-
Set Apart or One With?
At the center of our lives there is an innate tension. On the one hand, something in us wants to be different, wants to stand out, be separate, show itself
-
Our Real Moral Struggle
“The Heart has its reasons!” Blaise Pascal wrote that and it explains why our feelings and behaviour are often a mystery to us: “Why do I feel this way?” “Why
-
Home – The Place from which to Understand
More than anything else, we long for home. Our deep ache for intimacy, security, and comfort is, in the end, a longing for home, nothing more. We are forever restlessly
https://ronrolheiser.com/home-the-place-from-which-to-understand/
-
Suicide – The Pain of the Ones Left Behind
Each year I write a column on suicide and try to highlight three things. First, suicide is a illness, not something freely chosen. A person who dies by suicide, certainly
https://ronrolheiser.com/suicide-the-pain-of-the-ones-left-behind/
-
Our Need for Confession
In his book on the Sabbath, Wayne Muller brilliantly juxtaposes two descriptions: “Jules and Olivia are in their fifties, and even though their children are grown, they love to celebrate
-
Not Our Own Children
Towards the end of Margaret Laurence’s novel, A Jest of God, there is a particularly moving dialogue: Rachel, the story’s main character, an aging, spinster teacher, is more than a
-
Stopping the Haemorrhaging by Touching the Hem of the Garment
Several years ago in Germany, while giving the sacrament of confirmation, a bishop was questioning the children who were about to be confirmed: “Who can administer the sacrament of confirmation?”,
https://ronrolheiser.com/stopping-the-haemorrhaging-by-touching-the-hem-of-the-garment/
-
In Pursuit of Innocence
In the novel, The Stone Angel, Margaret Laurence describes a woman, Hagar Shipley, who, after overhearing a very unflattering comment about herself one day, goes into a public toilet and
-
Coping with the Divine Fire Within
“Our life is a short time in expectation, a time in which sadness and joy kiss each other at every moment. There is a quality of sadness that pervades all
https://ronrolheiser.com/coping-with-the-divine-fire-within/
-
Cultivating Loneliness
Few persons in recent centuries have touched the human heart as deeply as Soren Kierkegaard, the Danish philosopher. There are reasons for this, some more obvious than others. He was