You have only to be truthful to cause trouble. But it’s a different kind of trouble when you are untruthful. You have to decide what kind of troublemaker you will be. Perhaps most people want to avoid causing any trouble because they are frightened of a backlash; but eventually we all have to decide. Are we going to tell the truth, to live the truth or to hide behind platitudes and half-truths? A heightened level of awareness through meditation can allow us to be truthful even when this carries a high cost. “The truth will set you free.” When meditators experience this incremental liberation from fear and evasion, they more readily come out into the open to say what they really mean. And they stand on the side of those in need rather than merely on the side of those who will be the likely winners in a conflict. In the mysterious paradoxes of reality it can often happen that divisions are necessary to create healing and a stronger union. We break the bread in order to share it and be brought into unity. The mystery here is that of separation, which is necessary for us to know ourselves before we can give ourselves to another, to God.
— from the book Sensing God: Learning to Meditate during Lent by Laurence Freeman, OSB
