This Week's Reflection for Hope and Resilience

This is part of a series of weekly messages of hope and resilience that will be made available through Employee Connections and printed copies for those who do not have easy access to computers. Read last week's reflection here.

Below is a letter written by Father Giovanni Giocondo to Countess Allagia Aldobrandeschi on Christmas Eve, 1513. The countess and her country were undergoing tremendous strife and upheaval, and the priest was trying to comfort her. I hope you all are feeling the goodness of life each day, and especially so in this season of Christmas and of so many celebrations of the beautiful spiritualties of the world.

- Chaplain Mike McMahon, Methodist Hospital

“I salute you. I am your friend, and my love for you goes deep. There is nothing I can give you which you have not. But there is much, very much, that, while I cannot give it, you can take.

No heaven can come to us unless our hearts find rest in it today. Take heaven!

No peace lies in the future which is not hidden in this present little instant. Take peace! 

The gloom of the world is but a shadow. Behind it, yet within our reach, is joy. There is radiance and glory in darkness, could we but see. And to see, we have only to look. I beseech you to look!

Life is so generous a giver. But we, judging its gifts by their covering, cast them away as ugly or heavy or hard. Remove the covering, and you will find beneath it a living splendor, woven of love by wisdom, with power. Welcome it, grasp it, and you touch the angel’s hand that brings it to you.

Everything we call a trial, a sorrow or a duty, believe me, that angel’s hand is there. The gift is there and the wonder of an overshadowing presence. Your joys, too, be not content with them as joys. They, too, conceal diviner gifts. 

Life is so full of meaning and purpose, so full of beauty beneath its covering, that you will find earth but cloaks your heaven. Courage then to claim it; that is all! But courage you have, and the knowledge that we are pilgrims together, wending through unknown country home. 

And so, at this time, I greet you, not quite as the world sends greetings, but with profound esteem and with the prayer that for you, now and forever, the day breaks and shadows flee away.”

***

We know these are difficult times. If you would like to speak with a chaplain for support, please feel free to reach out.

Methodist Hospital and Methodist Women’s Hospital: Call Operator “0” and ask for the chaplain to be paged.

Methodist Fremont Health: Call Scott Jensen at (402) 290-1408.