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July Newsletter — Jul 10, 2009
What is your vision for the world? When asked this question by an interviewer, Br. David found it “a bit big.” He scaled things down and began with the crows who snack on his back patio treats:
http://www.gratefulness.org/readings/vision_project06.htm
“Surely you will remember some quirky little incident that made you smile, changed your mood, and suddenly the world looked brighter. If this ever happened to you, the key for understanding a causal chain of great consequence is in your hand: Any change in attitude changes the way one sees the world, and this in turn changes the way one acts.”
But it is not only quirky little incidents that turn our lives inside out and shape a future we never expected. On her way from Calcutta to Darjeeling for a retreat, a 36-year-old nun named Teresa heard Jesus ask her, “Would you not help the poorest of the poor?” Nearly two years later – after continuing to hear this call and obtaining permission to begin – she donned a white, blue-bordered sari and set out to serve destitute people in Calcutta, establishing the Missionaries of Charity:
http://www.gratefulness.org/giftpeople/teresa_calcutta.htm
The woman we know today as Blessed Mother Teresa received countless honors, including the 1979 Nobel Peace Prize. But she had long since lost the consolation of a call. “If I ever become a Saint,” she wrote to one of her advisors, “I will surely be one of ‘darkness.’ I will continually be absent from Heaven – to lit the light of those in darkness on earth.” She felt herself to be a hypocrite, needing to speak about the sweetness of God’s love while experiencing only God’s absence. Yet with astounding tenacity, she held on to her commitment to heal others’ suffering. So if you find yourself blessed with a vision but immersed in the darkness of its terrible demands, perhaps you can take courage from this woman who did not give up.
This month we honor another person whose vision inspired people throughout the world: Thomas Berry, who died June 1st at age 94. In the words of Frederick Franck, Berry’s life “testifies to the indestructible human spirit, the surviving triumph of human wisdom over all the follies and cruelties of our generation”:
http://www.gratefulness.org/readings/hallward_berry.htm
What a simple, impressive vision Berry had for what the world needs! “Whatever preserves and enhances this meadow in its natural cycles of transformation is good; whatever opposes this meadow or negates it is not good.” If Mother Teresa’s gratefulness appeared in compassion towards unwanted people, Thomas Berry’s appeared in recognition of the rights of meadow. Those rights spring from a revelation, built into the very structure of the universe, of our integral connection to one another:
http://www.gratefulness.org/a/inthenews/index.htm
The “way of love,” Br. David tells interviewer Kate Olson, gives you an existential sense of belonging. When you have this, “you are ‘in love,’ not in the sense in which we speak romantically about being in love, but you are within that realm that is love. You belong, and therefore you will act lovingly.”
So what is your vision for the world? If you are not sure yet, or if you need to re-attune, you might want to begin your quest by looking with gratefulness at things simple and near: the birds you feed, the humblest of people around you, your own back meadow, the realm of love you inhabit.
Wishing you all good gifts,
Patricia and Margaret
on behalf of our ANG*L Webteam
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