“I wish it need not have happened in my time,” said Frodo. “So do I,” said Gandalf, “and so do all who live to see such times. But that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.” ― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Fellowship of the Ring
“All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.”
Indeed.
If you are reading this, you are alive, this is your time; no matter your age, your occupation, your circumstances.
You, as a Catholic, are a member of the Church Militant, and have duties to perform within your own sphere of living. Do not let the (apparent) smallness of such duties lead you to believe that they are inconsequential.
They are not.
I say this, today, as I said in a post from September 11 of 2018: carry on.
I frequently (still, as of March of 2022) meet Roman Catholics who are carrying on: mothers changing a seemingly endless stream of diapers; fathers going out to work despite a dislike for their job; priests who ascend the altar, and speak the Truth from the pulpit; single women, bravely facing days of work and toil without the consolation of a family; single men, trying to decide where they land in this world.
When I see them in action, it is like seeing a soldier on the (spiritual) battlefield.*
In conclusion, let us carry on as our Catholic ancestors did, in good times and in bad.
May Our Lady cover you with the mantle of her love!
~SCF
*I did not cover the numerous hidden souls (ie, cloistered nuns, monks, etc) who are on the spiritual battlefield; the layperson’s (unseen) companion(s)
~Top image: The Angelus, source. There is an app on the iPhone for praying the Angelus: here.
~Scripture image: thank you to K. Anne.
~Lenten reading: St. Alphonsus Liguouri’s Death, Judgment, Heaven, Hell: Meditations on the Four Last Things, edited by Darrell Wright, Ph.L., purchase, pdf. (The pdf is a gift to the readers of The Marian Room from D. Wright).
