According to the Journal of Aging Life Care, our social networks thin with age, impacting our bodies and health as greatly as experiencing high blood pressure, obesity, or smoking. Consider that the word “religion” shares the same Latin root as “ligament”—a word meaning “to bind.” We are called to community.
At its best, community is the mirror that shows us the face of God in everyone we see, leading us and guiding us to the next best thing for ourselves and for the good of the whole. The challenge of living in community is to honor our unity to see and feel and love all parts of the body—while not having our individual lights snuffed out.
We long for community—a place where we receive and bring the light of God. In community, we most clearly come to know ourselves as made in the image of God.
The message is an excerpt from “Darkness is your candle” by Violet Cucciniello Little in the April 2020 issue of Gather magazine. Today we remember Irenaeus, Bishop of Lyons, who died around 202.
Daily Grace has been offering you things to ponder and things to pray about for more than 10 years. For free. Women of the ELCA provides many other free online resources, too—see welca.org/resources. Please support Women of the ELCA at welca.org/give.
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