Good and evil both increase at compound interest. That is why the little decisions you and I make every day are of such infinite importance. The smallest good act today is the capture of a strategic point from which, a few months later, you may be able to go on to victories you never dreamed of. An apparently trivial indulgence in lust or anger today is the loss of a ridge or railway line or bridgehead from which the enemy may launch an attack otherwise impossible.

…it would be quite wrong to think that the way to become charitable is to sit trying to manufacture affectionate feelings. Some people are ‘cold’ by temperament; that may be a misfortune for them, but it is no more a sin than having a bad digestion is a sin; and it does not cut them out from the chance, or excuse them from the duty, of learning charity. The rule for all of us is perfectly simple. Do not waste time bothering whether you ‘love’ your neighbor; act as if you did. As soon as we do this we find one of the great secrets. When you are behaving as if you loved someone, you will presently come to love him.

I’m not saying that at some point love isn’t staying up until 2am phone calls or stealing kisses when you least expect it or instantly falling for each other’s favorite songs - because it is - or at least that’s what the lead up to it feels like, but real love is so much more. It’s going out at 12am to get something to eat for your wife who can’t get out of bed. It’s listening to them as they explode with vulnerability on your living room couch, talking about how they were only so young when their parents passed on. It’s remembering how someone likes their coffee in the morning without asking - without ever asking. It’s visiting someone in the hospital knowing the last thing you want to do is see them in that condition. It’s wanting to be with that person despite everything, the future, the past, and everything in between. It’s the intimate things that you don’t even realize involve such intimacy, but they do in secret, like the pinky promises you two made behind your back, to love one another for always, in the time you thought you were in love, when you were actually just on your way to it.

Free will, though it makes evil possible, is also the only thing that makes possible any love or goodness or joy worth having.

We are all neighbors…we should love, esteem, respect, and serve one another despite our deepest differences—including religious, political, and cultural differences.

The Lord loves us and is mindful of us. He is always on our side as we do what is right. He will help us in time of need.