Richard Rohr's Daily Meditation

We only become enlightened as the ego dies to its pretenses, and we begin to be led more by soul and by Spirit. That dying is something we are led through by the awesome and quiet grace of God and by the hard work of confronting our own shadow. As we learn to live in Divine Space, we will almost naturally weep over our former mistakes, as we recognize that we ourselves are often the very thing that we hate and attack in other people. Weeping, by the way, is much more helpful and true than ever attacking, hating, or denying our sin—maybe not literally weeping, but sincere, non-self-hating compunction for our mistakes. (Compunction was the subtle word that the mystics often used to describe a regretful ownership of our sins, but without descending into abusive self-hatred.) Only grace can teach us how to do that. But only then can we begin to become and to live the Great Mystery of compassion, even toward ourselves. How you treat yourself is how you will usually treat other people too. The person who was vindictive to you today has been vindictive in his own mind since early this morning. She is punitive toward you because she has been punitive toward herself for years—without even knowing it.

God’s one-of-a-kind job description is that God actually uses our problems to lead us to the full solution. God is the perfect Recycler, and in the economy of grace, nothing is wasted, not even our worst sins nor our most stupid mistakes. God does not punish our sins, but uses them to soften our hearts toward everything.

Adapted from A Lever and a Place to Stand:
The Contemplative Stance, the Active Prayer (CD)

The Daily Meditations for 2013 are now available
in Fr. Richard’s new book Yes, And . . . .