Success come from knowing that you did the best and are courageously living each moment as fully as possible. When one thinks about it, it is only the existence of marriage that makes virginity a choice, and only the existence of virginity that makes marriage a choice. Without either of them there would no longer be any “choice,” or, if there were (as between marriage and so-called free love, or getting married and staying single solely for the sake of freedom and an undisturbed life), it would be morally unacceptable. In saying this we are not saying anything new and revolutionary, but are only correcting a certain conditioning bound up with particular cultures and historical moments, and getting back to the ideas and attitudes of Jesus Christ. The Holy Spirit never ceases to guide the Church, in every area, to a knowledge of the complete truth. By the working of the Holy Spirit, revelation, like a precious spirit in a valuable temple, constantly renews its youth and also makes the temple grow younger. The Holy Spirit—as I said above—does not do new things, but makes new things. He makes them young again, restores them to their original splendour, and He does the same with the charism of consecrated virginity. When difficult things are asked of us, even things contrary to the longings of our heart, remember that the loyalty we pledge to the cause of Christ is to the supreme devotion of our lives. Of course, we all have some habits or flaws or personal history that could keep us from complete spiritual immersion in this work. However, God is our Father and is exceptionally good at forgiving and forgetting sins we have forsaken, perhaps because we give Him so much practice in doing so. In any case, there is divine help for every one of us at any hours we feel to make a change in our behaviour. #RandolphHarris 1 of 20

On the subject of getting back to the spirit and thought of Jesus, I have been struck by the fact that in Matthew’s Gospel, immediately after those sayings of Jesus about those who do not marry for the sake of the Kingdom of Heaven, comes His words about children—without any break, in fact linked to them by a temporal adverb: “Then (!) children were brought to Him so He could lay His hands on them and pray, but the disciples rebuked them. Jesus said, “Let the little children come to Me,” reports Matthew 19.13-14. In this way, Jesus’ words about voluntary chastity are enclosed between two major sayings of His about marriage: one regarding the indissolubility of marriage (“Have you not read that He Who created them from the beginning made them male and female?”), the other about children. Children are the fruit of marriage; they are the love of the two spouses made flesh. To welcome children, as Jesus does, is to welcome in the fullest way and in its most profound implications, the reality of marriage. To say, “Let the little children come to Me” is like saying, “Let the spouses, let the fathers and mothers come to Me.” Parents know very well that to welcome their children is to welcome them, in fact it is more. Naturally, all this is true when the marriage itself is lived in faith and in harmony with the will of God. Only in faith do the two charisms meet and shed light on one another. This is why the martyr St. Ignatius of Antioch, whom we heard warning virgins to be humble, admonishes married people in the same text to marry “in the Lord.” “It is proper,” he writes at the beginning of the second century, “that spouses should enter their union with the bishop’s consent so that the wedding takes place according to the Lord and not according to concupiscence, and that everything is done for the honour of God.” #RandolphHarris 2 of 20

Everything is always brought back to the same source, the lordship of Christ. If it is embraced “for the Lord,” virginity has value. If it is celebrated and lived “according to the Lord, matrimony has value. However, let us advance still further in our teaching about charisms. A charism—says St. Paul—is a particular “manifestation of the Spirit given to each one for the common good,” reports 1 Corinthians 12.7. St. Peter says the same thing when he writes “to the extent that each of you has received a gift (charisma), use it to sever one another as good stewards of God’s varied grace,” 1 Peter 4.10. What does all this mean when we apply it to our case? It means that celibacy and virginity are also for the married, and that marriage is also for virgins, in other words for their benefit. Consecrated virginity, therefore, is not a private matter, a private choice of perfection. On the contrary, it is “for the common good” to be used “to serve” others. The gift is destined only for some, for those who are called, but all are its beneficiaries. Such is the essential, apparently contradictory nature of a charism. It is something specific and individual—“a manifestation of the Spirit given to each one,” but at the same time it is something which is to be placed at the service of all (“for the common good”). In the Church, virgins and married people mutually “edify” one another. The married are reminded by virgins of the primacy of God and of the things that do not pass away. They are introduced to love of God’s Word, which consecrated persons, having more time and being more available, are able to study in greater depth in order to “break” the bread of the Word for their brothers and sisters who are more taken up with the occupations of the World. However, even virgins and celibates also learn something from married people. #RandolphHarris 3 of 20

What they learn is to be generous, to forget themselves, to serve life and often to have a certain humanity that comes from direct contact with the events of life. Some people find it difficult to pray or even dedicated an hour of their day to God. However, if one looks at married people, young mothers and fathers have to get up not once but five, six or more times a night to feed or nurse or rock a crying child, or watch at one’s bedside to see if he or she has a fever. And in the morning, at the same time each day, one of the two, or both of them, having taken the child to a grandparent or to the nursery, would rush to work in time to clock in, come rain or shine, good health or sickness. Then I said to myself: if we do not do something about it, we are in grave danger here! Our lifestyle, unless it is supported by a genuine observance of the Rule and by a certain rigour in its schedule and customs, is in danger of becoming a rose-water existence which will eventually make us uncaring. Do we have the right to feel offended when someone calls us “parasites”? We certainly do have that right, but only if we spend ourselves unreservedly for the Kingdom, if we are truly “united to the Lord without distractions.” Otherwise, we have no such right. What good parents are able to do for their children according to the flesh, the degree of self-forgetfulness they are capable of attaining in order to provide for their children’s health, studies and happiness, must be the measure of what we ought to do for our spiritual children who are our brothers and sisters in the Lord. Our example in this is the apostle Paul himself, who said he wanted to “spend what he had and to be spent” for the sake of his children in Corinth (2 Corinthians 12.15. #RandolphHarris 4 of 20

This shows how useful it is tht there should be a healthy integration of charisms in the Christian community, whereby married people and celibates do not live in strict separation from one another, but in such a way that they can help and encourage one another to grow. It is not true that the proximity of other genders and of families is always necessarily a danger or a dark threat for the unmarried. It can be, if one has not yet accepted one’s vocation freely, joyfully and definitively, but this is true for a married person too. Today we are called to work pastorally in a society no longer organized along the lines of the separation of the genders, but one where both genders constantly interact and are present together in every area of life and work. We need to adapt the way we live our charism to this new situation. In no way does this mean that each person has to give up one’s own lifestyle and surroundings. In the earliest days of the Church, virgins and celibates—as we can deduce from Paul, Tertullian, Cyprian and others—were integrated into Christian homes as part of the fabric of the whole community. However, very soon, certainly by the fourth century, they felt the need for a place apart where they could organize their time, with its rhythm of silence and activity, in accordance with their own special vocation. And so monasteries were born, like those founded by St. Ambrose in and around Milan. Today new types of community are coming into being, in which families and consecrated persons live together in the same location and share the same rule of life. Together they profess and practice poverty and obedience. The one thing that distinguishes them is whether they are married or celibate. This manifests an important aspect of the Church: the fact that it is a body with “many members,” each different from the other yet moved by the same Spirit (1 Corinthians 12.12-27). #RandolphHarris 5 of 20

In this particular form of life there is a need on both sides for space and freedom. The married need it in order to attend to their children, join in their games, solve the inevitable family tensions and cultivate mutual love. Virgins need it in order to cultivate silence and to study, and to be “united to the Lord without distractions.” While respecting the lifestyles of each, there are many ways in which married people and celibates can be spiritually united within a community. I once attended a meeting of the clergy and pastoral councils of a local Church and I remember the spiritual boost, the joy an the unity caused by the reading of a letter from the cloistered nuns of a convent in the same diocese, by which they showed they were present at the meeting, contributing to it through their prayers. Clearly the possibility of change and living at a more elevated level has always been one of the gifts of God to those who seek it. What is the key to a breakthrough in contented, happy living? It is embedded in one sentence: “The love of God…dwells in the hearts of the people.” When the love of God sets the tone for our own lives, for our relationships to each other and ultimately our feeling for all humankind, then old distinctions, limiting labels, and artificial divisions begin to pass away, and peace increases. Of course, we are speaking here of the first great commandment given to the human family—to love God wholeheartedly, without reservation or compromise, tht is, with all our heart, might, mind, and strength. This love of God is the first great commandment in the Universe. However, the first great truth in the Universe is that God loves us exactly that way—wholeheartedly, without reservation or compromise, with all His heart, might, mind, and strength. #RandolpHarris 6 of 20

When those majestic forces from God’s heart and ours meet without restraint, there is a veritable explosion of spiritual, moral power. Fathers of the church and actualized Christians, who were seekers after spirituality and for whom celibacy was an ongoing test of their commitment devoted their entire lives to their own salvation. However, until the arrival of the Kingdom of Heaven, what about everyone else’s soul? Who would teach, guide, scold, punish, and condemn sinning humanity? For the vast majority of humankind, priests are needed. Lifetime celibacy was, as we seen, a primarily Christian reoccupation. However, some people took false vows of celibacy to protect their jobs, then contrived, in unpriestly stealth, to creep into another person’s bed at night and prayed—if they dared—that no children would arrive to give the lie to the supposedly chaste marital arrangement. However, what underlay the mammoth battle over clerical celibacy? Foremost was the conviction that celibacy was a fundamental component of “good” Christianity. The Church Fathers strongly influenced this perception, reaching a wide, receptive audience through their writings, their preaching, and their teaching. They set personal examples as well, for most were unmarried celibates. In or survey of their theology, we saw how they evoked the Scriptures as proof of their arguments, quoting the words of the apostles and of Christ, and the Old Testament tale of Adam and Eve, as irrefutable evidence. One major consequence of all these theological, spiritual, and political contortions was that, increasingly, lay Christians adopted celibacy, so tht a core of many communities lived as spiritually pure a life as the Fathers of St. Augustine could have. #RandolphHarris 7 of 20

Often, they put professional religious to shame, and during the periods of widespread “lapsing” and apostasy in monasteries and women’s cloisters, these chaste and committed Christians shone—metaphorically, at least—with the pristine glow of a guiding star. However, some Christians argued strongly against clerical celibacy on the grounds that it was too difficult for most men. Yet, the growing wealth of monasteries, other cloisters, and the Church in general was another important reason to implant clerical celibacy. Bachelors leave no heirs, so would not be tempted to divvy up the property they administered, which would pass intact to the next generation of church men. They also suspected that unmarried candidates would be favoured in the Church, and that celibacy would be a good career move. Over the years, the celibacy campaign pressed on. In 401, priests at carthage were required to swear an oath of celibacy, the first-ever instance of this. Churchwide, a priest’s private life was now—theoretically—heavily monitored. His wife had to be virginal at the time of marriage and remain so forever. She could not share his bedroom, much less his bed. Instead, she passed her nights elsewhere, with a chaperone, while he lay with other clerics. Should her husband die, the widowed virgin was not permitted to have another go at marriage. A later edict went further: married clergymen had to leave their wives at their ordination. However, consider not the highborn clerics with access to fortunes but the lowly priests who constituted the greatest part of the clerical corpus. Material life in the postclassical West was so brutishly difficult that, while it also drove some unreligious men into ostensibly celibate monasteries as havens from hunger, it drove some sincere priests to marry as a form of economic survival. #RandolphHarris 8 of 20

Alongside the children they produced, wives could cultivate the parish landholdings and in other ways arrange to feed and clothe their priest husbands. More ambitions priests contrived to marry women with dowries, property, or small business, even if the latter consumed so much of the couple’s time that the business of religion was secondary to the exigencies of commerce. Some tattling, of course, was justified, particularly when priests and bishops fathered children. The great fear, entirely vindicated by subsequent events, was that the clerics would then use Church property as a family business, a personal legacy to provide for their sons and daughters. Expecting them to live with their wives “as if they were not wives” assumed as well that they would manage their church’s possessions as if they were men who had no possession, which was literally the case. Informing on priests and bishops who flouted Church policy with even a single infant was not motivated by personal spite but by a grave concern for the material future of the Christian community. Defiantly uncelibate clergymen were harassed and some lost their jobs, while the covertly uncelibate must have exercised discretion. In 1171, the abbot-elect of St. Augustine at Canterbury fathered seventeen children in a single village, but this was a puny production compared to a twelfth-century bishop of Liege who was unseated because he had sired sixty-five. The most ludicrous, later-century case was Pope Innocent VIII, a proud father who publicly acknowledged his brood of “bastards” and was then forgiven because he had been honest. Martin Luther believed strongly that God bestowed the gift of celibacy on some people. “This was Christ’s way,” he wrote in explanation of celibacy. Martin Luther’s views on celibacy, like St. Augustine’s and the earliest Church Fathers’, have had a profound doctrinal effect on Christian life. However, the agreed that celibacy should never be imposed nor pledged rashly by people, lay or religious, unable to fulfill their commitment. #RandolphHarris 9 of 20

A family-of-origin pattern every bit as dominant as abuse in the mental health literature is an absolute corrosive combination of parenting behaviours: parental overinvolvement or overprotectiveness coupled with lack of parental care. When parents are overly intrusive in the lives of their children, but at the same time emotionally distant, there is a high potential for serious psychosocial consequences that can include depression, eating disorders, schizophrenia, personality disorders, and social anxiety. The ubiquity of this parenting pattern in the mental health literature is as remarkable as the range of problems with which it appears to be associated. This pattern of parenting may stem from serious problems with boundary regulations and ambivalence about parenthood. Overinvolvement and overprotection reflect a form of boundary dysregulation that may adversely affect the child’s ego development and sense of self in relation to other people. A person exposed to parental overinvolvement may form either unrealistic expectations for care that simply cannot be met during later adulthood, or preoccupation with fear of interpersonal intrusion. In either case, relational problems are likely to follow, contributing to any of a variety of psychological symptoms. A lack of parental care reflects a parent’s ambivalence about or rejection of one’s role. Even young children have an extraordinary aptitude for detecting acceptance or rejection from a caregiver. A lack of parental care sends messages such as “You are not worthy,” and “I do not value my relationship with you” to a child. When this is coupled with overinvolvement, a child’s (or even an adult’s) ability to make sense of these interpersonal experiences may be taxed beyond its limits. The bewilderment, confusion, self-blame, and damaged self-esteem produced by such childhood experiences surely contributes to later psychosocial problems. #RandolphHarris 10 of 20

One of the primary means by which children learn attitudes and behaviour is modeling. No agents are more readily available and credible than parents. Many of the behaviours and cognitions that constitute mental disorders may in fact be socially learned. Parental modeling of dysfunctional attitudes and behaviours has been implicated in such problems as social anxiety, eating disorders, alcoholism and other substance use problems, somatoform disorders, and psychogenic dysfunctions in pleasures of the flesh. In all cases, evidence indicates that children may learn maladaptive behaviours and cognitions that later come back to cause them substantial distress in their adult lives. Critics who are sympathetic to the biological paradigm might prefer to explain parent-child similarities in psychological symptoms with a genetic hypothesis. Indeed, it is difficult to disentangle the effects of genes and the social environment, as they come from the same source—the family of origin. However, it is now becoming clear that genes can only explain a portion of this concordance. Furthermore, such problems as somatoform disorders and psychogenic sexual dysfunctions are at least assumed, by definition, to have nonbiological bases (id est, if such a problem could be explained by biological factors, a person could not receive the diagnosis). In such cases, it appears that people learn the attitudes and behaviours underlying these problems through parental modeling, at least in part. The effects of family processes on offspring do not end with adulthood. In reality, many adult psychiatric patients still reside in their families of origin. Particularly among the more profoundly affected individuals, such as those with schizophrenia or bipolar disorder, independent lives outside of their families of origin may simply be unattainable because of problems with employment, maintaining stable relationships, managing finances, and so on. #RandolphHarris 11 of 20

For such people, caustic family processes can still devastate psychological well-being, and foreclose the possibility of a complete recovery and functional independent life. When adult patients reside in households with a great deal of expressed emotion (EE), negative affective style (AS), and communication deviance (CD), symptoms become aggravated and relapses becomes accelerated. EE and negative AS reflect a critical and overinvolved orientation between a parent and a child. These family processes have been implicated in schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, and eating disorders. Even many adults are still sensitive and susceptible to the ill effects of parental criticism. Throughout the animal kingdom, parents either nurture their offspring or simply leave them alone. Aside from humans, it is difficult to locate species in which some patents actively meddle with or torment their young during critical periods of psychosocial development. However, many parents may (albeit subtly and with their best intentions) aggravate their children’s mental health through criticism and overinvolvement, even into stages of adulthood. Some parents also communicate with their family members in ways that are peculiar, splintered, and difficult to grasp. This may create a bizarre template for the construal of social interaction that makes rewarding socialization with other people a near-impossibility, in the same way that extreme isolation or neglect can permanently mar the capacity for interpersonal relations. For most people, interpersonal and psychological development launched and guided by the family. When normal family processes such a nurturance, education, and self-esteem support go awry, psychological distress often follows. Even well into adulthood, the family of origin has a powerful impact on its offspring’s psychological health or illness. #RandolphHarris 12 of 20

Unfortunately, for many people, their means of coping with disordered family processes (exempli gratia, substance misuse, binge eating, somatization, and dissociation) are themselves maladaptive and abrasive to mental health. I remember a spring night in a school auditorium, during the rehearsal of a play. I am thirteen. I am weary of the farce, weary of the silliness of the cast, of our endless horseplay, mindlessness. A scene in which I have no part is being rehearsed; I stand in an open door at the rare of the dark and empty hall. A storm is under way. The door is on the lee of the building, and I step out under the overhang. The rain swirls and beats. Lightning reveals a familiar schoolyard in a ghostly light. I feel a sudden poignancy. Images strike in my mind. The wind is the scream of a lost spirit, searching the Earth and finding no good, recalling old bereavements, lashing the land with tears. Consciousness leaves my body, moves out in time and space. I undergo an expanding awareness of self, of separateness, of time flowing through me, bearing me on, knowing I have a chance, the one chance all of us have, the chance of a life, knowing a time will come when nothing lies ahead and everything lies behind, and hoping I can then look back and feel it well spent. How, in the light of fixed stars, should one live? So begins the hunger for meaning. Is the scheme of things the creation of humans? A charismatic leader who achieves a new vision of lice secures a following? Did Christ invent Christianity? I think not. He created disorder, led a rabble, was an irritant to existing schemes of things. The scheme of things which is Christianity, of which His teachings are the nucleus, was the creation of many people over a span much longer than His life. Indeed, by the time it could have been called Christianity it has taken on a character He would have repudiated. #RandolphHarris 13 of 20

A scheme of things is a social creation, something offered to the individual by society as a system of significance. One’s ambition may be secret, but the pattern of meanings that makes possible the ambition and within which it may be realized is social. Even if one’s entire hope of meaning in life hinges on acquiring a complete set of American stamps, that vision still is social, depends upon others being similarly engaged; for such an endeavour could mean nothing in a World without stamp collecting. When a society offers at its apex a scheme of things, inclusive and integrative of all subordinate orientations, and when that scheme by virtue of being generally accepted as true holds great authority, then that society is unified and cohesive, is an organism. Every leader seeks to embody such a scheme of things, and charismatically to make it even more powerfully appealing, binding on the loyalties of all. When society offers, at the top, contending schemes, none of compelling authority, that society is fragmented. Nevertheless, we see groups of boys and young men disaffected from the dominant society. The young men are Angry and Beat. The boys are Juvenile Delinquents. These groups are not small, and they will grow larger. Certainly they are suffering. Demonstrably they are not getting enough out of our wealth and civilization. They are not growing up to full capacity. They are failing to assimilate much of the culture. As was predictable, most of the authorities and all of the public spokesmen explain it by saying there has been a failure of socialization. They say that background conditions have interrupted socialization and must be improved. And, not enough effort has been made to guarantee belonging, there must be a better bait or punishment. However, perhaps there has not been a failure of communication. Perhaps the social message has been communicated clearly to the young men and is unacceptable. #RandolphHarris 14 of 20

However, socialization to what? to what dominant society and available culture? Is the harmonious organization to which the young are inadequately socialized, perhaps against human nature, or not worthy of human nature, and therefore there is difficulty in growing up? If this is so, the disaffection of the young is profound and it will not be finally remediable by better techniques of socializing. Instead, there will have to be changes in our society and its culture, so as to meet the appetites and capacities of human nature, in order to grow up. Growth, like any ongoing function, requires adequate objects in the environment to meet the needs and capacities of the growing child boy, young, and young man, until he can better choose and make his own environment. It is not a “psychological” question of poor influences and bad attitudes, but an objective question of real opportunities for worthwhile experience. It makes no difference whether the growth is normal or distorted, only real objects will finish the experience. (Even in the psychotherapy of adults one finds that many a stubborn symptom vanishes if there is a real change in the vocational and sexual opportunities, so that the symptoms are no longer needed.) It is here that the theory of belonging and socializing breaks down miserably. For it can be shown—I intended to show—that with all the harmonious belonging and all the tidying up background conditions that you please, our abundant society is at present simply deficit in many of the most elementary objective opportunities and worthwhile goals that could make growing up possible. It is lacking in enough man’s work. It is lacking in honest public speech, and people are not taken seriously. It is lacking in the opportunity to be useful. It thwarts aptitude and creates stupidity. It corrupts ingenuous patriotism. It corrupts the fine arts. It shackles science. It dampens animal ardour. It discourages the religious convictions of Justification and vocation and it dims the sense that there is a Creation It has no honour. It has no community. #RandolphHarris 15 of 20

Just look at that list There is nothing in it that is surprising, in either the small letters or the capitals. I have nothing subtle or novel to say in this report; these are the things that everybody knows. And nevertheless the leaders of the church says, “We must give young men a sense of belonging.” Thwarted, or starved, in the important objects proper to young capacities, the boys and young men naturally find or invent deviant objects for themselves; this is the beautiful shaping power of our human nature. Their choices and inventions are rarely charming, usually stupid, and often disastrous; we cannot expect average kids to deviate with genius. However, on the other hand, the young men who conform to the dominate society become for the most part apathetic, disappointed, cynical, and wasted. (I say the “young men and boys” rather than the “young people” because the problems I want to discus in this report belong primarily, in our society, to the boys: how to be useful and make something of oneself. A girl does not have to, she is not expected to, “make something” of herself. Her career does not have to be self-justifying, for she will have children, which is absolutely self-justifying, like any other natural or creative act. With this background, it is less important, for instance, what job an average young woman works at till she is married. The quest for the glamour job is given at least a little substance by its relation to a “better” marriage. Correspondingly, our “youth troubles” are boys’ troubles—female delinquency is sexual: “incorrigibility” and unmarried pregnancy. Yet as every woman knows, for if the body do not grow to be men, where shall the women find men? If the husband is running the rat race of the organized system, there is not much father for the children.) “A generous man will prosper; he who refreshes others will himself be refreshed,” reports Proverbs 11.25.  #RandolphHarris 16 of 20

There reason many people are not growing is because they are not sowing. They are living self-centered lives. Unless they change their focus and start reaching out to others, they will probably remain in a depressed condition, emotionally, financially, socially, and spiritually. The Scripture says, “Whatever a man sows, that he will also reap,” reports Galatians 6.7. All through the Christian Bible, we find the principle of sowing and reaping. Just as if one hopes to reap the harvest, a famer must plant some seeds, we, too, must plant some good seeds in the fields of our families, careers, businesses, and personal relationship. What if the farmer decided that he did not really feel like planting, that he was tired, so he “felt led” to sit around and hope the harvest would come in? He would be waiting around his whole life! No, he must get the seed in the ground. That is the principle God established. In the same way, if we want to reap good things, we, too, must show some good seeds. Notice, we reap what we sow. If you want to reap happiness, you have to sow some “happiness” seeds by making other people happy. If you want to reap financial blessings, you must sow financial seeds in the lives of others. If you want to reap friendships, you should sow a seed and be a friend. Some people say, “I have a lot of problems of my own. I do not are about sowing seeds. I want to know how I can get out of my mess.” This is how you can get out of your mess. “If you want God to solve your problems, help solve somebody else’s problem. In biblical times, great famine struck the land of Canaan. People did not have any food or water, and they were in desperate need. So Isaac did something that people without insight may have thought rather odd: “In the middle of that famine, Isaac sowed a seed in the land. And in that same year he received one hundred times what he planted and the Lord rewarded him greatly,” reports Genesis 26.12. #RandolphHarris 17 of 20

In his time of need, Isaac did not wait around, expecting someone else to come to his rescue. No, he acted in faith. He rose up in the midst of that famine and sowed a seed. God supernaturally multiplied that seed, and it brough him out of his need. Maybe you are in some sort of famine today. It could be a financial famine, or maybe you are simply famished for friends. It is possible you need a physical healing. Perhaps you need peace in your home. Whatever the need, one of the best things you can do is to get your mind off yourself and help meet someone else’s need. Sow some seeds of happiness. That is the way to receive a huge harvest. The Bible says, “In times of difficulty, trust in the Lord and do good,” reports Psalm 37.1-3. It is not enough to say, “God I trust You. know You are going to meet all my needs.” That is like the farmer not planting any seeds and expecting a fabulous harvest. Scripture says there are two things we must do in times of trouble. First, we must trust in the Lord: and second, we must go out and do something good. Go out and sow some seed. If you need a financial miracle, go by someone a cup of coffee tomorrow morning, or give a little extra in the offering at church. If you do not have any money, do some physical work for somebody; mow somebody’s lawn, pull some weeds, wash their windows. Make someone a pie. Do something to get some seed in the ground. If you are lacking in friends, do not sit at home alone month after month, feeling sorry for yourself. When you make other people happy, God will make sure that your life is filled with joy. We need to be more seed-oriented than need-oriented. In your time of need, do not sit around thinking about what you lack. Think about what kind of seed you can sow to get yourself out of that need. #RandolphHarris 18 of 20

My dear Devout, to avoid those dreary discussions, those shaggy syllogisms, about the inner workings of this most profound Sacrament. Why? Because they come up with such funny conclusions. And frankly, because they tend to induce doubt rather than increase faith. Which is another way of saying their conclusions may be curiouser, but are the necessarily seriouser? A good text for this might come from Proverbs: “The person who undertakes an intellectual investigation of Majesty may well find it only to be blinded by its glory,” reports Proverbs 3.21, 25.27. Another way of putting it is that the Godhead has more modes of operation than Humankind has of intellection. Nonetheless, always tolerable is the pious and humble inquiry to the Truth. It is prepared to learn something and strives to entertain the sane and sound opinions of the Fathers. Blessed is the simplicity that can free itself from the intellectual entanglements of University thinking and forge ahead down Faith’s plain and firm path, where every paver’s a command or a commandment. All of which is another way of saying that many Devouts in higher studies—that is to say, as Jesus son of Sirach has said, studies beyond one’s competence (3.22)—lose their devotion while striving too hard to succeed intellectually. What is needed in life, My dear friend, is faith as well as sincerity. Not depth or height, nor breadth or sweep of intellect. Ans certainly not mastery of the Mysteries of God. If you do not come to grips with the World within, how do you expect to comprehend the World without? Let God be your tutor and give your senses a good schooling in faith. Then the light of knowledge will come. Perhaps not the full flood, but certainly flickering enough for you to complete your studies without losing your sight. #RandolphHarris 19 of 20

Dear Lord in Have, today I choose to focus on the needs of others rather than my own I believe that as I plant seeds of goodness in other people’s lives, You will do something similar in my own life. Thank You, Father, for the blessings that are coming! Awakening in a moment of peace, I give thanks to the source of all peace as I set forth into the day. The beautiful birds sing with new voices and I listen with new ears and give thanks nearby. The flower called Angels’ Trumpet blows in the breeze and I give thanks. My feet touch the beautiful emerald green grass, still wet with the morning’s dew, and I give thanks, both to my mother Earth, for sustaining my steps, and to the seas, cycling once again to bring forth new life. The dewdrops become jewelled with the morning’s sun-fire and I give thanks. When the vision is clear, you can see forever. In this moment, each moment, I give thanks. Please send dew and rain for a blessing upon the Earth. Please satisfy us out of Thy bounty, O Lord. Do Thou bless this year, that it be for us a year of abundance. Praised by Thou, O Lord, who doest bless the years. Sound the great Shofar proclaiming our freedom. Raise the banner to assemble our exiles, and gather us together from the four corners of the Earth. Blessed art Thou, O God who wilt gather the dispersed of Thy people America. Restore our judges as of yore, and our consellors as aforetime, and thus remove from us grief and suffering. Reign Thou over us, O Lord, Thou alone in lovingkindness and mercy and vindicate us in judgment. Blessed art Thou, O Lord, Thou King, who lovest righteousness and judgement. Blessed art Thou, O Lord, the King of judgment. You have been given a glimpse of the goal. Now you must strive to attain that goal. The glimpse itself has enable you to understand the consciousness and the characteristics to strive for. Both are so subtle that words merely hint at them and may be meaningless. In receiving an experience beyond words, you have therefore been so fortunate as to be favoured with the Overself’s Grace. The momentary feeling of peace one experienced may be an intimation of the still greater peace one may know if one takes the trouble to purse the opportunity of developing it through the Quest. #RandolphHarris 20 of 20

Cresleigh Homes

No one can deny the power of the built-in wine fridge! We love hearing the collective gasps from friends…and we certainly enjoy it just as much as the day we moved in!

Don’t want to boast but I know my Cresleigh Home is a toast. Wait until you see her, you’ll agree, a Cresleigh Home is the only one for me. I’ll make my bed for a chance to live in Meadows Residence 2! Happy Holidays comes to you courtesy of Meadows Residence 2!

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