Dear Friend,

Let me suggest a few "Definitions" that flow from the Gifts of The Holy Spirit:

Prophecy: setting before people the Word and wisdom of God persuasively.

Encouragement: drawing alongside to comfort, encourage, and lead someone into insight toward action.

Dear Friend,

In Jerusalem, there is a Holocaust Museum dedicated to the memory of the millions of Jews who were killed by the Nazis in World War II. Going through the museum is a very depressing experience because you see these horrible pictures and read the accounts of the ghettos and the concentration camps. But in the midst of all the dark tales of suffering, there is one amazing story of how God can transform horror into hope.

Dear Friend,

Sin demands to have a person be alone. It withdraws the individual from the community. The more isolated a person is, the more destructive will be the power of sin over him or her, and the more deeply the person becomes involved in it, the more disastrous is the isolation.

Sin wants to remain unknown. It shuns the light. In the darkness of the unexpressed, it poisons the whole being of a person.

Dear Friend, Do you remember the cartoon with Wiley Coyote and Ralph the sheep dog? I use to love that cartoon. Every morning Ralph and Wiley would meet at the time clock which was mounted on a tree. As they clocked in they would great each other and then they would go to their respective departments.

Ralph the sheep dog went to his post on the cliff and took his position as head of the sheep protection department.

Dear Friend,

Among the many books written by Henri Nouwen (1932-1996), one stands out as an enduring little classic, The Wounded Healer. For those who knew him, this book is especially powerful because, without expressly intending to do so, it describes very well the man himself. It was because of his own wounds that he was able to touch the lives of so many people. “By his wounds we have been healed,” St Peter wrote of Jesus (1 Peter 2:24).

Dear Friend,

Margaret Cregg, my high school classmate, wrote that in the mid -1990’s her uncle, Father Walter Sangster, began to notice some uneasiness in his throat and a dragging in his leg. When he went to the doctor, he found that he had an incurable disease that cased progressive muscular atrophy. His muscles would gradually waste away, his voice would fail, and his throat would soon become unable to swallow.

Dear Friend,

A bishop friend of mine in Ireland recently sent this to me and I want to share it with you:

Ten Commandments of "Human Relations"

1. Speak to people. There is nothing as nice as a cheerful word of greeting.
2. Smile at people. It takes seventy-two muscles to frown, only fourteen to smile.
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Dear Friend,

All blame is a waste of time.

No matter how much fault you find with another, and regardless of how much you blame him, it will not change you.

The only thing blame does is to keep the focus off you when you are looking for external reasons to explain your unhappiness or frustration.

Dear Friends,

Pope Saint John XXIII often reminded people, "Do not forget your prayers. These may be as short as you wish if you find long prayers too hard, but do not forget them. Even a sign can be a prayer."

We all have our routine and we don't always want to change it. Never-the-less we can find more time for prayer, if we just look at our daily routine.

Dear Friend,

Once armies carried cannonballs with them, afraid they would meet the enemy somewhere and have nothing to shoot at it.

In terms of specific gravity, grudges are about as heavy as cannonballs.

But it makes little sense to carry them.

Dear Friend,

THE WORLD NEEDS WOMEN AND MEN…

who cannot be bought;
whose word is their bond;
who put character above wealth;
who possess opinions and a will;
who are larger than their vocations;
who do not hesitate to take chances;
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Dear Friend,

In his book, An Anthropologist on Mars, neurologist Oliver Sacks tells about Thomas, a man who had been blind from early childhood. When he was 50, Thomas underwent surgery and was given the gift of sight. But as he and Dr. Sacks found out, having the physical capacity for sight is not the same as seeing.

Dear Friend,

In the early days of the church BAPTISM was a declaration that the believer was definitely identifying with that group of people who were called Christians and were often despised and hated.

To be a Christian meant taking a leap of Faith.