Photo was taken in perfectly calm waters just off the Fastnett Rock, West Cork (Irl)
This photo is from the archive and as this lighthouse faces the Atlantic Ocean, there are very few days in the year when the sea is as calm as it was in our photo
The lighthouse on Fastnett rock is one of the most famous lighthouses in the world. It marks Ireland’s most southerly point. In 1847 90 lives were lost when a ship ran aground on rocks in West Cork near Crookhaven. A decision was then taken to build a lighthouse on the Fastnett rock. The first lighthouse was built there in 1854 made of cast iron, but fierce Atlantic Storms swept it away. (The rusty base of this old lighthouse can still be seen in our photo today) The current lighthouse is made of Cornish granite and is well able to withstand the ferocity of the Atlantic.
Thought on Sunday – August – 28/06/2020
Thought For The Week
‘At some point in our lives, faith will feel like darkness, belief like unbelief and God’s person and existence will feel like nothing. Our minds and hearts will, at that point, come up dry and empty when they try to imagine or feel God, not because God doesn’t exist or is less present than the physical world, but because God is so massively present’ ~Ronald Rolheiser
There comes a point in everyone’s life when we struggle to get around the idea of God or what it means in our life. Spiritual writers have written about this and how such moments are in fact good and healthy. Any person who claims to understand God or knows everything about God, are best listened to with great caution. No one, not even Pope Francis, is close to understanding God fully. When we talk about God we are talking about the infinite and so we will always be limited in understanding God completely.
When talking about God, it is like reflecting a significant and special beam of light. It lights up our darkness, fills our soul with hope, it energises us and keeps us going. But we can only touch and feel some of these beams. There are hundreds, thousands, probably millions of them. They are all over the world and we experience a few or some of them. What a privilege to be able to experience God’s presence in our daily stories constantly unfolding.
Last Sunday (June 21st) we had the longest day of the year. The weeks and months of 2020 have moved on so quickly, partly due to so many news stories around the covid pandemic. The month of June is a celebration of abundance, light, energy and abundant growth. Nature responds by maximising this overflow of energy. The summer solstice is a celebration of everything abundant in this present moment that we call now.
How often we forget about today and the present moment. It is in the current and present moment that life is lived to the fullest. It is here that we will find God best and it is the place where we can simply be. We don’t have to earn God’s love. We don’t have to prove anything. We don’t have to earn points or try to be perfect. We don’t have to pretend. All we need do is just be true to ourselves. This can only happen in the present moment.
