Real

We make ourselves real by telling the truth. –Thomas Merton

As quoted by Elizabeth Esther.

Truth

Truth comes only to those who must have it, who want it badly enough. And gifts of healing come only to those willing to change. Jesus had his demands even for the blind and leprous. Go, wash in the Pool of Siloam. Show yourself to the priest. Sin no more. He had larger demands for the rich. Sell all and come.

There is hope for us but no easy healing. There is truth but never without search.

There is beauty but only in the exercise of discipline and the control of waste. Our lives can be redeemed but only with lasting commitment to live under God's judgment and grace.

By Doris Janzen Longacre in the Foreword to Living More with Less page 15.

And, at the spring-time beginning of this new year, a re-posting of Flannery O'Connor's unadorned statement:

The truth does not change according to our ability to stomach it.

True fasting

It is necessary most of all for one who is fasting to curb anger, to accustom himself to meekness and condescension, to have a contrite heart, to repulse impure thoughts and desires, to examine his conscience, to put his mind to the test and to verify what good has been done by us in this or any other week, and which deficiency we have corrected in ourselves in the present week. This is true fasting.  - St. John Chrysostom

 As quoted by Molly Sabourin.

Ten years

Ten years ago today.

Very compelling thoughts on the significance of that day for the future:

What now after the “world changing” events of 9/11? That day saw horrific tragedy. Yet, there could be a far, far worse tragedy to come, following on its heels. We should really be afraid of letting this awful loss come to naught. [...]

There can be no greater memorial to those who lost their lives than for us to change ours. Charity can be an easy kind of love and get us off the track. In tracing the footsteps of all the firefighters, police, and other heroes, you come face to face with the hard love based on a commitment to place others’ lives ahead of one’s own.

Jules Dervaes, October 2001

To mourn is a lost ‘art’ in the West. [...] Why would we want to waste precious time remembering those “no longer with us”?

It’s all about establishing value. What we mourn is what we value outside ourselves. To ‘cry’ over an extended time will convey appraised worth. We can’t let life become another throwaway commodity.

Jules Dervaes, November 2001

To contemplate and to do

If you let your heart be open--not closed in prejudice or through fear--and if you truly desire and really "dig for" the truth, Christ will deliver to you the answers for which you have sought as a result of your sincere necessity.

It is critical to understand how this process of getting answers works. God is only bound to give us what we need to know and not what we may want or wish to know. We will always have what it is that is relevant--by His determination--to our salvation on any given day. We will always be provided with enough truth to grow on.

What determines the rate and the amount of further answers is our readiness as seen in the prior acceptance of what we already have been given. For every morsel of truth previously delivered, we must be acting on it, taking visible steps to make it a living part of us. Or, no more will be forthcoming. What is our universal condition is that we obstruct the process because we are not willing to accept all what God has been willing to offer!

Jules Dervaes, October 1991