It is Christmas week, and so in the spirit of Christmas I am going to try and be calm, and enjoy Christmas. I am going to enjoy my family, and what we have, and who we are.
I found this....and loved it.
Letter to a Friend
I salute you. I am your friend and my love for you goes deep. There is nothing I can give you which you have not got; but there is much, very much, that while I cannot give it, you can take.
No Heaven can come to us unless our hearts find rest in today. Take Heaven! No peace lies in the future which is not hidden in this present little instance. Take Peace! The gloom of the world is but a shadow. Behind it, yet with in our reach, is Joy. There is radiance and glory in the darkness ... could we but see and to see we have only to look. I beseech you to look.
Life is so generous a giver, but we, judging it's gifts by it's covering, cast them away as ugly or heavy or hard. Remove the covering and you will find beneath it a living splendor, woven of love, by wisdom, with power.
Welcome it, grasp it, and you touch the Angel's hand that brings it to you. Everything we call a trail of a sorrow is there; the gift is there, and the wonder of an overshadowing presence. Our joys too; be not content with them as joys. They too conceal diviner gifts.
Life is so full of meaning and purpose, so full of beauty ... beneath it's covering ... that you will find earth that cloaks heaven. Courage then to claim it, that is all! But courage you have, and the knowledge that we are pilgrims together, wending through unknown country, home.
And so at this Christmas time, I greet you. Not quite as the world sends greetings, but with profound esteem and with the prayer that for you, now and forever, the day breaks, and the shadows flee away.
- Fra Giovanni written in 1513 A.D
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