I have a relative who doesn’t go to the Sacraments but does pray a lot and is very loving. This relative was asking me if I thought God loved “them” in spite of not going to Church.

I said yes and I was about to go into a long argument about how not going to Church is rejecting the love Jesus has for one and not letting Him come into one with His Body and Blood.

Instead I just kept listening to this person’s reasons for not liking to go to Church.

The relative then said, “You know, usually whenever I talk about religion you jump down my throat angrily. This time you just listened. That meant so much to me.”

I think this is related to my big push to talk less (see A New Way, June 2 Blog). What a dividend!

I must watch for this. No matter what splendid retorts I have on different Church matters, it might not always be the right thing to enunciate them. Sometimes we need to just listen, especially with family members.

The next thing my relative said was how running to Mary helps so much because she understands!

Thank you, Mary.

Read more blog entries by Dr. Ronda by visiting RONDAVIEW. Dr. Ronda Chervin has many free e-books and audios on her website rondachervin.com. If you go to her website and read or listen and then want to correspond with her she will be available. Her schedule does not permit, however, responding to comments on the Blog, though she enjoys reading them. Dr. Ronda’s newest project is spiritualityrunningtogod.com.