Most
of us are familiar with the Serenity Prayer:
“God grant me the serenity to accept the things I
cannot change;
courage to change the things I can; and wisdom to know the
difference.”
This short prayer is one of the
most cherished in America, if not in the whole world. It can be
found in many forms—bookmarks, wall plaques, bumper stickers, and collections
of inspirational poetry. Millions pray it each day in Twelve-Step recovery
programs and millions more use it to help sort through the stressful
issues in their lives.
But many people are not familiar
with the second part to this beautiful prayer that is essential
to living the first part. Here it is:
--Living one day at a
time;
--enjoying one moment at a time;
--accepting hardships as
the pathway to peace;
--taking, as God did, this sinful world as it is, not
as I would have it;
--trusting that God will make all things right if I
surrender to His Will;
--that I may be reasonably happy in this life
and supremely happy with
Him forever in the next.”
This seldom-quoted second part
really contains the ingredients for living the first part well.
For we are more serene:
-- when we live one day at a time and enjoy one moment
at a time;
--when we calmly accept things as they are, not as we
would have them;
--when we trust that
God will make all things right if we surrender to His will;
--when we realize that our ultimate happiness is not
to be found in this world but
in Heaven.
Serenity. Peace. Each
of us longs for these gifts. The wisdom of the Serenity Prayer is
that it puts our longing into words and shows us ways to Serenity: living,
enjoying, accepting, trusting, surrendering.
Serenely yours,
Sister Loretta
