“Don’t Tread on Me!” is a slogan that has become very popular in our modern political landscape.  It suggests a certain defensive posture that may truly be appropriate when applied to the evil one, but misses the mark when it comes to human relationships.  Instead of putting up the proverbial wall, we could start experimenting with the following phrases:  “Thanks for sharing your opinion” or “I need some time to think about that” or “You might be right” or “Let’s talk that through more some time” or “Help me understand where you’re coming from” or “Now we know where we stand with one another.”  Such responses serve as a welcome balm and a healing touch for ragged souls desperate for an interruption to the cycle of raw reactionary living.  Indeed, in choosing our words carefully and practicing patience, we will invite our sisters and brothers to tread with us in a common direction that leads to life. 

Ave Crux, Spes Unica.

Let’s pretend that the ego is a marble slab that sits on the lofty throne of the mind.  As long as our lives are lukewarm and complacent, not moving in the forward direction, things just get piled up on it: ideas, relationships, worries, fears, memories, etc.  Pretty soon that slab is buried and we not only become hidden from others, but, tragically, from ourselves as well.  Nevertheless, there is good news: we can choose, starting today, right here and now, to take that first step in the forward direction, and when we do, the circumstances of our lives, through which we journey, will begin to clear all of that junk off of that marble slab, and the slab itself will begin to take on new contours as it is shaped by contact with the other.  Let’s, therefore, be open to the risk of new encounters that will allow our true beauty to be revealed.  Ave Crux, Spes Uncia.

Let’s get comfortable with transcendence.  That glorious risk of going beyond ourselves.  That courageous decision to cross the line of safety and security into the unknown.  The certainty camp gets old fast as we drown in predictability.  The chaos camp makes us equally wary as we wallow in feelings of inadequacy.  The way of transcendence, however, allows us to choose mystery out of a constant baseline of order.  We set goals, work hard, and pursue our dreams not because those things satisfy, but because they reveal our limits to us, and in so doing, invite us into a life of grace.  Such a way of being cannot but put us in touch with our true humanity and eternity at one and the same time.  Ave Crux, Spes Unica.

“Fight or flight” instincts are deeply ingrained in our human psyches.  When faced with a threat, our first impulse is to either eliminate or escape from the perceived enemy.  Perhaps we have lashed out when we feel personally attacked by a colleague or family member, or maybe we have gone silent in a texting thread or email correspondence when a friendship no longer feels safe.  Whatever the case may be, the good news is that we do not have to be enslaved to such a bipolar way of life.  We can decide today to follow the narrow way (Mt 7:14) that holds these two instincts in tension long enough and tightly enough to produce some new way of being.  We will discover that we are capable of confrontations that establish the boundaries necessary for relationships and at the same time soul-searching that establishes a constant interior sanctuary.  In this way, our true animal nature will emerge as women and men who live by the new motto of “connection and perfection.”   Ave Crux, Spes Unica!