[Mad Dawg]

Thanks for the idea and for the ping. I'm wondering if the way to do this is to "abstain for a season." Even those who don't think we should refrain forever could agree for a Lent of silence. I don't know. It's interesting. It's a heck of a challenge. Parable: The other day I was at evening prayer with somebody who didn't usually pray the office. So I'm reciting the Magnificat from memory and this person gets a verse wrong and I am immediately confused and lose my place and have to grab a breviary. Of course, it's silly and not a big deal. But I DID think, "I guess I don't know the Magnificat as well as I thought I did."

THEN I thought, Hey, this is like virtue. I go along being all genial and funny warm and fuzzy and think I'm quite the dude. But when I encounter some gratuitously nasty person, I lose all that niceness in a heart beat. There's a lot I don't know as well as I thought I did, and maybe working here is a good training ground and diagnostic all in one.

[Judith Anne]

We learn our faults in company with others...but sometimes we don’t see them until we step back.

[wagglebee]

I refrained from most of the more heated threads last year during Lent and felt much better.

[Judith Anne]

I go along being all genial and funny warm and fuzzy and think I'm quite the dude. But when I encounter some gratuitously nasty person, I lose all that niceness in a heart beat.

Oh, boy, not me. I'm ALWAYS nice. /sarc!