OPreach
Dominican Preaching through Word and Image
Wednesday of Hope – Which Doesn’t Require Optimism
Since Active Hope doesn’t require our optimism, we can apply it even in areas where we feel hopeless. The guiding impetus is intention; we choose what we aim to bring about, act for, or express. Rather than weighing our chances and proceeding only when we feel hopeful, we focus on our intention and let it be our guide.
– Joanna Macy & Chris Johnstone, Active Hope: How to Face the Mess We’re in Without Going Crazy, p. 3.
To Climb to the Heights
“Those who would climb to a lofty height must go by steps, not leaps.”
– St. Gregory the Great
Wakening to Oneness – The Deep Truth
The deep truth about matter, which neither Descartes nor Newton realized, is that, over the course of four billion years, molten rocks transformed themselves into monarch butterflies, blue herons, and the exalted music of Mozart. Ignorant of this stupendous process, we fell into the fantasy that our role here was to reengineer inert matter.
– Brian Swimme, Journey of the Universe
Wednesday of Hope – We Make Plans
The trick comes in planning next summer’s vacation while knowing that next summer is not promised to anyone. This impermanence is the key to our pain and our joy.
– Sallie Tisdale
The Magic of Beginnings
And suddenly you know: It’s time to start something new and trust the magic of beginnings.
– Meister Eckhart
Wakening to Oneness – Invisible Bonds
Things are united by invisible bonds. You cannot pick a flower without troubling a star.
– Galileo Galilei
Wednesday of Hope – Seeds of Love
Every farmer who plants a seed takes a risk. We work through faith that the good deeds we do are to put down roots. The roots are invisible, but they sustain plants that may not give fruit for a while. How lovely is this planting the seeds of love.
– Omid Safi
Welcome the Present Moment
Welcome the present moment as if you had invited it. Why? Because it is all we have.
– Pema Chodron
Wakening to Oneness – Life Abounds
Life abounds in all variety of resources and resourcefulness. Every moment is a divine encounter, every facet is an exposure to the boundless energies by which life is sustained and our spirits made whole.
– Howard Thurman
Wednesday of Hope in The Peace of the Wild Things
When despair grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting for their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.
– Wendell Berry, “The Peace of the Wild Things”
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