As we celebrate Thanksgiving, let us be joyful and grateful for the myriad gifts - tangible and intangible - that bless us. Let us focus on the abundance in our lives - most especially, our fruitful association and loving community.
With gratitude, we celebrate the daily efforts of men and women in search of a better world. With them, strengthened by the Spirit, we want to continue finding the face of God in the future towards which we journey. We find hope in initiatives towards solidarity and reconciliation, gestures of sharing goods and of caring for life, and words that console and challenge us. In the beating of these human hearts in accordance with the rhythm of life, with joy we discover the love of the Heart of Jesus.
What have we learned from her? The value of a steadfast purpose; the success of failure and the unimportance of our standards of success; the power of grace released by deep, divine desires and simple duties daily done; the old, unearthly, stark, unwelcome fact that God is the worker, we the tools, so that God often takes the keen edge of our choice plans and uses it in God's own way, not ours, producing wonderful results entirely beyond our understanding - but only if the handle of the tool is smoothed and rounded to God's hand by sacrifice and prayer.
How do I make the love of Christ known - to myself and to others? Can I transform my thoughts, words and actions into prayer through connection to the divine? Will I be a light of God's love for others?
Only when life is placid can one be indifferent to conflict. And whoever truly follows Jesus cannot lead a placid life. ...the charism, as a gift of the Spirit, is calling for different ways of living and being present, a shift in emphasis, and so on, precisely so that the following of Christ may be a reality in the midst of human limitations:
In doing for others, do I neglect to care for my true self - my soul and my spirit? Do I attend to the present at the expense of the Presence?
... if we do not become women of active inwardness, if we do not allow ourselves to be led by the Spirit to that place of Deep Life, we cannot be of one mind with Jesus; relationships and tasks will be dispersed and scattered... in contrast to the activity permeated with Presence, flowing gently from the source within.
...if we ourselves do not go to the Fountain, how are we going to be able to lead others there?
