I just returned from a pre-chapter meeting of my community. We’re getting ready to chart the course for the future–as much as we humanly can– and elect new provincial officers. Not easy today, when the future is so murky and our numbers older and fewer.

But our time is our time, and we have to live it to the full.

I like Pope Benedict’s words in “Charitas in Veritate:”

“The current crisis obliges us to re-plan our journey, to set ourselves new rules and to discover new forms of commitment, to build on positive experiences and to reject negative ones. The crisis thus becomes an opportunity for discernment, in which to shape a new vision for the future. In this spirit, with confidence rather than resignation, it is appropriate to address the difficulties of the present time.”

The pope isn’t doing our thinking for us; he’s telling us to  discern and to plan the future ourselves, with confidence.