A Reminder from the Pope
By Kim Roberts
I was reading through messages on Facebook, a guilty pleasure, and I found a recent message from Pope Francis that struck a chord with me.
In this particular message, he reminds us that life goes by so fast, and we should really learn to appreciate what we have.
Sounds pretty simple, but how many of us really do this; really savor every day that the Lord has given us? He says not to fight with people, criticize your body so much or complain. Well, that’s me most days.
It is great advice and something we should pass on to our children now before they get into bad habits.
Something else he said, that I know happens in my life, is that we should try not to lose sleep over our bills. That is a hard one; we all have bills. It would make life less stressful.
The pope reminds us to enjoy traveling and family time. Now, that is something to work toward. We all could use more time with our family travelling and experiencing new things together.
The pope also said something that I already do – don’t put away the good china; use it often. I agree. What is the point of having it, if you don’t enjoy it.
We should embrace the good in our lives and reinforce that with our kids. Show, don’t tell, them that they should make the best of each day and, if they have a bad day, remind them the next day will be better.
Also, show them that it is important to forgive sooner rather than later and pray throughout the day, not just at bedtime or in church.
The pope also pointed out that we spend so long waiting for Christmas, the weekend, for when everything is perfect, and he said we should look for the good in each day because everything perfect doesn’t exist right now. We can’t achieve this because we weren’t put on this Earth to be perfect, we are not intended to achieve that here. We are here to learn.
What a fabulous challenge from the pope. This is so relatable. So, maybe we should all accept this challenge that is life – love more, forgive more, embrace more and leave the rest in God’s hands.
