Please fast and pray every Thursday for the renewal of the Catholic Church in America. Please note: The Cybersociety will fast on Fridays beginning January 2013, in accordance with ancient custom.

This is not a photoblog; this is not a Catholic trivia blog. The story of our origins.

Friday, April 24, 2015

Mature Hope


"The more mature hope becomes, the more clearly it perceives the nonsense of a mere existence running toward death. Hope is continually being confirmed in little, outwardly insignificant but irrefutable ways. How? In the sparks that flash forth in love's response. Summoned by love, hearts recognize each other now here and now there....This is a spark from the immense fire that burns in its unapproachable center. Hope would not exist if it did not come from the immense fire at the heart of things, if eternal love--contrary to appearances--were not the meaning of life." (Hans Urs von Balthasar, You Crown the Year with Your Goodness)

Friday, April 17, 2015

Hope


"The new earth that will some day come will result both from man's endeavor and from God's act in raising it up to a final and complete form. Once we have summoned the courage to entrust ourselves to this hope, however, how can we live? How can we apply it? The power of  hope grows within us by battling against meaninglessness and futility. The vast regions of unbelief all around us; all the mortal weariness of our culture; the absurd with all it powers of persuasion; all of this must be negated, constantly, by our hope."--Hans Urs von Balthasar, You Crown the Year with Your Goodness



Friday, April 10, 2015

Easter Week

     

Christ keep the hollow-land
Through the sweet springtide,
When the apple blossoms bless
The lowly bent hill side.

Christ keep the hollow-land
All the summertide;
Still we cannot understand
Where the waters glide.

--William Morris (1834-1896), "The Hollow-Land"








Friday, April 3, 2015

Good Friday

"What is the good of trying to teach people to love God without preaching through those wounds?"
--Thomas Merton, The Sign of Jonas

"Jesus gave us more than a sublime doctrine: He gave us Himself."--Thomas Merton, What is Contemplation?