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Volume 38, #8 Plant these "seeds" well and water often. Enjoy!
An April Day . . . . . . . . . Malcolm Forbes, Forbes"One cannot walk into an April day in a negative way. With spring, each man’s plans and hopes result in new efforts, fresh actions."
"Fully alive human beings are alive in their external and internal senses. They see a beautiful world. They hear its music and poetry. They smell the fragrance of each new day and taste the deliciousness of every moment…To be fully alive means to be open to the whole human experience …Most of all, perhaps, these people are alive in will and heart. They love much. They truly love and sincerely respect themselves. All love begins here and builds on this. Fully alive people are glad to be alive and to be who they are. In a delicate and sensitive way they also love others. Their general disposition towards all is one of concern and love." Life’s Little Instruction Book " Be kinder than necessary." I Will Welcome… . . . . . . . . . Og Mandino "I will welcome happiness, for it enlarges my heart; A Reader’s Prayer . . . . . . . . . H. H. Barstow
The Wise Person . . . . . William Arthur Ward "The wise person builds up physical reserves, spiritual resources and emotional bulwarks to meet life’s inevitable emergencies, storms and crises." Add What We Can . . . . . . . . . William Osler "We are here to add what we can to life, Within You . . . . . . . . . Choquet "Within you there is an inner seed Contribution vs. Commitment. . . . . Pulpit Helps, 4/92"The difference in a contribution and total commitment is usually the difference between failure and success. A growing problem facing our world and the church today is the increasing number of people who have given up commitment to become contributors." Question/Answer . . . . . . . . . Anton Chekov "Putting a question correctly is one thing and finding the answer to it is something quite different." Power of the Holy Spirit . . . . . . Sunday Sermon Masterpiece Collection, p. 541
It doesn’t take much power to join the chorus of negative talk these days about the declining morality of humanity. It doesn’t take much power to condemn the world. But it does take power to redeem it." What I Believed . . . . . . . . . Dr. Albert Schweitzer "Instead of trying to get acceptance for my ideas, I decided I would make my life an argument. I would advocate the things I believed in terms of the life I lived and what I did. Instead of vocalizing my belief in the existence of God within each of us, I would attempt to have my life and work say what I believed." This Day Is Mine . . . . . . . . . Douglas A. Cox
Prophet of Conservation . . . . . . . . . Complete Speakers’ AlmanacThe Complete Speakers’ Almanac notes that April 21 "is the birthday of the great American naturalist John Muir, who was born in Scotland in 1838 and grew up in Wisconsin. Muir is the father of the conservation movement in the United States, and it was because of his efforts that the Yosemite National Park was created and the idea of national forest preserves was adopted." Muir wrote, "Any fool can destroy trees. They cannot run away; and if they could, they would still be destroyed, chased and hunted down as long as fun or a dollar could be made out of their bark, hides, horns or backbones." His articles…alerted the nation to the danger to forests from private and commercial interests. "It took three thousand years to make these great trees," Muir wrote, "and since the time of Christ, God has cared for these trees, saved them from drought, disease, avalanches, and a thousand straining, leveling tempests and floods; but he cannot save them from fools — only Uncle Sam can do that." The Man Makes The Name. . . . . Mickey Mantle The greatest baseball player who ever lived had a nickname that would have embarrassed most boys. His real name was George Herman Ruth, but he was called Babe. Babe Ruth was so terrific that he changed the meaning of his nickname, so much so that big powerful hitters who came along after him were called Babe out of respect.
Ruth turned the nickname into a symbol of strength and power and ability, even today a boy enjoys it when he hits one over the fence and someone shouts, "Hey, Babe!" But remember that when Babe Ruth broke into baseball, it didn’t mean excellence. He had to achieve that himself.
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Fully Human, Fully Alive
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John Powell, S.J.
"Lord, let me never slight the meaning nor the moral of anything I read. Make
me respect my mind so much that I dare not read what has no meaning nor moral.
Help me to choose with equal care my friends and my books, because they are both
for life. Show me that as in a river, so in reading, the depths hold more of
strength and beauty than in the shallows. Teach me to value art without being
blind to thought. Keep me from caring more for much reading than for careful
reading; for books than for The Book. Give me an ideal that will let me read
only the best, and when that is done, stop me. Repay me with power to
teach others, and then help me to say from a disciplined mind, a grateful Amen."
"The New Testament writers have told us that we come of age as Christians by
the power of the Holy Spirit. When we receive the Holy Spirit we are empowered
to live our life on the highest level…It is the power to make sense out of life.
It is the power to begin to realize our true and highest potential as human
beings. It is the power to love, the power to care about other people and really
be present to them, the power to love the world as Christ loved it and to make a
difference in it. Our task is to move this reality from the level of
intellectual understanding into the deep center of our being so that the Holy
Spirit becomes real to us.…
"Today I will know that what I do is valuable and important. I will search to
build my understanding of the ultimate value of my service to others. (However
obscure, it is there.) I will begin to eliminate those habits that short circuit
my success and pour fresh energy into learning and growing. I will read one
extra paragraph today that will build my future. I will reexamine my hopes and
dream to find new inspiration for this day’s labors…And although perhaps my
hopes and dreams lie far beyond the workplace of today, I will give this day my
very best…This day is mine!"
But when Ruth broke into baseball it was a nickname for a baby. He was just a
young kid fresh out of school when he joined the minor league Baltimore Orioles
in 1914, and his teammates were mostly men in their 20s and 30s. The owner of
the Orioles was Jack Dunn, and when Ruth joined the team the veterans called the
young player "Dunn’s baby," or "Dunn’s babe." The name caught on and he was
called "baby" or "babe" from then on.