Dear Editor: With all the ills of society today and the lack of morals and values, perhaps the following could help us back to a reality we’ve forgotten.

The world would be an infinitely better place if people could understand and accept this basic concept. Suppose you were standing on a sandy beach stretching for miles, and on the tip of your finger was one tiny speck of beach sand, almost microscopic, sparkling in the sun. That speck represents out time on this earth compared to eternal time represented by all the grains of sand on the beach and all the beaches of the earth.

That’s how long our life is, these few years, like the blink of an eye compared to the infinite stretches of eternity. Why have we, and the billions who have come before us and the billions who will come after us, been given this moment of life by God? So that we can do our best to love God and love others during this moment, and to spend eternity, which is our real life, with him. And that’s the only reasons we’ve been put on our tiny planet in the vastness of space.

For the sake of each of us, for the sake of others, and for the sake of the world, we must understand our reason for being here and what we’re supposed to be doing here. Choosing to give up our future with God by not living as we’re meant to, is to believe that one grain of sand is more important than all the vast and uncountable sands of eternity.

JOAN KELLY

North Providence, RI