pots and pans.’ This expressed her conviction that the kitchen is a place of holiness and grace.”
— Christine Valters Paintner, PhD Breath Prayer: An Ancient Practice for the Everyday Sacred
Where do you find holiness and grace in the ordinary spaces of your life?
To register for the self-study companion retreat to the book with extra resources and guidance click here>>
Verse of the day
He has made everything suitable for its time; moreover, he has put a sense of past and future into their minds, yet they cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end.
– Ecclesiastes 3:11
Voice of the day
Time never stops, but does it end? And how many lives /
Before take-off, before we find ourselves /
Beyond ourselves, all glam-glow, all twinkle and gold?
– Tracy K. Smith, “Don’t You Wonder, Sometimes?”
Prayer of the day
May we be good stewards of the time we have and understand that life extends beyond our days.
Verse of the day
So then, putting away falsehood, let each of you speak the truth with your neighbor, for we are members of one another.
– Ephesians 4:25
Voice of the day
Everybody is sitting around saying, ‘Well, jeez, we need somebody to solve this problem of bias.’ That somebody is us. We all have to try to figure out a better way to get along.
– Wilma Mankiller
Prayer of the day
May we work together to figure out a better way to get along, for we are all members of one another.
“Along the way of life, someone must have sense enough and morality enough to cut off the chain of hate.”—Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
The word faith is often understood as accepting something you can’t understand. People often say: “Such and such can’t be explained, you simply have to believe it.” However, when Jesus talks about faith, he means first of all to trust unreservedly that you are loved, so that you can abandon every false way of obtaining love. That’s why Jesus tells Nicodemus that, through faith in the descending love of God, we will be set free from anxiety and violence and will find eternal life. It’s a question here of trusting in God’s love. The Greek word for faith is pistis, which means, literally, “trust.” Whenever Jesus says to people he has healed: “Your faith has saved you,” he is saying that they have found new life because they have surrendered in complete trust to the love of God revealed in him.
Our inclination is to show our Lord only what we feel comfortable with. But the more we dare to reveal our whole trembling self to him, the more we will be able to sense that his love, which is perfect love, casts out all our fears.
Therefore, Lord, I promise I will not run away, not give up, not stop praying, even when it all seems useless, pointless, and a waste of time and effort. I want to let you know that I love you even though I do not feel loved by you, and that I hope in you even though I often experience despair. Let this be a little dying I can do with you and for you as a way of experiencing some solidarity with the millions in this world who suffer far more than I do.
