A further reflection on immigration from Pope Francis’ encyclical, #44:
We forget that “there is no worse form of alienation than to feel uprooted, belonging to no one. A land will be fruitful, and its people bear fruit and give birth to the future, only to the extent that it can foster a sense of belonging among its members, create bonds of integration between generations and different communities, and avoid all that makes us insensitive to others and leads to further alienation”.
Here is a wonderful summary of what God is all about, of what we should all be about. It comes from Daily Prayer 2026:
The heart of God’s law is creating a community in which all are regarded equally as his children. This is the most important law of God—by loving others, we love him.
A central idea of the Buddha and his teaching is that desire is the root cause of human suffering. “From craving (desire) springs grief, from craving springs fear. For one who is free from craving, there is no grief and so no fear” is a quote attributed to Buddha.
He doesn’t say to want nothing but that suffering comes from coveting and attachment to things, and if we want peace, we must understand desire and the control it can produce over us.
A contemporary spiritual writer, Margaret Silf, offers a healthy understanding of desire: We tend to think that if we desire something, it is probably something we ought not to want or to have. But think about it: without desire we would never get up in the morning. We would never have ventured beyond the front door. We would never have read a book or learned something new. No desire means no life, no growth, no change. Desire is what makes two people create a third person. Desire is what makes crocuses push up through the late-winter soil. Desire is energy, the energy of creativity, the energy of life itself. So let’s not be too hard on desire.
This morning dawned rather cold and cloudy but by mid day, everything had changed. There was a really bright blue sky that invited me to a ride through Louisville’s magnificent Cherokee Park. The uncommonly cold and snowy winter was with us just a day or two ago but now the smallest buds are starting to appear.
Today a group of our cousins had lunch together and Marilyn gave us an old photo from 1928 showing four of the Dittmeier uncles in their youth. I was especially happy to see this early photo of my dad, Charlie (on the right).
Even as individuals maintain their comfortable consumerist isolation, they can choose a form of constant …. bonding that encourages remarkable hostility, insults, abuse, defamation and verbal violence destructive of others, and this with a lack of restraint that could not exist in physical contact without tearing us all apart. Social aggression has found unparalleled room for expansion through computers and mobile devices.
In 1994 Carl Sagan, the brilliant astronomer and science communicator, offered comments which we might apply today to the development of artificial intelligence:
Many of the dangers we face arise indeed from science and technology–but, more fundamentally, because we have become powerful without becoming commensurately wise. The world altering powers that technology has delivered into our hands now require a degree of consideration and foresight that has never before been asked of us.
This afternoon I took my bicycle out for a short ride to Kroger’s and had my first flat tire. I’ve been anticipating it and wondering about the timing and where I would be. Fortunately it was only two or three miles from my home. I called my super biker brother-in-law who also has a truck and he picked me up and we took the bike to the shop where I bought it because I have never changed a tire on a bike with a motor in the hub. It’s going to be expensive to let them fix the flat but I’ll learn what needs to be done. Mike’s wife, my sister, has a twin bike like mine and Mike called her and she agreed I could borrow her bike till mine is fixed so we went to their house in the truck and picked it up and brought it to Nazareth Home. That’s it above, some funny shade of pink–or is it purple? Or is it….? Whatever the color, it rolls so I’m fixed for a few days. Thanks, Mary!
