Longing, yearning, aching for that ultimate "something"--this is the root of my identity and my actions. It is the way my heart is made.

Most of the day I smother this great and deep longing of the heart, or at least I try. It is so vast, so much beyond my control, so provocative to the dreams of comfort that I fool myself with. But it is what makes for every authentic engagement of life that I manage in a day.

It makes it possible to perceive things as they really are and to recognize that my relationship with reality consists in a recognition of its beauty and a joy tinged with sadness--things are and yet they are not enough.

Being Christian does not take away this yearning. Rather, it intensifies it. It does not remove the sweet pain of my need for the Infinite. On the contrary, Christianity is the revelation that the Infinite One has embraced my life.

Being Christian makes it possible to live life according to its true meaning, without escape or desperation.

Usually I don't live this possibility. I flee every day, into my own schemes and vain imaginings and grasping and blindness. But I have moments when I remember that this is what life is really all about.

They are moments of prayer. They generate hope.

In hope, I truly begin to live.
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