Halcyon

souldelights:

“Ask yourselves, young people, about the love of Christ. Acknowledge His voice resounding in the temple of your heart. Return His bright and penetrating glance which opens the paths of your life to the horizons of the Church’s mission. It is a taxing mission, today more than ever, to teach men the truth about themselves, about their end, their destiny, and to show faithful souls the unspeakable riches of the love of Christ. Do not be afraid of the radicalness of His demands, because Jesus, who loved us first, is prepared to give Himself to you, as well as asking of you. If He asks much of you, it is because He knows you can give much.”
- Bl. John Paul II, The Meaning of Vocation

“How shall I make a return to the Lord for all the good he has done for me?”

— from Ps 116

(Source: verbumcarofactumest)

(Source: reekrhymes, via rawrboom)

Marina Abramović - The Artist Is Present: This emotional exhibit, held in the Museum of Modern Art for three months in early spring 2010, featured Abramović sitting in a chair for the entirety of the day at the museum. Visitors were encouraged to sit silently across from the artist for a duration of their choosing, becoming participants in the artwork. Abramović, acting as an “emotional mirror” to the patrons, silently stared at them, often inducing deeply profound and heartbreaking reactions.

The artist didn’t know what was going to happen when she started the project, but when people started sitting down and she looked at them , a lot of people started crying simply because someone was acknowledging them and looking them in the eye.  On the artists website there’s pictures of all the people and how long it took them to cry.

(Source: halogenic, via your-still-obsessed-stalker)

Dead soldier’s friend tells why a funeral dress was the only way to honour him. The Observer.

“Kev was like my brother – we would have done anything for each other.
We said that whoever died first, the other one had to wear a pink dress with green spots to the funeral – and we shook on it. It was mainly his idea and the more I think about it, I’m sure Kevin knew something was going to happen.
I looked for the exact dress but couldn’t find one anywhere.

I eventually picked up the green one in Primark and bought the pink pop socks to make it look even sillier. It’s what Kev would have wanted.
Kev told his whole family about the pact, so I couldn’t back out. I had a word with him at the graveside and asked if he liked the color – I’m sure I could hear laughter coming out of the ground.

Kev was a true hero and someone I’m proud to call my best mate.”

(via your-still-obsessed-stalker)

Homosexuality is a sin, homosexuals are doomed to spend eternity in hell.

If they wanted to change they could be healed of their evil ways.

If they would turn away from temptation, they could be normal again.

If only they would try and try harder if it doesn’t work.

These are all the things I said to my son bobby when I found out he was gay.

When he told me he was homosexual my world fell apart, I did everything I could to cure him of his sickness.

8 months ago my son jumped off a bridge and killed himself.

I deeply regret my lack of knowledge of gay and lesbian people.

I see that everything I was taught and told was bigotry and de-humanising slander, if I had investigated it beyond what I was told, If I had just listened to my son, when he poured his heart out to me.

I would not be standing here today with you, filled with regret. 

I believe that god was pleased with bobby’s kind and loving spirit. In gods eyes kindness and love are what its all about.

I didn’t know that each time I echoed eternal condemnation for gay people, each time I referred to bobby as sick and perverted and a danger to our children, his self esteem, his sense of worth were being destroyed.

And finally his spirit broke beyond repair.

It was not gods will that bobby climbed over the side of a freeway overpass and jumped directly into the path of an eighteen wheel truck, which killed him instantly.

Bobby’s death was a direct result of his parent’s ignorance and fear of the word gay.

He wanted to be a writer, his hopes and dreams should not have been taken from him, but they were.

There are children like bobby sitting in your congregations, unknown to you they will be listening as you echo amen and that will soon silence their prayers, their prayers to god for understanding and acceptance and for your love but your hatred and fear and ignorance of the word gay will silence those prayers.

So before you echo amen in your home and place of worship, think, think and remember, a child is listening.

Mary Griffith

(Source: soparagarottos, via knuckledebate)

thedailywhat:

Heartwarming Tearjerker of the Day: “It’s not the right thing to do, but I did it. If I were younger, maybe I’d be spending time in the hoosegow.”

So says Hyman Strachman, a 92-year-old, 5-foot-5 World War II vet who has spent the past eight years sending bootlegged copies of first-run movies to American soldiers in Afghanistan and Iraq. Known to soldiers as Big Hy, he has copied the movies — more than 300,000 — in his small Long Island apartment, then sent them overseas free of charge, and at a personal cost of about $30,000.

“It was pretty big stuff — it’s reconnecting you to everything you miss,” said Jenna Gordon, a specialist in the Army Reserve. “We’d tell people to take a bunch and pass them on.”

Now, with the wars waning and soldiers returning home, Strachman’s shameless violation of domestic copyright laws is winding down, as his chance of being prosecuted. In fact, Howard Gantman, with the Motion Picture Association of America, hinted that Strachman might never have been on Hollywood’s radar at all: “We are grateful that the entertainment we produce can bring some enjoyment to them while they are away from home.”

[nyt]

(via binkini)

Live simply.

(via inspiring-pictures)

ourafrica:

A church is not a building, it’s the people. 

This is Africa, our Africa

This is incredible. Beautiful. Amazing. It’s a testimony that wherever you are in the world, our God is present. 

(via lifeofpraise)

"Sometimes fate is like a small sandstorm that keeps changing direction. You change direction, but the sandstorm chases you. You turn again, but the storm adjusts. Over and over you play this out, like some ominous dance with death just before dawn. Why? Because this storm is not something that blew in from far away, something that has nothing to do with you. This storm is you. Something inside you. So all you can do is give in to it, step right into the storm, closing your eyes and plugging up your ears so the sand does not get in, and walk through it, step by step. There is no sun there, no moon, no direction, no sense of time. Just fine white sand swirling up into the sky like pulverised bones. That is the kind of sandstorm you need to imagine."

Haruki Murakami, Kafka on the Shore 

(Source: musingsofalibertine, via cheesepimiento)

When people say these books are children’s books, as if to demean them, I balk. These books dealt with themes that adults do not fully understand or wish to. It dealt with racism, classism, sexism, homophobia, prejudice, and general ignorance. These books taught us that it doesn’t matter how you were raised, but that you get to choose to be kind, loyal, brave, and true. They taught us to be strong under the pressures of this world and to hold fat to what we know to be right. These books taught me so much, they changed me as a person. So just because they’re set against a fantastical backdrop with young protagonists does not mean that their value is any less real.

(Source: fhloston-paradise, via dapperblainey)