Reading this Awesome Book!

Found this awesome book called "The Happiness of Heaven" by  Fr. J. Boudreau,SJ

Oh my goodness what an incredible book! Think it ought to be on everyone reading list if you have any interest in heaven and the afterlife and if not then read it anyway to get one! He covers so many area's that I have never even considered yet and its just mind blowing!  It has really started me thinking hard about what he says which is so much more advanced than what I have so far come up with in my own simple meditations. One thing he touches on that I had "noticed" but never took it further into the heaven realm is our physical bodies, how we are basically slaves to them. We MUST eat, we MUST sleep...Don't know about you but I get tired sometimes of lugging mine around from place to place, its not always an easy task, we humans are "heavy" even if we are thin! He says that in Heaven when we get our risen bodies no food demands, no sleep demands and NO extra weight to carry around! He says we will be light like air able to transport ourselves anywhere by just the thought like talking long distance on the phone he says, only we will not just hear the other person we will actually be able to transport there! Can you imagine? He says so much more...He has really communicated to me in the few chapters I have read that God LOVES us so much and is just waiting so patiently to reward us sooooooooo richly for our faithfulness. He is just waiting to reward so far beyond our wildest dreams in so many, many ways.  Please even if I tried to paraphrase everything this man says I couldn't convey it so well as he...Please trust me and read the book. Amazon may have it. Tan Publishers will have it.  If not let me know and I'll research it for you. I have a copy so know they are out there. This guy has really meditated on the risen Christ to write so much of what is there, how HE was, that is how we will be. He draws from scripture and Thomas Aquinas amoung others.  A must read. It has left me so excited, can't wait to read more, and it has doubled my desire for heaven as well! Again this is one  amazing  you won't be left untouched book! You will be craving heaven so badly after reading this I promise!

GG

Animals and Heaven

Been thinking again about this.  Animals in heaven. Again if a new earth it should have animals. Second off if animals were condemned along side of us after Adam and Eve and they like us now suffer death that came into the world due to sin should they not also like us enjoy the reward? They do not have souls like our own and yet we condemned them to die by our sin. Feel God being a just God would not simply let them suffer along side of us and then not repay them somehow for their pain. This again is just my theory but I'm sticking too it as the country song says. Animals are sinless and yet they suffer, hit by cars, neglected, all suffering from the hands of men, then illness and disease, what did they do to deserve all this, nothing. To the best of my knowledge animals perfectly obey the will of God and yet again they are cursed due to our fault. Can't help but to believe that God won't reward them as well as those of us who persevere till the end by giving them what originally they would have had if we hadn't brought death into the world. Just a thought.

GG

Going through such a tough time in my life (again)

Life can be so discouraging, distressing, depressing, etc...Sometimes no matter what you do its so hard to keep going. I have such a personal history of this, sometimes it seems so unfair. Unhappy childhood due to issues with a parent, one was supportive, one was NOT! The supportive one gave me so much that still to this day brings me great joy and gave me so much ability like my gardens, my art, and so much more. The other robbed me of so much...And then adulthood seemed to be the answer the freedom so long sought. Only problem is that due to being so naive and untrained in determining such things ended up in yet another not so wonderful situation. One that is even harder to get out of than childhood was. And yet through it all there is one thing, one hope, one bright beacon that shines true. Its called Heaven. This thing, this place, this state of existence that none here can say much about...And yet it has such a draw, such a promise of all that we just can't seem to find here. Its almost as if we instinctively know that we were made for this place, this existence...Its almost inexplainable our desire for this. I believe its because we are hardwired by our Creator to desire this. We were made to be there and somehow deep in our being we know this. I think so many of us though get distracted, sidetracked. We search here on earth for the happiness of heaven. It can't be found really, its not here only small glimpses of it can be located. Just enough to tease, to encourage, to prove that such a place does exist, somewhere...We find it in the laugh of a child, a smile, a good deed that comes out of the blue when most needed, the beauty of a sunset or sunrise, the new leaves of spring, in prayer, so many little glimpses are there. Not the full picture but enough to show its real, waiting. I am in the waiting crowd. I know so well that true happiness cannot be found here except in small windows. It must be enough. I am deeply grateful for the little bits I do see and wait with great longing for the day when I get to see the full picture. It makes me think that no matter what you endure here if as St Paul says you "finish the race" the prize will be such that the pain of the race will be without memory...Only the joy, the exuberence, the satisfaction of having made it will remain! As I stated at another place it will not matter what you suffered here when you get there...It will all seem as naught. So be happy that you were born, it means you are predestined to be eternally happy and without pain no matter how bad your life may have been here on earth. Just knowing the joy I will experience makes it all seem as dust blowing away in the wind...

Peace, may you find it before you pass into eternity and may we meet on the happy side to run and laugh without memory of the pain...

If...

If you could go to heaven right now today/tonight would you?

Would you have hesitation? Would you be ready? If you could literally go right now would you?

I would IF I knew my daughter could come with me and I knew my two dogs could too...Those would be the only things that would hinder me... What about you? Those are my loose ends. What are yours?

Just something to think about.

A Wise Friend Said...

Happy Easter to all before I start.

A wise friend told me today that this world is so sad and full of so many negative things but that God knows how the human heart has need of hope in order to survive here. So He has not only given us the promise of Heaven through His resurrection but He also gives us little glimpses, little reflections of what awaits us in the eternal land of light and joy...Everytime you see a small beauty of nature, a blooming flower in an unexpected place, a stunning sunset or sunrise, a secret brook bubbling away deep in a wood...All these are little promises of what will come...They are HOPE for our weary world...Hang on Heaven's Coming!

GG

Refocusing

Sometimes as hard as you try life makes you forget things you may not want to. Or maybe it just distracts you from those things...Lately I have lost some of the intense focus on heaven that I usually have. Its called life here on earth. Thats the problem. Sometimes life HERE gets so involved, so intense that you lose sight of most everything else...That is what has been happening to me. Thanks to my lovely daughter who reminded me by her innocent little questions and comments, the fruits of so many conversations on heaven that the focus was brought back... We must not ever totally lose sight of heaven. As St Paul says keep your eye on the goal, run the race! We must not lose sight of the finish line! Those that do will be lost! I know so many family members well these are inlaws actually that have forgotten. It deeply pains me to see them living by the worlds standards and losing sight of the future! The thought of what their future might be pains me greatly since these people are so well known to me. I see what could be and then have to compare it to what very well will be for them...Its tragic. And yet all you can do is share what you know, its up to them to decide what to do with their time here. Thanks to my daughter for redirecting me of late. Life has thrown me some interesting curves and its especially important to not get distracted and hence caught up in worldly ways of dealing with things and possibly losing the race because of it! No like I keep telling my daughter from before and now again, YES! I'm going to heaven because I am going to make the right choices to get me there! And so are you (when she asks if she will also get there) Its up to us isn't it? Its not like buying a lottery ticket- you hope you picked the winning number! No Christ died for us, opened the doors to heaven for us, now we only need to accept those graces He offers to us, make the right godly choices and we're in, we will have won! Its not a "oh I hope I get there" thing. Of course we can say that in the sense of "oh I hope I DO make all the right choices" but we DO have free will remember? We can make the right choices that put us in God's camp under His standard! Heaven IS within our reach, everyone of us! We must simply choose to run the race with the goal in mind. We must not often get distracted lest we fall and not get back up. Its not an easy race by any stretch of the imagination... Think of tri-athletes is it? Running over all kinds of terrain and elevations, doing all kinds of physical exertion. Its tough and you have to be tough to do it. But the help is there if we but ask, then with our God given free will we must CHOOSE to get there no matter what we encounter along the way. It CAN be done, we must never believe otherwise. If it were unattainable God wouldn't have offered it to a weak human race now would He? And we do know that other have made it so we can too...

Peace,
GG

Have been locked out of my site here....

Sorry for the long silence, couldn't get back in, wouldn't recognize my password, again! Here's hoping the next time don't have to go through this again...