New Year’s Reflection from Bp. Robert Morneau
For some reason, I like the word osmosis. It has a ring to it that rivals the word sauerkraut. But what is osmosis? According to my little Merriam-Webster Dictionary, we read: “movement of a solvent through a semi permeable membrane into a solution of higher concentration that tends to equalize the concentrations of the solutions on either side of the membrane” – I think I’m getting a headache.
Then I came across this sentence from Aelred Squire’s Asking the Fathers: “Like a little drop of water in a quantity of wine, or red-hot iron in the burning flame, we take on the character of that in which we are immersed.” That’s it! That’s osmosis made visible. We become what we get next to.
We venture into a new year, 2012. One of the most important things will be our decisions of what we allow in our minds and hearts. The books we read, the movies we watch, the companions we select, will, (“osmostically”) get inside us and shape our days. A drop on water in wine knows this; a piece of iron in a fire knows this; and, if we are wise, we will know too the power of osmosis in our lives.