Today's Thoughts...

Today’s Thoughts. Today’s first reading from Daniel describes terrifying dream-like visions which Daniel saw during the night.  The visions Daniel saw were quite alarming and violent.  However, towards the end, Daniel sees a hopeful sign:  One like a son of man coming, on the clouds of heaven. Daniel believes that God has intervened.  The point of all the visions/dreams is that God will at some point intercede to destroy all evil so that those who stand firm in their faith will prevail.
 
Today, we may not have monstrous-type lions with eagle wings or bears with tusks or leopards with four heads in our dreams, but we might ask ourselves what are the challenges which block us from God, self and one another?  How does fear control us and what are we missing? 
 
In our Gospel today, Jesus reminds us that the Kingdom of God is near and there are signs wherever we choose to look, even in the effortless process of the seasonal cycle of growing trees.  Our challenge is one of maintaining attention and intentional response. Perhaps as we journey through this Friday there is more than enough here to occupy our prayerful moments until the beginning of Advent on Sunday.
 
Have a great Friday everyone and pleasant dreams!