Daily Meditation for January 24, 2025

Frost and cold, bless the Lord! People in warm climates see us on the news, bundled up looking like the Michelin Man and they think, “Why would anybody live there?” Garrison Keillor, a writer and native Minnesotan, described in his online column on December 16, 2024, what it is like during “…a classic hard Minnesota freeze like the ones of my childhood, when you walk out the door and the cold hits you like a board. The wind blows in off the Mississippi. Nobody is out for a walk, nobody is hanging out, everyone is heading briskly for a car or for a warm building. And there is no complaining. This is the remarkable thing. Nobody says, ‘My God, it’s cold out, I have no feeling in my face,’ because one: this is not a personal experience, everyone else is cold too, and two: God is aware of the cold and is hoping it will make you a better person, which God knows it should.”

By Mary Jackle, OSB