Ronald Rolheiser

Domestic Monastery

Michael Nadēr

because at this stage we are net so much strug gling with how to give our lives away but with how to give our deaths away, Our questions now become:

How do i live the last years of my life se that when I die my death will bless my loved ones 

How do I live out my remaining years se that when I die "blood and water" will, metaphorically, flew from my dead body as they once flowed from Jesus's dead body?

Prepare for death by living more fully now.

Work at loving more deeply, less discriminately, more affectionately, and more gratefully.

Tell those close to you that you love them and death will never catch you like a thief in the night.

At one point, he asked the old monk: "Do you still wrestle with the devil, Father Makarios?" The old priest sighed and replied: "Not any longer, my child.

I have grown old now, and he has grown old with me. He doesn't have the strength... I wrestle with God." "With God!" Kazantzakis exclaimed in aston-ishment. "And you hope to win?" "I hope to lose, my child," the old man re-plied. "My bones remain with me still, and they continue to resist."

Friendship, says St. Augustine, is the beauty of the soul.

Deep, life giving friendship, as we all know, is as difficult as it is rare. Why?

We all long for it in the depths of our soul, so why is it so difficult to find? We all know why: We're different from each other, unique, and rightly cautious as to whom we give entry into our soul. And so it isn't easy to find a soulmate, to have that kind of affinity and trust. Nor is it easy to sustain a friendship once we have found one.

Sustained friendship takes hard commitment, and that's not our strong point as our psyches and our world forever shift and turn. Moreover, today, virtual friendships don't always translate into real friendships.

"The end of friendship may be more important than love.

The epiphanies of youth are meant to blossom and ripen into

Finally, being a parent should naturally lead you to shape your heart for reconciliation. Love is all about forgiving, again and again and again. Families survive only if this is happening. A parent is meant to be the compassion of God, the father and mother of the prodigal son and the bitter brother, who embraces the child not because the child is worthy, but in spite of all unworthiness. A parent must ever say in word and attitude, "Return as far as you can and I will come the rest of the way."

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