Winter Woes?: Weekly Message for 01-24-2023

Dear Fellow Digital Pilgrim, pax Christi:

Here in the northern hemisphere it is winter now.  In past centuries, life in winter differed immensely from life in the other seasons.  You simply could not continue living in the same way, because of the weather.  You had to stay indoors, work on indoor things.  You had shorter days and longer nights.  You had to be less mobile, and more frugal, since you didn’t know how long the winter would last and your supplies had to make it all the way through.

Now, in many parts of the world, life in winter is pretty much the same as life in other seasons.  We can still buy mangoes at the grocery store.  We can extend “daylight’ with electricity as long as we like.  We have to wear a heavier coat, maybe, and drive a little more carefully, but except for the occasional snow day at school, our schedules and rhythms are the same.

But winter is winter for a reason.  God made the world with its seasons, and we are made to live in this world.  So, winter has something to give us that the other seasons don’t.  Have you found the gift of winter?

I am thoroughly convinced that our post-modern frenetic pace of life is stealing many things from our human experience.  One of those things is the enrichment that comes from accepting, or at least listening to and enjoying, the rhythms of the natural seasons.  That’s why I wrote a series of meditation books on each of the four seasons.

If you feel that you are out of sync with the God-designed rhythms of the natural seasons, I strongly recommend that, this winter, you take some time to reflect, maybe even to pray about, the beauties and lessons of winter.  And if you would like some help, please check out my book Winter Meditations.  The meditations are brief, and they have brief spiritual exercises you can do at the end of each chapter.  It’s a great book to read with a friend or a spouse.

God is always reaching out to us, always wanting to teach and enrich us, to give us more.  This winter, let’s make a point of pausing, listening, and welcoming his gifts.

And as you do, you can keep counting on our prayers for you here at the RC Spirituality Center.  God bless you!

In Him,

Fr. John Bartunek, LC
Republished from 1/29/2019

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