Happy Easter

Happy Easter to all! I hope that your Lenten journey was introspective.

A re-post of some wise words from late Father David Kirk:

"If you want to find God, really find God, go to where people are suffering. There, if you can open your eyes to the needs of others, and let your heart respond to see.....you're in for a great adventure! May this Sunday be a day for beginning to DO the word of God and not simple hear the word of God. Amen."

The Most Famous Mob

I've been posting a lot about the "angry mob" lately. Today might be a good day to reflect on one of the most famous angry mobs.

A Note For Lent

by Father David Kirk

A preface about Lent:
People “give up” things during lent:
Pizza, beer, lobster, whatever.
But does it move us closer to God,
Closer to one another, to ourselves?
Maybe what we should work on at Lent
Is CHANGING ATTITUDES.
Leaving behind frustrations, fears,
Cultural attitudes
Which box in others.
TO GIVE UP NEGATIVE, DEFEATIST ATTITUDES
To see temporary setbacks as permanent
To escalate disappointment into catastrophe
To experience problems as insurmountable.
To try to see other possibilities
When things don’t go as we had hoped or planned.
Sometimes I set myself up to feel like a failure
Or to feel badly
About things I cannot control;
And I get out of this only by deciding
That if things can’t be one way,
Well, maybe they can be another.
Its possible, I think, even for me,
To still make inner changes,
To move old emotional garbage out
Permanently
To see the world in a whole new way,
To come closer to God.
So I’m not sure what I’m giving up this Lent
But I think its
HOPELESSNESS.
I think I learned this attitude
At an early age,
As a lonely adolescent,
As a young man whose people die young,
Whose sister died of alcoholism.
But God keeps seeking me, the lost lamb,
And in intervening in my life
Converting all these things into HOPE.
So I put all hopelessness on the altar
As a sacrifice to faith and joy.

As God Lives in me, I determine who I am.
[Mark 9:14-29]

*Reposted from Ash Wednesday 2009

http://fatherdavidkirk.com/

A Note For Lent

by Father David Kirk

A preface about Lent:
People “give up” things during lent:
Pizza, beer, lobster, whatever.
But does it move us closer to God,
Closer to one another, to ourselves?
Maybe what we should work on at Lent
Is CHANGING ATTITUDES.
Leaving behind frustrations, fears,
Cultural attitudes
Which box in others.
TO GIVE UP NEGATIVE, DEFEATIST ATTITUDES
To see temporary setbacks as permanent
To escalate disappointment into catastrophe
To experience problems as insurmountable.
To try to see other possibilities
When things don’t go as we had hoped or planned.
Sometimes I set myself up to feel like a failure
Or to feel badly
About things I cannot control;
And I get out of this only by deciding
That if things can’t be one way,
Well, maybe they can be another.
Its possible, I think, even for me,
To still make inner changes,
To move old emotional garbage out
Permanently
To see the world in a whole new way,
To come closer to God.
So I’m not sure what I’m giving up this Lent
But I think its
HOPELESSNESS.
I think I learned this attitude
At an early age,
As a lonely adolescent,
As a young man whose people die young,
Whose sister died of alcoholism.
But God keeps seeking me, the lost lamb,
And in intervening in my life
Converting all these things into HOPE.
So I put all hopelessness on the altar
As a sacrifice to faith and joy.

As God Lives in me, I determine who I am.
[Mark 9:14-29]

*Reposted from Ash Wednesday 2009.

http://fatherdavidkirk.com/