Good Morning Friends & Refugees, Phamily & Misfits ADD Irregulars, WSN Curators and all the rest of you Conversants, Lurkers, Searchers and Lost on the interwebs! Happy Sunday Digital Neighbors! This is my favorite day of the week, a day that is meant to be overflowing with gratitude, praise, joy, wonder and awe if you are a Disciple of the Risen One. If you are not, Happy Sunday none the less and all the more.
A few thoughts & quotes on gratitude which is the dominate attitude of mind and heart that I try to cultivate and sustain. Sunday is the day of gratitude for me, I strive to make gratitude my dominate expression to the Giver. I can't say that I live everyday grounded in gratitude, but many of them are awash with an abundance of gratitude and reasons to be thankful. Even on the days that test me, I know my greater reality is unmerited blessings and gifts in living that have come my way. Since I believe in a Giver, it prompts me easily enough to respond in either personal prayer, communal worship or service to neighbor or stranger.
If you don't believe in a Giver, I would think that it would give you even more reason to wonder at the amazing nature of this unpredictable reality. The gift of life has dropped in your lap and the fact that you can read this on a phone or PC means that your life could be far worse or impoverished. Gratitude does not mean that we ignore the realities of life like hardship, suffering and death, but rather that we return to the greater cause for gratitude after the episode of sorrow and stretching has passed. Sometimes we have to choose gratitude in the middle of the trial to keep us grounded in the truths that are larger than suffering. it is one of the most difficult things to do, but often one of the most empowering.
If I didn't believe in a Giver of Life and a Lover of Souls, I would seek the wisdom of Buddha. No offense to those who follow his wisdom, it is profound and I barely scratched the surface of it in college. I know next to nothing beyond the 4 Noble Truths and the Noble 8 Fold Path. To admit that that life is suffering is a profound insight. But since I believe in a Giver and that the Giver has communicated with us, suffering is to be seen as more of a challenge. Life is an invitation and a challenge. It is up the the individual to discern what that invitation is all about and to recognize the challenges that appear in their personal story of life. Happy Sunday Digital Neighbors! Since it is Sunday, a few quotes to plant some seed of thought and a photo of some Autumn beauty.
Live a life full of humility, gratitude, intellectual curiosity, and never stop learning. - Gza
When you arise in the morning give thanks for the food and for the joy of living. If you see no reason for giving thanks, the fault lies only in yourself. - Tescumseh
Let us be grateful to the people who make us happy; they are the charming gardeners who make our souls blossom. - Marcel Proust
Lord,
make the old tolerant,
the young sympathetic,
the great humble,
the busy patient.
Make rich people understanding,
strong people gentle,
those who are weak prayerful;
make the religious lovable,
happy folk thoughtful,
the clever kindly,
the bad good,
the good pleasant
and, dear Lord, make me what I ought to be.
Short Prayers for the Long Day
Autumn Sunrise - Sumaid Pal Singh Bakshi - Unsplash
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 ...
Good morning, digital neighbors! I will be away this week at Convocation and mostly offline. I will check in to keep the email from piling up, but I will not be doing my morning missives, checking in for Teams Coffee Talk, or any other posting throughout the week. Please know that you will be on my mind and in my prayers.
Our Vicar for Priests sent out this message to the faithful to explain the nature of the Convocation:
Once every four years for the past four decades, the priests of the Archdiocese of St. Louis have been called together by our Archbishop for a week-long Convocation. It is a time of prayer, enrichment for ministry, and fellowship in priestly fraternity.
As the experience of priestly life and ministry in our Archdiocese continues to evolve — particularly as priests are called upon to pastor multiple parishes simultaneously, and as communities as large as 1,800 to 2,000 households are increasingly served by only one priest — opportunities for enrichment for our priests, such as ...
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.
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.”
