Good Morning Digital Neighbors! FAT Tuesday ADD Irregulars, WSN Contributors, Friends & Refugees, Early Birds & Late Dayers, Conversants & Lurkers, PHAM & Misfits and all the rest of wanderers on the Local's.
I guess we have to reconsider calling this day Fat Tuesday and call it Body Positivity Day? For most people it just another day to over do it on the eating, the boozing and the other hedonistic joys of being human. If there is one thing America likes to make part of the melting-pot (I can feel the Woke cringing at that old image that was far better than what we have now) are celebrations with booze and frivolity. Social gatherings, with or without alcohol and other drugs can build bonds of communion among strangers. It is a good thing, and most of those types of bonds have been under attack by the CABAL and its militant cultural arrogance.
My brother Jerry had some of the best friends, pot brought them together, but they found out that they had much in common apart from smoking, Too many people malign the destructive nature of alcohol and drugs, but forget the interesting fellowship that it can create. The real test is how the friendships survives if the uniting substances fades into the background. It is one of the more difficult trials of being a young adult as you experience the inclusion and exclusion of people on your journey of life. Some mature and change with you, others remain stagnate and often depart. There is a sadness for me in some of the friends I just slowly lost through the passage of time. The flip side are the new ones that have come along, in the the end it has more than balanced out for me and I am profoundly blessed for good people to share may path.
How about a prayer for waking up to the day from a dabbler in Celtic spirituality? I have often returned to John O'Donohue for his wisdom and insight, his perspective on life and its dance. I am always looking for ways to awaken the inner senses of my person to see, listen and experience the subtle and humble workings of the Master, of my neighbor, of my own mysterious inner self that is at best partial known and too often left unattended. Happy FAT Tuesday all of you fine souls! Wake up to reality and see the beauty of life all the while wrestling with its ugliness and brokenness. Push against the darkness rather than yielding to it. No Pollyannaish wishes from the Friar, just the hard and satisfying work of wrestling with reality and discovering gratitude and laughter as hidden gems along the path. Thank you for being part of the gems I have found.
FOR THE SENSES
May the touch of your skin
Register the beauty
Of the otherness
That surrounds you.
May your listening be attuned
To the deeper silence
Where sound is honed
To bring distance home.
May the fragrance
Of a breathing meadow
Refresh your heart
And remind you you are
A child of the earth.
And when you partake Of food and drink,
May your taste quicken
To the gift and sweetness
That flows from the earth.
May your inner eye
See through the surfaces
And glean the real presence
Of everything that meets you.
May your soul beautify
The desire of your eyes
That you might glimpse
The infinity that hides
In the simple sights
That seem worn To your usual eyes.
To Bless the Space Between - John O'Donohue
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.
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2026 Coffee Talk with the ADD Irregulars
Thursday, January 1, 2026
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Occurs every day starting 1/1 until 12/31/2027
Coffee Talk - Daily beginning at 6:00 AM Central Time Zone - USA
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Other chats as posted in the community.
XIII
The Proud Minister
One day there came into the Garden a man in torn clothes badly bruised and cut, who said to the Lover, “In the name of the Beloved I demand your help.”
So the Lover and the Disciple let him in and dressed his wounds and prepared the best of the vegetables from the Garden for him to eat. When his wounds had been dressed and he had eaten and rested the Lover asked him how he had fallen into this plight, to which the man replied, “I was Minister of the Beloved in a city near this place, where I preached His gospel and expounded His doctrine to the people. I pointed out to them how their sins had made them wholly hateful to the Beloved and how therefore they were utterly beyond the range of His love and He would condemn them to eternal torments, whereon some fell into despair and wept bitterly but many were angry. One day the magistrates called me before them and begged me to leave the city and preach elsewhere for they said I had made many people so angry and desperate that they feared there might be a riot and they might not be able to protect me but that I might suffer some injury. I, however, very zealous for the Beloved and believing that the magistrates only feared that their own sins might be proclaimed, preached the more vehemently, denounced the magistrates and made it abundantly clear that the whole wicked city was foredoomed to eternal punishment by the just provision of the Beloved. Whereon a mob, stirred up no doubt by the corrupt and venal magistrates, fell upon me with sticks and stones, nearly killing me and driving me out of the city in the state in which I came to you.”
“My friend,” said the Lover, “this was not a good deed of yours, for besides denying the unfathomable compassion of the Beloved, you have by your obstinacy caused these people to commit a grievous sin, and this cannot be pleasing to the Beloved, that through you who profess to be His minister the people should become worse. Surely you remember that He Himself said, ‘If they persecute you in one city flee to another.’”
Therefore the man was very angry, and cursing the Lover, said, “I see that I have had a very false report of you and I do not believe that you are a servant of the Beloved at all. When I came to you so injured for the Beloved’s sake you set before me only herbs and fruits although the garden is full of birds which you could have killed to make me a worthy meal. I shall proclaim everywhere that you are no true servant of the Beloved but a mere falterer who dares not suffer in the cause of the Beloved. Be sure that you are foreordained to eternal torments who suffer nothing here.”
For the man was so blinded by his own pride that he could not perceive the scars on the hands and feet and the brows of the Lover nor how the cloth beneath the armpits of his tunic was dyed with a red dye. So he went out of the Garden cursing and shouting.
But the Lover looked sad and said, “A man like this does much harm to the cause of the Beloved, for by thus speaking falsely about the Beloved he may bring men to fear Him but none to love Him, and by love alone can any man approach the Beloved.”
