Good News

It is a piece of good news. I had told you about one of my priest friends who was offered eighty thousand dollars a year by a congregation abroad in order to leave us to serve it, and he had refused. I know some of his arguments with himself before he refused. However, he strengthened himself in God and in the love of those who were with him. “Who is weak, and I am not weak?”. Before I traveled, I learned about another priest whose wife works in an institution that has decided to shut down its offices in Lebanon, and move abroad. The offer that was made to him, in addition to his wife’s allowance, which is more than double that of the aforementioned priest, is a job for him that includes housing, education for his children, and medical care for them all. He also refused. “He chose rather to suffer affliction with the people of God”. We all know news about those who emigrate. However, we do not always know about the eloquent love that drives brethren, who are among us, to remain in an expanse which they want us to consider more precious than the apple of our own eyes. The good is always greater than its news. I hope that the good will keep giving us life in awareness of it till the end.