Daily Meditation for February 20, 2024

We remind ourselves that the opposite of gratefulness is taking gifts for granted. That may be true, but it’s also true that every person should be able to take for granted a long list of the ordinary blessings our generous God wants to give us. For instance, all children should be able to take for granted loving parents, teachers who help them find their talents and offer those talents to the waiting world. They deserve to play outside neighborhoods where missiles, bombs and renegade bullets don’t shatter their games. Like children, all people should be able to take for granted  nourishing food, sturdy shelter, health care when they’re ailing, and freedoms of many kinds. Utopia, you say? No, rather this is the world we can have if those among us who can take for granted these gifts and many more, work together to ensure that all our children, all our sisters and brothers wake each day to a taken-for-granted world.

By Mara Faulkner, OSB