Wednesday, June 04, 2008

The Worth of a Life

For Christmas 2006 my Dad gave me a wonderful gift: A Year with Dietrich Bonhoeffer -daily meditations from his letters, writings and sermons. I read a couple of entries each month, and this one today was illuminnating. Bonhoeffer's quote on life and love caused some good reflection in me; may it be so for you.

The worth of a life is measured by how much love it has.

What do happiness and unhappiness mean, what do wealth and poverty mean, what do honor and disgrace mean, what does living at home or abroad mean, what does life and death mean where people live in love?

They do not know.

They do not differentiate.

They only know that the sole purpose of happiness as well as unhapppiness, poverty as well as wealth, honor as well as disgrace, living at home or abroad, living and dying is to love all the more strongly, purely, fully.


-- from A Testament to Freedom, 241

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