When You Are Old

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Aging, spiritual formation, spiritual life, Theology; Trinity; Trinitarian; Christianity; God; Son: Holy Spirit

This is the best quote I have heard about growing old

When they asked her to reveal her beauty secrets, Audrey Hepburn wrote this beautiful text that was later read at her funeral.

To have attractive lips, speak kind words. To have a loving look, look for the good side of people. To look skinny, share your food with the hungry. To have beautiful hair, let a child cross it with his own fingers once a day. To have a beautiful poise, walk knowing you’re never alone, because those who love and loved you accompany you. People, even more than objects, need to be fixed, spoiled, awakened, wanted and saved: never give up on anyone. Remember, if you ever need a hand, you’ll find them at the end of both your arms.

When you become old, you will discover that you have two hands, one to help yourself, the second to help others. The beauty of a woman is not in the clothes she wears, in her face or in her way of fixing her hair. The beauty of a woman is seen in her eyes, because that is the door open to her heart, the source of her love. The beauty of a woman doesn’t lie in her makeup, but the true beauty in a woman is reflected in her soul. It is the tenderness that gives love, the passion that it expresses. The beauty of a woman grows over the years ′′

As I meditate and think about growing old, here are four movements of the Holy Spirit that will help us.

Reservoirs and Canals

Tags

spiritual formation, spiritual life

 

 

Image Credit: Communio – Saint Bernard
of Clairvaux

The man who is wise, therefore, will see his life as more
like a reservoir than a canal. The canal simultaneously pours out what it
receives; the reservoir retains the water till it is filled, then discharges
the overflow without loss to itself…

Today there are many in the Church who act like canals, the
reservoirs are far too rare. So urgent is the charity of those through whom the
streams of heavenly doctrine flow to us, that they want to pour it forth before
they have been filled; they are more ready to speak than to listen, impatient
to teach what they have not grasped, and full of presumption to govern others
while they know not how to govern themselves.

Bernard of Clairvaux, Commentary
on the Song of Songs, Sermon 18.3

 

more quotations may be found here on Kairos Spiritual Formation Quotes

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