Devotion to Christ: The Fruit of the Marian Gaze

"Remembering our most holy, pure, blessed, and glorious Lady, the Theotokos and ever virgin Mary, with all the saints, let us commit ourselves and one another and our whole life to Christ our God." ~ The Divine Liturgy of Saint John Chrysostomos

The Intimacy of Christmas

In Jesus, "we see God in our nature, coping with our world, meeting situations known to us. Outside Christianity there is nothing to compare with the intimacy of this knowledge." ~ Frank J. Sheed, Theology for Beginners

Wisdom, Mercy & Justice

A wise judge may let mercy temper justice but may not let mercy undo it. ~ Lewis B. Smedes, The Art of Forgiving

The prisoner was you...

To forgive is to set a prisoner free and discover that the prisoner was you. ~ Lewis B. Smedes, Forgiveness

Detecting forgiveness...

You will know that forgiveness has begun when you recall those who hurt you and feel the power to wish them well. ~ Lewis B. Smedes, Forgive & Forget

It only takes one to forgive...

It takes one person to forgive, it takes two people to be reunited. ~ Lewis B. Smedes, The Art of Forgiving

Forgiveness is not understanding...

...Forgiving is not having to understand. Understanding may come later, in fragments, an insight here and a glimpse there, after forgiving. ~ Lewis B. Smedes, Forgive & Forget

Forgiveness isn't tolerance...

You can forgive someone almost anything. But you cannot tolerate everything... We don't have to tolerate what people do just because we forgive them for doing it. Forgiving heals us personally. To tolerate everything only hurts us all in the long run. ~ Lewis B. Smedes, Forgive & Forget

Forgive the wife-slammer

Forgive a wife-slammer if you can. But you don't have to live with him. Forgive a husband who is abusing your children if you can. But only after you kick him out of the house. And if you can't get him out, get help. It's available. In the meantime, don't let him near the kids, and don't let anyone tell you that if you forgive him it means you have to stay with him. [There's an important difference between forgiving a person and tolerating their bad behavior.] ~ Lewis B. Smedes, The Art of Forgiving

Giving up on vegeance

When you give up vengeance, make sure you are not giving up on justice. The line between the two is faint, unsteady, and fine...Vengeance is our own pleasure of seeing someone who hurt us getting it back and then some. Justice, on the other hand, is secure when someone pays a fair penalty for wronging another even if the injured person takes no pleasure in the transaction. Vengeance is personal satisfaction. Justice is moral accounting...Human forgiveness does not do away with human justice. ~ Lewis B. Smedes, The Art of Forgiving

The Problem with Revenge

The problem with revenge is that it never gets what it wants; it never evens the score. Fairness never comes. The chain reaction set off by every act of vengeance always takes its unhindered course. It ties both the injured and the injurer to an escalator of pain...Why do family feuds go on and on?...the reason is simple: no two people, no two families, ever weigh pain on the same scale. ~ Lewis B. Smedes, Forgive & Forget

Ghandi was right

Gandhi was right: if we all live by 'an eye for an eye' the whole world will be blind. The only way out is forgiveness. ~ Lewis B. Smedes, Forgive & Forget

Videotaped Vengeance

Vengeance is having a videotape planted in your soul that cannot be turned off. It plays the painful scene over and over again inside your mind... And each time it plays you feel the clap of pain again... Forgiving turns off the videotape of pained memory. Forgiving sets you free. ~ Lewis B. Smedes, Forgiveness

Healed, but not deleted...

Forgiving does not erase the bitter past. A healed memory is not a deleted memory. Instead, forgiving what we cannot forget creates a new way to remember. We change the memory of our past into a hope for our future. ~ Lewis B. Smedes, The Art of Forgiving

Failure's Real Name

The rule is: we cannot really forgive ourselves unless we look at the failure in our past and call it by its right name. ~ Lewis B. Smedes, Forgive & Forget

Forgiving Evil

When we forgive evil we do not excuse it, we do not tolerate it, we do not smother it. We look the evil full in the face, call it what it is, let its horror shock and stun and enrage us, and only then do we forgive it. ~ Lewis B. Smedes, Forgive & Forget

God's Remedy

God invented forgiving as a remedy for a past that not even he could change and not even he could forget. His way of forgiving is the model for our forgiving. ~ Lewis B. Smedes, , The Art of Forgiving

God's Invention

Forgiveness is God's invention for coming to terms with a world in which, despite their best intentions, people are unfair to each other and hurt each other deeply. He began by forgiving us. And he invites us all to forgive each other. ~ Lewis B. Smedes, Forgive & Forget

The Original Forgiver

God is the original, master forgiver. Each time we grope our reluctant way through the minor miracle of forgiving, we are imitating his style. I am not at all sure that any of us would have had imagination enough to see the possibilities in this way to heal the wrongs of this life had he not done it first. ~ Lewis B. Smedes, The Art of Forgiving

Celebrating Lewis B. Smedes

Every so often a single person impacts you in dramatic ways. Today, I will be celebrating one such person, Lewis B. Smedes. Enjoy the feast!