The famed German writer Goethe offered a list of nine requisites for
contented living. They are as timely now as they were when he wrote them
200 years ago.
“Health enough to make work a pleasure. Wealth enough to support your
needs. Strength enough to battle with difficulties and overcome them.
“Grace enough to confess your sins and forsake them. Patience enough
to toil until some good is accomplished. Charity enough to see some good
in your neighbor.
“Love enough to move you to be useful to others. Faith enough to make
the real things of God. Hope enough to remove all anxious fears concerning
the future.”
Goethe showed wisdom in these thoughts, perhaps especially in the use
of the word “enough.” Often we seek something more, when contentment could
come with gratitude for having enough.
There is great gain in godliness with contentment;
for we brought nothing into the world, and we cannot
take anything out of the world. (1 Timothy 6:6-7)
“Grace me with contentment , Jesus, for after all I do have
everything in You. ”
~ Fr. John Catoir