Archive for The Gathering Place "The Gathering Place" is a web community where people can gather and make new friends, share ideas, enjoy a few laughs and learn about many interesting things together. It is a safe place where friends can correspond with each other about what they love.
I have thought a lot about this subject recently: Passionate Causes. When I was young, I don't remember having any, but the older I get, the more passionate I have become about a great many things.
I am passionate about my family. At this point in my life, my family has dwindled down to single digit numbers, and I find that I am the oldest of the group. I am passionate about holding them close, away from harm and illness and pain.
I am passionate about my friends. Those I have, I so dearly want to keep. I am passionate about their health, both physical and spiritual. I am passionate for their well being.
I am passionate about animals. The numbers of homeless animals greatly concerns me. I want to gather them in, feed them, and allow them to rest for awhile. I think their lives must be filled with such terror.
I am passionate about plants, those things that God gave us so freely. What are we doing to our earth, to those gifts that have surely outnumbered us in longevity?
So many of our passions cannot be dealt with in our lifetime. I cannot keep my loved ones safe or free of harm and illness. I cannot welcome every homeless animal into my home. I cannot feed every bird I find in my garden. I cannot save every tree, every flower, every grain of sand.
But you know, I can care, and in caring, I have an outlet for my passions.
What a very sad being, the one who does not care. He lives a life devoid of smiles and laughter, empty of tears and heartache, because without one, can we have the other?
If we had no reason to cry, then we would have no reason to laugh. That is what happens when we do not care. If you have never loved, then you do not miss it when it is gone. But how very sad to have never known love.
I try to see the good in any given situation, but you know how difficult that sometimes is. Just this week one of my former students and her two very young children perished in a house fire. It was an accident, they think, but what is the reason, the good in that situation? To lose a young mother and two dear children causes unbearable pain that we cannot in this lifetime understand.
There are so many who are hurting every second of every day, and there is not a thing we can do for even more than one or two of them.
But we can care, and our passion can be about caring. Even if we do not know a homeless cat, or a lost soul, or even a lifeless child, we can still care.
Sometimes I think that I must make caring my most passionate passion. And if we all could do that, think what a difference it would make. Because when we care, we become compassionate, we pray a little more, we smile from the inside out. And that does make a difference.
I think I will make caring my most passionate cause. Perhaps that alone can make a difference.
God's Warrior
Sharon, you are one of the most caring people I have ever known and it fills my heart with joy just to be able to call you my friend.
Sharran
Thank you, Elena. I think the same of you.
However, I do wish I could learn to spell! (I think it is correct now!)
