Good Morning Neighbors! Happy Monday & November! I hope you had an enjoyable Halloween if you celebrated it last eve. In Cath-O-land we celebrate the Feast of All Saints and those good souls that have gone before us and figured it out. I don't talk as much about faith, religion, prayer and the Divine as one might imagine here. I have plenty of opportunity to chat about such things in my daily goings about that posting about it on-line is secondary.
On-line discussion of important things often do not lend themselves to nuance and good listening, but Local's has been more of a exception. Back in the 90's I used to engage in all kinds of questions and semi-debates about faith & religion, mostly dealing with the "ya -butt" heads who mainly want to bring up the something that happened 500 or a 1000 years ago while they told me about their "perfect" community that was started down on the corner 50 years ago. The failure to deal with criminals in the fold was an even uglier recent chapter. The harm done to children and families is appalling, but not unique to Cath-O-Land or priests. It is sad and infuriating how widespread exploitation and abuse is in humanity.
As I have mentioned here, I don't try to knock what others have figured out about their path of life. If you believe it is one and done, and once the light goes out so do you, so be it. If you believe in the Divine, great. I hope your Deity or Deities is a good one! If you have are on board with the Divine Community that is One and Da Jesus as the Incarnate representative of them so much the more. Christians have more in common than they realize.
Life is too short to play disruptive dick in someone else's life. It can be fun when you are young, but it gets old as one ages. What was I talking about? Oh yeah, the opposite of dicks, saints. Big S ones and little s ones. Everyone needs someone to inspire them, to show them how the business of living might be done. Saints not only show me how it, the living thing, might be done, but I also believe in the friendship one might form with them by studying their life and praying with them. The praying to thing gets messy for some fellow Catholics who place a human being above the Divine, but I can be patient with that.
My inspiration after the Master is His Mom, His crazy locust-honey eating Cousin, John Chrysostom & Gregory the Great. There are others in the roll call, but those four are the main group I like to visit in the privacy of my prayer. A few quotes about saints if you have managed to read along this far. Tomorrow we will visit All Souls and then off to the rest of November. Happy Monday Friends!
May God protect me from gloomy saints. - Saint Teresa of Avila
A church is a hospital for sinners, not a museum for saints. - Pauline Phillips
In his holy flirtation with the world, God occasionally drops a handkerchief. These handkerchiefs are called saints. - Frederick Buechner
November Photography by PWN Photography
Today marks the three hundred and thirtieth birthday of the Frenchman François-Marie Arouet, better known by his nom de plume, Voltaire (1694-1778).
Born into a bourgeois family during the reign of Louis XIV, the “Sun King” (r. 1643-1715), Voltaire suffered tragedy at a young age when his mother died. Never close with his father or brother, Voltaire exhibited a rebellious attitude toward authority from his youth. His brilliant mind was fostered in the care of the Society of Jesus, who introduced him to the joys of literature and theater. Despite his later criticisms against the Church, Voltaire, throughout his life, fondly recalled his dedicated Jesuit teachers.
Although he spent time as a civil servant in the French embassy to the Hague, Voltaire’s main love was writing—an endeavor where he excelled in various genres, including poetry, which led to his appointment as the royal court poet for King Louis XV. Widely recognized as one of the greatest French writers, and even hyperbolically referred to by ...
Padre - Tom Miller invites you to a Coffee Talk, Speakeasies, Schmoozes, Tea Times, Afterhours and other gatherings.
https://teams.live.com/meet/93792382189049?p=DiBHsYfuECPgDrG7vO
2026 Coffee Talk with the ADD Irregulars
Thursday, January 1, 2026
6:00 AM - 8:00 AM (CST)
Occurs every day starting 1/1 until 12/31/2027
Coffee Talk - Daily beginning at 6:00 AM Central Time Zone - USA
White Pilled Wednesday - A break from the heaviness of news and current events to focus upon things more personal & positive for the first hour of Coffee Talk.
Afternoon Chats - Most Tuesday, Friday & Sundays 2:00 PM Central
Other chats as posted in the community.
Good morning, Digital Neighbors! Happy Sabbath and Saturday to all you fine souls milling about on Locals and Substack. A morning meditation from Anthony de Mello. Not all of his writings are my cup of tea, but Wellsprings is a book I have returned to often for reflection and meditation. I take all these morning musings as something like a 12-Step program session: take what you like and leave the rest. Some have put me on block or mute at various sites, which I am thankful for as a modern feature. They can enjoy the community without my content interfering or distracting. I have done the same to a few myself. It is one of the best features of more recent social media. I wish they would have had that back in the days of AOL chat rooms. The first rule of the internet: jerks are emboldened by a screen between them and reactive reality. Anywho, off to the morning reflection. It is a tad longer than most morning posts. Have a great Saturday, Digital Neighbors!
THE EXPOSURE
I think of the times I come alive
and the times when I am dead.
I ponder on the ...
