Remember The Little Things by Most Reverend Charles J. Chaput O.F.M. Cap.

Most Reverend Charles J. Chaput, O.F.M. Cap. - Archbishop of Denver

St. Augustine once said, “to be faithful in little things is a big thing.” Devotion to family sounds like a simple thing, and it is. Gratitude, humility, faithfulness – these all are simple things. They’re also very difficult. It’s easy to talk about fixing the problems of American society with big national programs and policies, because we can always blame somebody else when they don’t work.

Personal change, personal moral integrity, personal fidelity to people and principles – that’s much harder work, because we’re stuck with the clay of who we are, and there’s nobody to blame but ourselves if we fail. But in persisting in these little things, we accomplish a big thing. We affect others. One life, lived well, can begin to change the world.

A reporter once asked Mother Teresa the secret of her success. She answered that she wasn’t called to succeed, but only to try. Success was God’s business. Trying was her business. She wasn’t called to find big solutions to poverty, but to live the little solution of personal love that would become a good infection in the hearts of other people.