Happy Saturday ADD Irregulars, WSN Delvers & other Black Sheep! Hey there Friends & Refugees, Misfits & PHAM and all the rest of you Insomniacs, Wanderers and Seekers. The move is going well, going to get some help today with the great unpacking. Things should begin to take shape in the house looking for like a home. A morning quote and some commentary for all you gentle readers.
God does not take away trials or carry us over them, but strengthens us through them. —E. B. Pusey
This quote tends to be my response when Believers and Disciples say the often heard comment of "God never gives you more than you can handle." That statement helps many deal with the challenges of life, but it has never done me much good as a person of faith. It presume or assumes a number of factors that I tend to find difficult to accept.
I am not a fan of Cosmic Micro-management. While I firmly believe in the God who pays a surprising amount of attention to me, I do not find Him, Her or Them constantly moving the levels of fortune, pushing the chess pieces or dropping things randomly into my lap. For me, it makes the Luminous some sort of arbitrary experimenter who is constantly testing us "for our own good." I have never put much stock in anyone testing or telling us something for "your own good." It is for their own good, their satisfaction or their plans, you are the pliant recipient who should appreciate their benevolence. Thanks any chap.
The permissive will of the Divine is one of the more challenging aspect of maintaining faith in a world broken by malice and the evils of humanity. I consider the problem of evil as it is called in philosophy the most pressing argument against an all powerful, all good and all loving Being that permits what seems like a massive amount of evil in the world. My personal answer that I expect to satisfy no-one but myself is patience. In time, probably on the other side of death and at the gateway of eternity I will humbly understand. Until then, I have to trust that the goodness of God is real enough.
In the midst of life's trials, the Divine wants us to deepen our faith through successive dives into the depths of trust, acceptance and yielding. God will often if not always give us more than we cand handle, especially if the great invitation is one of trust. While not arbitrarily willing something into our lives, He does allow the unfolding. I know I have repeated this point, but it is not one easily accepted by Believers.
It is all a bunch of talk until the testing occurs, and there will always be the "see here, see here" people who will point out your failings to trust, your wresting with acceptance or your lack of immediately yielding to God. God bless them and screw them. Such people don't deserve a place at the table of your life without a changed attitude. If they can't change it, they need to go or be muted. You may keep them around out of fondness and familiarity, but don't count on them helping you bear the trials of life. Sometimes it is with great sadness that long term family or friends get mired in that attitude of "told ya so." They are not doomed to always voice that corrosive attitude, but they will rarely be free of it without some real heart to heart discussion.
Be the person who trusts in the trial and helps others do so. Not in some pollyannish way, but real invitations to trust, hard moves of patience and yielding to the mysterious and unknown future. Perspective on anxiety or real concern need not cave into fear and panic. Listen to emotions, but don't let them drive you. They are the color of our world but nots its form. Together color and form make beautiful realities. It is the beautiful realities that the Luminous want to lead us to experience.
Happy Saturday my friends!
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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The native Brits are going to jail for trying to protect their land, their homes, their children, their culture. They are deemed Rrrracist.
The French are dealing with violent riots, burning of schools and businesses, targeting of religious institutions, and any dissent is Rrrrracist.
As most every Western society kowtows to an invasion of barbarians, opposing this is considered Rrrracist.
Now they are instituting the thought crime of Rrrracism as the highest of crimes (over raping children, for example) and punishable by death. No "due process" needed. Just HUNT these people down and MURDER them.
As their own world and culture is being destroyed, they are distracted to "kill the Jews." And the alternative is to go to jail, or, if accused of aiding or abetting, face the firing squad.
This is what the "Progressives" believe. The "Green" party, the socialists, the Marxists, the communists. They are the actual racists, full of a queer mixture of hate, stupidity, suicidal empathy, and indoctrination....
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.”
