Fr Ed Homily 10-23-20

Dithering

This is a word that is not used too often anymore. It means doubtful, to vacillate, or not to have a firm purpose. In other words, you do not want to decide for whatever reason. I see this hesitancy of making decisions in our culture more than ever before. I see this because of two reasons. First, we have so much information at our fingertips we get lost in the search for trying to find the best way to decide. If we tell ourselves that we will fail if we make the wrong decision we will never decide because of fear of failure. Yet, we often learn more from our failures than our successes. And when we fail, what we learn from failure is more than what we will learn in our search for information to decide. For example, we learn humility, patience, and forgiveness. You will not learn those virtues from Google.

But the more insidious form of not deciding is to dither. This is when you receive an invitation from someone to come to a party, but you do not want to respond right away because something better might come along. So, you dither. The person who invited you needs to know if you are coming or not so they can prepare for the party. Your dithering adds stress to the person who invited you. It is a form of selfishness. If you do not want to go, say so, politely. Or accept the invitation.

By the way, God has invited you to mass this weekend. Coming?

May the Lord bless you in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen