HOW DID IT GET TO BE NOVEMBER ALREADY? Does time fly for you as quickly as it does for me and my friends? Every week I seem to have a discussion or two about how quickly the week has flown by and then we comment on the fact that it’s almost the end of the year and where did it all go? Even though the years are full of special events, tragedies, traumas, and just ordinary everyday happenings, we seem to be losing any way to keep track of it all. Could it be modern technology, which brings so much to us at the same time and often even as it is happening? I find it difficult to sort it all out sometimes, and if it wasn’t for spiritual and religious insights I’m not sure I’d get through it all.
Thanksgiving, our national holiday that encourages us to get in touch with our inner self and see the world and the people and creatures in it as gifts, may help us to make sense of all that’s happening at this time. I often think about how many times during my lifetime I heard or read about what the future would be like, and now I realize that I am living through some of these predictions. I don’t like some of what I see, and I’m amazed at what we can do if and when we work together for the common good.
Climate change has really caught my attention this year as we witnessed so many storms, floods, fires, and other natural disasters that were predicted to happen and now are predicted to continue and even increase throughout the planet in years to come. When I see people lose everything in their homes and businesses because of fire and floods and see them struggle to rebuild their lives, I am most grateful for what I have and realize that but for the “grace of God” I could be in the same situation.
I am overwhelmed by the outpouring of the good people who reach out to help others in these situations. It inspires me that there are so many good souls who really care for others and do whatever they can to help. In a country like ours, where we are so blessed with so many resources, it still amazes me that despite our reputation for being rugged individualists, there are so many who understand the concept of the common good and do what they can to share from what they do have.
I hope and pray that we heed Pope Francis’s words and continue to learn how to have regard for all citizens and seek to respond as effectively as we can to the needs of the least fortunate wherever and whenever we can—in our families, in our neighborhoods, in our cities, in our state, in our country, in our world! Remember, “Your life is not about you. You are about life!”
Happy Thanksgiving, and Go Blue!
Sister Mary Thill is a Sylvania Franciscan Sister. She can be reached at mthill@sistersosf.org.
Looking to the common good is
much more than
the sum of what is good for
individuals.
It means having a regard for all
citizens
and seeking to respond effectively
to the needs of the least
fortunate….
-Pope Francis, Let Us Dream, 2020
Your life is not about you.
You are about life!
-Rev. Richard Rohr
