By Walter J. Ciszek SJ, with Daniel L. Flaherty SJ (2014)
This is the memoir of a self -willed, rebellious boy whom God chose to do something unique—to suffer and witness in the heart of intense suffering. Walter Ciszek was born of a Polish immigrant family in Pennsylvania, USA. Being a trouble-maker, his joining the Jesuits surprised everyone. After his ordination, responding to the Pope’s call to seminarians to volunteer to serve in Communist Russia, he trained in Rome. During the World War II he worked in a parish in Poland.
In 1939 the Soviet Army captured Eastern Poland, and unleashed a fierce persecution. Ciszek was arrested by the NKVD, the Soviet Secret Service. He was in solitary confinement for five years, and then sent to the Siberian slave labour camps. He spent the next fifteen years witnessing human suffering and cruelty at its most intense. Many thought him dead. Unknown to the outer world, Ciszek survived, slaving away in the midst of cruelty, bitter cold and starvation. Faith held him close to God and helped him endure while serving the faithful, secretly administering sacraments to fellow prisoners, consoling and encouraging them in their sufferings. In 1963 he was released in exchange for two Soviet spies held by the US government. His experiences were narrated in his first book, With God in Russia. But soon he felt that he had missed something—the spiritual lessons he learned from his experience, which prompted the present book.
He reflects how God had stripped away his physical and religious consolations, and left him with a core of seemingly simple truth. Prayer life provided the courage and relief from mental and spiritual suffering. His unshakeable inner serenity overcame the “arrogance of evil” that he faced. Solitary imprisonment became his “school of prayer.” He treated his slavery in the notorious Siberian salt mines in subzero temperatures round the year as a labour pleasing to God, providing him with a deeper understanding of God’s infinite compassion. His Catholic faith strengthened him. When he returned home, Fr Ciszek only felt a “simple sense of gratitude to God.”. He asks: “What can ultimately trouble the soul that accepts every moment of every day as a gift from the hands of God and strives always to do His will?” This wisdom sums up the meaning of all his sufferings. What a source of inspiration to all who suffer!
Die Empty: Unleash Your Best Work Every Day
By Todd Henry (2013)
Die Empty is a tool for people who aren’t willing to put off their most important work for another day.
“Don’t go to your grave with your best work inside of you. Choose to die empty,” is the message of this book. The inspiration for this book came from a question: “Which is the most valuable piece of land on earth?” Answer: “The graveyard.” Reason: It is the place where “all the unwritten novels, never-launched businesses, un-reconciled relationships” and all those things that had been put off for the next day lie buried! The absolute certainty of death raises the question who you want to be if you were to die empty. Instead of going to the grave with our best work inside us, we should be able to leave a body of work over our lifetime to make us proud in the end.
Firstly, we need to be “developers.” Secondly, we must overcome mediocrity, which grows over time and affects everyone including the most successful people. Treat each day as the last day of life. Henry cites an imaginary situation in which we can think of someone who accompanies us through one day of life reporting on everything that we do. How would it be if this would represent our whole life?
The author identifies seven deadly sins of mediocrity: aimlessness, boredom, comfort delusion (which forces us to live according to others’ expectations), ego, fear and guardedness (which isolates us from fruitful community life). We need to step out of our comfort zones to achieve great things. Henry also speaks of “S3 goals”—Step Go, Spring Go and Stretch Go. The first is to decide what we will do today, the second is the series of long-term goals and the third short term efforts and challenges that help us grow.
Prof Gigy Joseph
To subscribe to the magazine, click Subscribe
