I took advantage of the fact that since I had no parishes to fill in for Mass this morning I could sit out on the front porch of the Center, read some Abandonment to Divine Providence by Jean-Pierre De Caussade, drink tea and watch the bumble-bees and butterflies dance around the butterfly bush. 

This was all the more pleasant by the fact that I was kept awake into the wee hours of the morning by the sounds of a college party across the street.  As I sat there watching the butterflies and bees and the beauty of the sunlight shining through the branches and flowers of the bush I came to the realization that yes, let the youth have their late night parties.  I will enjoy the peace and serenity of the morning.  The youth do not yet know what they are missing.  Hopefully, time and experience will help mature their awareness. 

A thought by De Caussade:

Thus, beloved souls, you cannot know from where you came nor where you are going; nor can you know from what idea of God you have been produced nor to what end it is leading you.  For you there remains only a passive self-abandonment, carrying on without thinking and concerned with no models or examples of any particular mode of spirituality.  You must act when it is time for action and stop when it is time to stop.  In this self-abandonment you read or put books aside, talk to people or keep silent, write or drop your pen, and never know what will follow.  Finally, after several transformations, the formed and finished soul, now endowed with wings, flies up to heaven, but leaves on earth a fertile seed to work in other souls.