From
"The Ragamuffin Gospel" by Brennan Manning
John Predmore, S.J., is a USA East Province Jesuit and was the pastor of Jordan's English language parish. He teaches art and directs BC High's adult spiritual formation programs. Formerly a retreat director in Gloucester, Massachusetts. Ignatian Spirituality is given through guided meditations, weekend-, 8-day, and 30-day Retreats based on The Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola. Ignatian Spirituality serves the contemporary world as people strive to develop a friendship with God.
Sunday, November 6, 2011
Prayer: General Douglas MacArthur
Youth
is not a period of time. It is a state of mind, a result of the will, a quality
of the imagination, a victory of courage over timidity, of a taste for
adventure over the love of comfort. A man doesn't grown old because he has
lived a certain number of years. A man grows old when he deserts his ideal. The
years may wrinkle his skin, but deserting his ideals wrinkles his soul.
Preoccupations, fears, doubts, and despair are the enemies which slowly bow us
toward earth and turn us into dust before death. You will remain young as long
as you are open to what is beautiful, good, and great; receptive to the
messages of other men and women, of nature, and of God. If one day you should
become bitter, pessimistic, and gnawed by despair, may God have mercy on your
old man's soul.
I think we can be gnawed by despair but this makes it seem that fears and doubts are sinful whereas they can be opportunities to face and confront the truth.
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I see what you are saying. Despair can have a detrimental effect upon us or we can use it to come to freedom. Thanks, Phil.
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