St Augustine:
See how widely I have ranged, Lord, searching for you in my memory. I have not found you outside of it.
…Confessions, St. Augustine says that we understand everything in relation to what we have remembered.
Photography has profoundly affected modern memory. … Memory is potent. It gives us depth. It ties our past from our present.
pp. 20-21, Thomas Moore, Original Self
Naïveté and cynicism mark the failure to achieve innocence.
We are born naive, but we can grow into innocence, which is something to be achieved.
With courage we may gain enough acquaintance with real life to make choices that foster our innocence while avoiding naïveté or cynicism.
Innocence, won only after years of struggle toward a deeply ethical life in a culture torn between naive ideals and cynical behavior, allows one to accept one’s self absolutely for past ignorance and stupidity and to breathe…
pp. 17-19, Thomas Moore, Original Self
in our modern existential anxiety,… we worry… …that our children may grow up without the skills they need to be successful.
There is a form of not knowing, from not having reflected or thought, and an inspired way, being sufficiently educated that we realize how absurdly little we know.
Maybe we shouldn’t look too far ahead and miss what is presently before is, and maybe we should look at everything that is ahead, not only what we wish would be there.
Anxiety is nothing but fear inspired by an imagined future collapse. It is the failure of trust.
pp. 11-13, Thomas Moore, Original Self
I will show you my faith by the things that I do.
May we express our faith in loving action and unselfish service for the good of souls around us.
Mark Kropf, Halsey, OR, Beside the still waters, vol. 29, Issue 1.
In waiting there is work, and in work there is worth.
Delmar Eby, Loudon, KY
Beside the Still Waters, Vol. 29, Iss. 1, 2024
Remind the people to be subject to rulers and to be obedient, to be ready to do whatever is good, to slander no one, to be peaceable, and always to be gentle toward everyone.
And as many as walk according to this rule, peace be upon them, and mercy,…
And let us not be weary in well doing; for in due season we shall reap if we faint not.
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