New Beginnings

Its never to late to start over.  There is no greater statement of hope and belief in the value of every human person.  Every man who comes to St Anthony Shelter and grows during his stay knows that this is a fundamentally true.  Every person, no matter what his past contains, is worth the effort of renewal.  Personal renewal is a journey of epic proportions.  It involves staring at those painful, terrifying, even disgusting things that lead one to pick up the first drink or escape with the first drug.  It is going back to the ground zero of one's life and remembering the glories of what once stood there before the devastation of addiction, self destruction and dehumanization was unleashed.  When one can stand at this point than one needs to remember that life does not need to be about slavery or self destruction, rather, the former glory days are only a choice away from being reborn.  The joyful purity of childhood bliss is totally accessible through a consistent choice to do well and to choose the positive and, what Christians call, holy patterns of living.