"Conflict and lack of reconciliation in the world stem from the fact that we are locked into our own interests and opinions, into our own little private world. Selfishness, both individual and collective, makes us prisoners of our interests and our desires that stand against the truth and separate us from one another. Awake, the Gospel tells us. Step outside, so as to enter the great communal truth, the communion of the one God. To awake, then, means to develop a receptivity for God: for the silent promptings with which he chooses to guide us; for the many indications of his presence..." - Pope Benedict XVI, Christmas homily 2009.
"There are a great many kinds of sins. Scripture provides several lists of them. The Letter to the Galatians contrasts the works of the flesh with the fruit of the Spirit: 'Now the works of the flesh are plain: fornication, impurity, licentiousness, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, anger, selfishness, dissension, factions, envy, drunkenness, carousing, and the like. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things shall not inherit the Kingdom of God.'" (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1852; see also Galatians 5:19-21, Romans 1: 28-32, 1 Corinthians 6:9-10, Ephesians 5: 3-5, Colossians 3:5-9, 1 Timothy 9-10, 2 Timothy 3:2-5).
Dissension, anger, selfishness and factions have become a way of life in the Diocese of Worceste and throughout the Church in the United States.
ReplyDeleteBut these attitudes are not of God.