Tuesday, October 31, 2017

Because you loved us first (Henri Nouwen)


   Dear Lord, I bring before you all the people who experience failure in their search for a creative, affectionate relationship.  Many single people feel lonely and unable to sustain a friendship for a long period of time; many married people feel frustrated in their marriage and separate to go different ways; many children cannot speak to their parents; and many parents have become afraid of their children.  All around me I see the hunger for love and the inability to experience it in a deep and lasting way.

   Lord, look with favor on us, your people, and impart your love to us – not as an idea or concept, but as a lived experience.  We can only love each other because you have loved us first.  Let us know that first love so that we can see all human love as a reflection of a greater love, a love without conditions and limitations.

   Heal those who feel hurt in the most intimate self, who feel rejected, misunderstood, or even misused.  Show them your healing love and help them on the way to forgiveness and reconciliation.  Amen.

--Henri Nouwen, A Cry for Mercy:  Prayers from the Genesee

Monday, October 30, 2017

Devote everything (Matthieu Ricard)


 Love is to want the happiness of others: 
like a mother who loves her child, 
we should devote everything, 
our body, our property, and our merits 
to help others learn to bear 
the evil they can do to us. 

--Matthieu Ricard, 
Treasure of Precious Qualities 

Saturday, October 28, 2017

Love (Junot Diaz)





  The half-life of love is forever. 

--Junot Diaz,     
This is How You Lose Her