The Way is everything. It's not a particular direction or a special way of doing something; it's a circle with no outside and no inside, just the pulsating of life everywhere. It excludes nothing. Therefore, as peacemakers working in the world, we exclude nothing. We'll pick and choose according to what's appropriate for us at a certain place and a certain moment. But we won't be attached to what we choose, for everything is the Way.

A deep peace descended such as I had never felt before. My whole past, words, tears, everything sank into it. The only thing that remained was the here and now, transparent to light and to God... There was neither barrier nor distance between God and the world. Lying on the grass, I felt Love within me and I was filled with light, peace, and gratitude.

PEACE
comes within human souls
when they realize their
relationship, their oneness,
with the universe
and all its powers,
and when they realize that
at the center of the universe
dwells the Great Creator
whose Center
is really everywhere
within each of us.

Peace cannot be achieved through violence,
It can only be attained through understanding.

Those who have not found their true wealth, which is the radiant joy of Being and the deep unshakable peace that comes with it, are beggars, even if they have great material wealth. They are looking outside for scraps of pleasure or fulfillment, for validation, security, or love, when they have a Treasure within that not only includes all those things but is infinitely greater than anything the world can offer.

O Blessed Peacemaker, You invite us to return, to rest in You; for, in the Silence, we become strong; with utter trust, our way is made sure.

By the power of your Love, we pray: Enter our hearts to your Indwelling Presence. As we are still we come to know You.

Beloved of our hearts united with All, blessed are You,
O true Life of our lives: Lumen Christi . . . Holy Wisdom.

Social change must start in our hearts: peace and prayer open our hearts. People who practice spiritual disciplines have the most enduring impact on life because the inward work we do makes us more effective in any situation. We are most effective when we can return good will for ill will and show kindness to those who would harm us; when we look for a common solution without anger or a desire for retaliation; and act on principles of care and concern without a need for reciprocation.

 in spiritual nourishment gradually creates within us a permanent state of silence. The soul discovers in such silence unsuspected possibilities. It realizes that life can be lived at different levels. Daily silence experienced in humility and fervor as an indispensable exercise.

At the heart of each of us,
whatever our imperfections,
there exists a silent pulse of perfect rhythm,
a complex form of wave forms and resonances,
which is absolutely individual and unique,
and yet which connects us
to everything in the universe.

We are familiar with the space in meditation and prayer where we sit in deep silence, attentive and awake, listening within the darkness. Yet we can also live in this state of deep receptivity, relying on what we hear inside our hearts in all aspects of our lives. This is what is needed of us now: to allow the divine to flow into the world and awaken us all within the oneness and joy of That which is at once both infinite within the silence of our own hearts, and visible in the sparkling moments of light and love that are creation.

There is a tender sense of silence, without prayer to or from. In the moments of our own silence we are welcomed, as both stranger and friend. We need to allow this presence to be with us, not in defined moments, but as a flow. The river is here, not hidden behind the bank or crossing the horizon. In the tranquility of the moment there is no moment, nothing defined or captured. This world is seeped with the other, soaked with the dew of timelessness.

Sometimes there would be a rush of noisy visitors and the silence of the monastery would be shattered. This would upset the monks; not the Master who seemed just as content with the noise as with the silence. To those protesting he said one day, "Silence is not the absence of sound, but the absence of self. "

Golden lace.
sunrise pours slantwise
into clear water
through the blue spruce,
the deep tangle of pine
and purled woodsmoke.

I turned
and the earth hushed.
While I leaned into silence
a morning too vast to fathom
filled with light.

Spiritual growth is achieved with passion, difficulty, and intensity as much as it is achieved by peace, silence, and love.

In order to listen to God's silence we must escape the din of distractions that normally deafen us to it. Being deafened to the silence within as well as the silence without is corrosive to God-hearing. To be silent is to so empty oneself of the din of transitory distractions that one becomes fully receptive to the silence that always and everywhere underlies them. Silence is that state of spiritual sensitivity in which seekers make themselves available to the silence of God's voice.

Under all speech that is good for anything, there lies a silence that is better.

The soul of each one of us has its destination, and that is the Sacred Heart that draws us to Itself. What is true of each one of us is true of all the world. Walt Whitman in his strong, urgent way cries:

One thought ever at the face—
That in the Divine Ship, the world breasting time and space,
All peoples of the globe together sail, sail the same voyage,
Are bound to the same destination.

Some such thought as this is surely necessary for the bare subsistence of a soul, for our soul cannot live without the sense of a destination ... the destination of Divine Love.

Each of us possesses a soul, but we do not prize our soul as creatures made in the Divine image deserve, and so we do not understand the great secrets which they contain.

Had I taken the fork of despair, I would have remained angry and depressed over the fire, missing a golden opportunity to move West, to be closer to my son. Looking back, I see that I was too attached to my old environment to make the move on my own. I needed the tragedy to push me onward. I don't mean to trivialize the difficulty of certain aspects of life. It is important to look for the larger picture. If we could see that everything, even tragedy, is a gift in disguise, we would then find the best way to nourish the soul . . . "Crises" can help us discover much about ourselves and enrich our lives.

Educate your inner being in all aspects of life. Keep to the order you learned during your schooling. You did not begin all of a sudden to grasp the higher subjects; you started by learning the alphabet. The same applies to your soul. It is not good for it to strive toward exalted feats until it becomes familiar with the spiritual alphabet: humility and obedience. Let the whole of your life become a continuous prayer.

The soul seeks to serve; it inspires the personality to serve in particular ways and means. As that happens we become less and less interested in the personality aspect and more and more concerned in altruistic service for the benefit of all. The soul has no sense of being an individual, separate self and knows nothing of separation. It sees only the whole and itself in relation to the whole.

There are seasons in our souls: times of withering, times of coldness, times of renewal, times of sun and light. May the force which drives nature to its fulfillment be brought forth in us, too. Within each of us is the power to love and care awaiting our wills and our acts to bring it forth. Let us be instruments of the power oflove which comes through us but not from us, the power which waits for us to bring it forth.

Like billowing clouds,
like the incessant gurgle of the brook,
the longing of the soul can never be stilled.

The contemplation of Eternity maketh the Soul immortal.