Meditations : “Let us join in a moment dedicated to that quiet power within us.”

Yet, within us is also a great void. We feel this void at times of great loneliness, frustration, and despair. Sorrow, hatred, and greed, too, are within us.

Just as we need to be alone at times to put things right, so do we need to be with others to love and be loved. This great social urge also is within us as powerfully as that separateness -- that uniqueness -- that gives us identity.

Let us look within ourselves with honesty and trust. We shall find there a personal center important to who we are. We shall find there something held in common with those about us -- family, friends, neighbors -- and in ever-widening circles until we find that which we have in common with all people, something irreducibly human, something completely natural.

This is the center of all religion, all love, all concern for others; and it is the center of all personal growth. May these few moments be a personal time for you -- a time for that person within you who feels at one with humanity, with nature, and with all the universe that was, is, and shall be. Amen.