Bloom where I am planted.🌿

‘There is nothing more salutary or satisfying than to be able to help other people. It is not what happens to them when we help them, it is what happens to us when we give them that help with the Lord’.

 (Fr. Leo Clifford)

Pat on his way to the cemetery. ‘I haven’t missed one day since she left’, he utters, tears welling up in his sad eyes, he is so lonely without his beloved Ella. ‘You know Pat, she is as near to you as your breath’ , I say. Pat smiles and walks gently away.

Mike’s greeting: ‘I have sore feet’, walking slowly obviously in pain. I suggest he bathe his feet in warm salty water, he will give it a try.

Jack rang, he liked the hymn I sang at Holy Mass this morning, he watched it on his phone. Walking to Church is too much for him now. ‘You are doing what you can do Jack, God is very happy with that’, I say. Jack seems pleased.

‘How is your dear lady’, I ask Joe. ‘She’s great’, Joe replies. ‘I always knew God would send me a lovely lady when my mother got too old to do the housework’. Joe speaks his pure truth from his deepest heart. ‘The truth is kind and drives us towards the good’. (Pope Francis)

My friends share their joys and sorrows with me, I am profoundly privileged. To win the trust of another, to be the Hands and Feet of Jesus, no higher calling.

Gino Bartali (cyclist) said, ‘Good is something you do - not something you talk about. Some medals are pinned to your soul, not your jacket’. When I keep my eyes on my own paper, when I walk my own path, when I keep the eyes of my heart open at all times, something wonderful happens. I get to help lighten the burden of a fellow traveler and for me joy beyond measure. Bloom where I am planted.

Abbé Pierre suggested that the best way of knowing if we are in communion with God is to see whether we are in communion with the sufferings of humanity. 

‘Everyone has a place in my heart and I, in return, have a place in the heart of Jesus’. (St. Faustina)

‘I wanted to love my fellows; I loved the poor with compassion. I could not be happy unless I shared poverty, lived as they did, suffered as they did. We do it by seeing Christ and serving Christ in friends and strangers, in everyone we come in contact with’. (The reckless way of love by Dorothy Day)