Here are a few commandments designed to help us through the long haul in life:
1) Be grateful…never look a gift universe in the mouth!
To be a saint is nothing less than to be warmed and vitalized by gratitude. We owe it to our Creator to appreciate things, to be as happy as we can be. Resist pessimism and false guilt. Keep God central in all of life.
2) Don’t be naive about God…God will settle for not less than everything!
Religion puts a belt around you and takes you to where you would rather not be. Get used to virtue. It gives you a constant reminder of what you have missed out on. Know that God will settle for not less than everything. Demands from God always seem unreasonable. Learn to wrestle with God. You can win, by losing to God.
3) Walk forward when possible…when impossible, try to get one foot in front of the next!
Expect long periods of darkness and confusion. Take to the wonder of life. Take consolation in the fact that Jesus cried, saints sinned, Peter betrayed. The only thing that shatters dreams is compromise. Let ordinary life be enough. Start over often.
4) Pray…that God will hang on to you!
Distrust Gallup polls. Trust prayer. Prayer is an enlargement. Be willing to die a little to be with God. God is dying to be with us. Let your heart become the place where the tears of God and the tears of God’s children merge and become the tears of hope.
5) Love…if a life is large enough for love it is large enough!
Create a space for love in your life. Accept that nothing can be loved too much, though all things can be loved in the wrong way. Know that there are only two potential tragedies to life: Not to love and not to tell those whom we love that we love them.
6) Accept what you are…fear not – you are inadequate!
Be sufficiently fallible to be human. If you are weak, alone, without confidence and without answers…say so, then listen. Accept the torture of a life that is inadequate.
7) Don’t mummify…let go, so as not to be pushed!
Accept daily deaths. Do not hold on to life as a possession. Possessiveness kills enjoyment. Let go of life gracefully. The greatest strength of life is the power to resign it. Death-corruption-resurrection, that’s the true rhythm. Keep in mind that it is difficult to distinguish a moment of dying from a moment of birth.
8) Refuse to take things seriously…call yourself a fool regularly!
Laugh and play and give yourself over to silliness. Don’t confuse sneering with laughter. Keep in mind that it is easy to be heavy, it is hard to be light.
9) Stay with the folks…you are on a group outing!
Do not journey alone. Be “born again” more fully into a community. Accept that there are strings attached. To go anywhere in life we have to take along the family, the church, the country and the human race. Don’t be seduced by the false lure of absolute freedom.
10) Don’t be afraid to go soft…redemption lies in tears!
Resist the macho impulse. The person who will not have a softening of the heart will eventually have a softening of the brain. As G.K. Chesterton put it: “The swiftest things are the softest things. A bird is active because a bird is soft. A stone is helpless because a stone is hard. The stone by its nature goes downward, because hardness is weakness. A bird can of its nature go upwards; fragility is force.” Know that there are two kinds of darkness one can enter: the fearful darkness of paranoia, which brings sadness, and the fetal darkness of conversion, which brings life.
Based on the words of Fr. Ron Rolheiser, OMI Thanks to Ahha Pblxkoba for the photo
Which of the above 10 Commandments touched YOU the most? What special memories or people did they bring to YOUR mind? Which are the hardest of these Commandments to practice in YOUR life?
YOUR PROBLEMS HAVE AN EXPIRATION DATE. THEY WON’T LAST FOREVER. GOD’S PROMISES NEVER DIE. THEY WILL STAND FOREVER!!
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