Lees, luister en reflekteer saam op die volgende:
Franciscan blessing
May God bless you with discomfort at easy answers,
half truths, and superficial relationships,
so that you may live deep within your heart.
May God bless you with anger at injustice,
oppression and exploitation of people,
so that you may work for justice, freedom and peace.
May God bless you with tears to shed for those who suffer
from pain, rejection, starvation, and war,
so that you may reach out your hand to comfort them and turn their pain to joy.
And may God bless you with enough foolishness
to believe that you can make a difference in this world,
so that you can do what others claim cannot be done.
Amen.
Prayer — Maya Angelou
Father, Mother, God,
Thank you for your presence
during the hard and mean days.
For then we have you to lean upon.
Thank you for your presence
during the bright and sunny days,
for then we can share that which we have
with those who have less.
And thank you for your presence
during the Holy Days, for then we are able
to celebrate you and our families
and our friends.
For those who have no voice,
we ask you to speak.
For those who feel unworthy,
we ask you to pour your love out
in waterfalls of tenderness.
For those who live in pain,
we ask you to bathe them
in the river of your healing.
For those who are lonely, we ask
you to keep them company.
For those who are depressed,
we ask you to shower upon them
the light of hope.
Dear Creator, You, the borderless
sea of substance, we ask you to give to all the
world that which we need most—Peace.
“God is in the slums,
in the cardboard boxes where the poor play house.
God is in the silence
of a mother who has infected her child with a virus
that will end both their lives.
God is in the cries
heard under the rubble of war.
God is in the debris of wasted opportunity and lives,
and God is with us if we are with them.”
— Bono (U2)
Blessing for your work – John O’donohue
May the light of your soul guide you.
May the light of your soul bless the work
you do with the secret love and warmth of your heart.
May you see in what you do the beauty of your own soul.
May the sacredness of your work bring healing, light and renewal to those
who work with you and to those who see and receive your work.
May your work never weary you.
May it release within you wellsprings of refreshment, inspiration and excitement.
May you be present in what you do.
May you never become lost in the bland absences.
May the day never burden you.
May dawn find you awake and alert, approaching your new day with dreams,
possibilities and promises.May evening find you gracious and fulfilled.
May you go into the night blessed, sheltered and protected.
May your soul calm, console and renew you.
A Pledge For Grateful Living – David Steindl-Rast
In thanksgiving for life, I pledge
to overcome the illusion of entitlement
by reminding myself that everything is gift
and, thus, to live gratefully.
In thanksgiving for life, I pledge
to overcome my greed,
that confuses wants with needs,
by trusting that enough for all our needs is given to us
and to share generously
what i so generously receive.
In thanksgiving for life, I pledge
to overcome apathy
by waking up to the opportunities
that a given moment offers me
and so to respond creatively to every situation.
In thanksgiving for life, I pledge
to overcome violence
by observing that fighting violence by violence
leads to more violence and death
and, thus, to foster life by acting non-violently.
In thanksgiving to life, i pledge
to overcome fear which is the root of all violence
by looking at whatever i fear as an opportunity
and, thus, courageously to lay the foundation
for a peaceful future.
The World Has Need of You — Ellen Bass
everything here
seems to need us
—Rainer Maria Rilke
I can hardly imagine it
as I walk to the lighthouse, feeling the ancient
prayer of my arms swinging
in counterpoint to my feet.
Here I am, suspended
between the sidewalk and twilight,
the sky dimming so fast it seems alive.
What if you felt the invisible
tug between you and everything?
A boy on a bicycle rides by,
his white shirt open, flaring
behind him like wings.
It’s a hard time to be human. We know too much
and too little. Does the breeze need us?
The cliffs? The gulls?
If you’ve managed to do one good thing,
the ocean doesn’t care.
But when Newton’s apple fell toward the earth,
the earth, ever so slightly, fell
toward the apple.
Live work pray in me — Lancelot Andrewes (1555-1626)
Lord Jesus,
I give you my hands to do your work,
my feet to go your way,
my eyes to see as you do,
my tongue to speak your words,
my mind that you may think in me,
Above all I give you my heart
that you may love in me your Father
and all mankind,
I give you my whole self
that you may grow in me,
so that it is You, Lord Jesus,
who live and work and pray in me.
Daring greatly — Theodore Roosevelt
It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles,
or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena,
whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again,
because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds;
who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause;
who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly,
so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.
Real work, journey, life — Wendell Berry
It may be that when we no longer know what to do
we have come to our real work,
and that when we no longer know which way to go
we have come to our real journey.
The mind that is not baffled is not employed.
The impeded stream is the one that sings.