My feast day

Know how to dialogue.” It sounds all very simple, but I noticed that it anything but especially when it involves strongly held beliefs and deep convictions! Many times I thought it’s enough to respect the different opinion and perspective, be clear about what I believe in and defend well what I believe to be right. Then I thought that such attitude hasn't stopped any wars in the past and now. Friends have fallen out over differences of opinion. So what takes priority: that I am right at all costs or that I really try to enter into the way of thinking of the other to understand him/her more fully? 

I remembered what it means to love: To give everything to the point of being nothing, having nothing left out of love! God gives me all of himself all the time to the point that he has nothing to give, why, because that is his nature: Love. So, when I hold on to something I cannot truly welcome the other in me and fully understand him/her. There is no space. Loving my neighbour in the present leads me to a new strategy in dialogue as expression of that love: When I speak to somebody I will try to fully listen without thinking of an answer whilst the other still speaks! Empty my mind out of love; give everything out of love so that it is God who can give us the answers. If that is reciprocated then there emerges another, a third perspective, not a compromise, borne out of that mutual love which is right for the moment, because having given everything out of love God can act! What a revolution in dialogue! So it happened today with various people. I was at peace because there was God present instead of me or the other. 

It made me reflect on the constant close presence of God in his creation. If everything that happens to me is a sign of his love for me, I am the most fortunate person on earth, because I am constantly loved. That also means that all the people I meet in the present put there by God are the best people to express his love for me! The challenge is to go beyond appearances to see what God intended for each one of us in each moment. And if I don’t manage? The greatest gift is that I can start again, immediately! So, today I dedicate to loving God in and with my neighbour for the retreat in Rome, for Tim’s mum and all the movement.