Do you enjoy reading this article?
In general, do you enjoy reading?
What do you really enjoy during a normal day?
Enjoyment is a sign of good mental health. What do I mean?
If I am physically healthy, I will enjoy most of my physical activities. I will enjoy the taste of food. I will enjoy having good sleep. I will enjoy walking and other exercises.
If a couple have a good, loving relationship, they will enjoy sexual intimacy, spending time with each other, talking and listening to each other, doing things with and for each other.
The same for the whole family. A loving family enjoys meeting each other, being in each other’s company, preparing a birthday party for a family member, travelling together.
Enjoyment is a sign of health and good relationships.
Something similar happens in the so-called spiritual life, too. It is hard to define spirituality. In fact, different people and groups mean different things by this term. Very heroic and extremely cruel deeds have been done in the name of religion and spirituality—service of the least, making sacrifices for the poor, volunteering to work in difficult areas, even being ready to die for another, as also cruelty, including torture and murder.
Think of saints like Fr Maximilliam Kolbe who volunteered to die of starvation in the place of another man in a Nazi concentration camp. Threats or fear will not enable a person to do such heroic deeds. Only faith and love can inspire and strengthen someone to do it.
Fr Joe Mannath SDB
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