Quote for the day: when life seems too brutish and short

First posted February 2008

"....I wish to place on record that I am in unrepayable debt to Francis of Assisi, for when I pray his prayer [Make me an instrument of Thy peace], or even remember it, my melancholy is dispelled, my self-pity comes to an end, my faith is restored, because of this majestic conception of what the work of a disciple should be.

"So majestic is this conception that one dare no longer be sorry for oneself. This world ceases to be one's enemy and becomes the place where one lives and works and serves. Life is no longer nasty, mean, brutish, and short, but becomes the time that one needs to make it less nasty and mean, not only for others, but indeed also for oneself."--Alan Paton, Instrument of Thy Peace

Quote for the day: Prayer matters

"And if things cannot be changed, why pray? We may gloomily feel this way, but the Bible does not teach that...It is Stoicism that demands a closed universe, not the Bible. Many people who emphasize acquiescence and resignation to the way things are as 'the will of God' are actually closer to Epictetus than to Christ." ~~ Richard J. Foster, The Celebration of Discipline

Quote for the Day: T.S. Eliot and quiet places

There are other places
Which also are the world's end, some at the sea jaws,
Or over a dark lake, in a desert or a city—
But this is the nearest, in place and time,
Now and in England.

                                      If you came this way,
Taking any route, starting from anywhere,
At any time or at any season,
It would always be the same: you would have to put off
Sense and notion. You are not here to verify,
Instruct yourself, or inform curiosity
Or carry report. You are here to kneel
Where prayer has been valid.

T.S. Eliot, "Little Gidding" in Four Quartets