Intentions of the Holy Father for April

Ecology and Justice. That governments may foster the protection of creation and the just distribution of natural resources.
Hope for the Sick. That the Risen Lord may fill with hope the hearts of those who are being tested by pain and sickness.

My New Big Idea

I have a big idea. It's been creeping around in my head, like a shadow slipping among shadows in a dark room, over the last months or years. Normally, when I have a big idea, I like to keep it to myself for a couple reasons:

(1) I'd feel lame if I leaked it and someone else did it, even (or especially) independently, and I spent the rest of my life tempted to say, "That was my idea. I thought of it first."

(2) I wouldn't like very much to be the one who has all the great ideas, but never accomplishes very much. Much better just never to accomplish very much, without torturing myself about great ideas that never came to be. If I do not share the idea, the idea is itself less real than the idea that fizzled away before it could blossom into reality.

(3) I am perhaps superstitious on the periphery of my thought - not in my rational calculations, not in my intuitive problem solving, but in the frontiers of reason, where reason blends with emotion and experience and all lurk very near the subconscious. This little bit of superstition is perhaps enough to make me think, or rather feel, that I will jinx my idea if I speak it. I have heard that among Jews it is considered bad luck to name a child before it is born. That Jews often hold a very similar superstition somehow makes me feel exonerated for doing so myself.

(4) The idea needs prayer. It's only now beginning to arise in some definite form in my mind. If God doesn't want it, then how can the likes of me force it through. So it's best to pray first to see if it's His will that I give it a go.

This big idea will not make me rich, nor will likely change the world very much, but like this blog, it may help me systematize some of my thoughts, feelings, and ideas in a way that may, just may, be useful or enjoyable to a few others. That's my hope, anyway. It's a long term idea, anyway. Happily, I'm not going anywhere.

Yet.

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