Autumn is a bittersweet time. Marked by signs of death as well as the fullness of life, it is the season that I most associate with midlife. For both autumn and the middle years include a time of harvest, of plenitude; the two are also marked by evident changes and a test of faith. Regardless of our chosen way of life, more often than not, midlife is a time for second thoughts, for facing limited in ourselves and others, for embracing the consequences of choices made earlier in life. Likewise, it is also a time for giving thanks, for living a life enriched by experience, for appreciating the gift of deeper self-understanding and the rewards that come with self-transcendence. These years provide you and me with an opportunity to attend to those parts of ourselves that were neglected or inhibited during the earlier years of life. An perhaps, for the first time, some of us have a chance to begin to make that change of heart about which we have spoken so often and for which so many of us continue to say that we long. Never equate the middle years with the word "decline." For if we live them well, many years hence we will be able to look back on this time in life and realize that it might have been the moment when you and I were at our best: creative, productive and coming to know ourselves and our God as if for the very first time.