“Contemplation is a sacred mindfulness of my holy obligation to care for the world I live in. Contemplation is consciousness of the real fullness of life. Contemplatives don’t let one issue in life consume all their nervous energy or their hope. God is bigger than this problem at work or this irritating neighbor at home or this dependent relative in the family. God is calling me on and on and on, beyond all the partial things, to the goodness of the whole of life and my responsibility to it.
That’s enlightenment.
When I myself am the total square footage of my own small world, that’s darkness. When my pains and my successes and my agendas are my only concern, that’s darkness. When I see no larger meaning in my life than my own interests, that’s darkness. But when I begin to look at life through the eyes of God, the enlightenment has finally come.” (Joan Chittister, Wisdom Distilled from the Daily, p. 104)
