Oblate Program at Belmont Abbey, NC

Tag: power

We live in an age of bad dreams. . .

We live in an age of bad dreams, in which the scientist and engineer possess the power to give external form to the phantasms of man’s unconscious. The bright weapons that sing in the atmosphere, ready to pulverize the cities of the world, are the dreams of giants without a center. Their mathematical evolutions are… Read More ›

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Violence will not really change anything

I am against war, against violence, against violent revolution, for peaceful settlement of differences, for nonviolent but nevertheless radical changes. Change is needed, and violence will not really change anything: at most it will only transfer power from one set of bull-headed authorities to another. Thomas Merton

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God’s attitude to my sin is pity, not blame

Unfortunately we do not learn about sinfulness from a heavenly messenger. Nor is it like the result of a personality test. We learn of our sinfulness when we are tempted. Temptation is more than awareness of alternative options: I am not tempted to genocide if I lack the means; I am not tempted to computer… Read More ›

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Psalm 100(99): In prayer we abandon ourselves to God’s embrace

1. In the spirit of joy and celebration that continues in this last week of the Christmas season, we want to resume our meditation on the Liturgy of Lauds. Today we reflect on Psalm 99[100], just proclaimed, which is a joyful invitation to praise the Lord, the shepherd of his people. Seven imperatives are scattered… Read More ›

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Build your life on Christ

Vatican City, Mar 6, 2011 / 11:29 am (CNA/EWTN News).- On Christ, and not on the “sands of power, success and money,” does man find the true place to build his life, said Pope Benedict XVI at the Sunday Angelus. From his studio window high above St. Peter’s Square, Pope Benedict spoke about the Sunday… Read More ›

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Thoughts have power

The test of life – one of the tests – is how we deal with thoughts: what enters our minds. Here is a real resolution. Which thoughts do we hold onto? Which thoughts do we choose to keep? Are we inclined to anger, dislike, or lust? It is in the interior discourse that sin begins… Read More ›

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Christ is present to those rejected and unwanted in this world

Into this world, this demented inn, in which there is absolutely no room for him at all, Christ has come uninvited. But because he cannot be at home in it, because he is out of place in it, and yet he must be in it, his place is with those others who do not belong,… Read More ›

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