What do You Need?
Life Simplified
//Life Simplified//
Minute Meditation – Choose to Love
If we choose to love, if we decide to accept the demands of being a loving person, we immediately take on the responsibility of being for others, in service and in times of opposition, in trials and persecution, also in peace and joy. We accept this dynamic not in the way we would like, but as determined by the needs of others around us. Frequently, this means putting more heart into what we are about in all the ordinary tasks of daily life; it means reaching deeper into the source of our energy when it seems like it is too hard to allow the ministry or a child or another to keep making demands.
It takes a self-possessed, mature person to respond thus. But these same people know freedom; they are free from self and free for others, free to live the challenge of the gospel and open to the most that life can call forth. Such people know joy!
—from the book In the Footsteps of Francis and Clare by Roch Niemier, OFM
//Franciscan Media//
The Catechism in a Year – Day 234 -Freedom and Responsibility
The Catechism gives us an overview of what it means for humans to have freedom, as well as some of the ramifications of that freedom. It introduces us to the countercultural notion that true freedom is to choose the good—the “freedom” to choose evil is merely the abuse of freedom. Fr. Mike ensures that we understand imputability and culpability because questions about intention, ignorance, and other social factors will be the hinges upon which swing the doors of sin. Today’s readings are Catechism paragraphs 1730-1738.
Click on link: https://youtu.be/fI6gSUIXRyc?si=b-PC3zzjeBQfPAm1
Minute Meditation – Freedom in God
A good spirituality achieves two huge things simultaneously: It keeps God absolutely free, not bound by any of our formulas, and it keeps us utterly free ourselves and not forced or constrained by any circumstances whatsoever, even human laws, sin, limitations, failure, or tragedy. “It was for freedom that Christ has set us free!” as Paul writes (Galatians 5:1). Good religion keeps God free for people and keeps people free for God. We cannot improve on that.
—from the book Breathing Under Water: Spirituality and the Twelve Steps by Richard Rohr
Daily Reflection – Worth the Freedom You Will Gain
Minute Meditation – Identity, Justice, and Community
We will not appreciate Jesus’ loyalty to the Law and the Prophets if we do not accept his deeper understanding of freedom. I’m afraid that the cry of the French Revolution, “Liberty, equality, and fraternity,” has formed us much more than the Jesus Revolution. His cry might instead be “Identity, justice, and community.” Think about the difference. We also tend to think of freedom as freedom of movement and the liberty to choose between options. This is surely a good and important freedom. There is no indication that the great spiritual teachers, Jesus included, see it as essential, however. They seem to recognize that the world of preferences and possibilities does not of itself lead to wisdom, truth, or even depth of experience. In fact, in the spiritual life, the rule seems to be that less is more. There is almost no correlation between the number of options and the amount of truth or goodness that one attains.
—from the book Jesus’ Alternative Plan: The Sermon on the Mount
by Richard Rohr, OFM
//Franciscan Media//
Daily Reflection – You Can Love Only to the Extent that You are Free
Let Freedom Ring
The #1 Thing That Gets in the Way of Love
Love is impossible without freedom. And what do we all want more than to love and be loved? Yet, we seem to entertain all kinds of slaveries in our lives, don’t we? We embrace the chains of distraction, selfishness and unforgiveness—and hold ourselves back from experiencing the fullest kind of love. Today, Matthew explores how Jesus helps us overcome what gets in the way of love.