What sets monks apart from the rest of us is not an overbearing piety by a contemplative sense of fun. They know, as Trappist monk Matthew Kelty reminds us, that "you do not have to be holy to love God. You have only to be human. Nor do you have to be holy to see God in all things. You have only to play as a child with an unselfish heart."
Sometimes the bird turns away. Sometimes it does not open its mouth to sing. Sometimes it is afraid of the dark. But when it forgets it is afraid and opens its mouth to sing, it fills the world with light.