Roman Catholic, Liberal, Willing to Listen, Addicted to Calendars and Responsories. Loves the old spirituality, but accepts the new. "Behold, I do a new thing."
Some days are harder to get through than others. That's not unusual for anyone, we all have days that we wish had not happened. Either we've had the Midas touch in reverse, where everything we touch turns to something not-gold, or we've done that which we ought not to have done. Or, failed to do something that needed doing. My day has been all of the above.
The specifics are not important, they never are, little incidents that dot our lives seem important to us in varying degrees, but we forget the important, the really important part is what we do with the little incidents. Anger can take the focus off of God. Loneliness can deprive us of the presence of God because we can't see beyond our own condition. A simple crush on someone can block the Holy Spirit because we become momentarily blind to God. A slight can become a huge grudge if we do not give it up to God immediately.
None of these are meant to reflect my day, but are examples of how any event in day to day life can be turned to our merit, or to self-distancing from God. How many times has a petty annoyance been left unaddressed until it boils up into an explosion of irritation that stuns everyone around us? That could have been prevented by turning to God and asking for help dealing with the situation, instead of just sitting on it and brooding like an old hen.
Pain, finances, friends, religion, slights real or imagined; all so much dross before the fact. "Be still, and know that I am God."
The LORD said to Abram: "Go forth from the land of your kinsfolk and from your father's house to a land that I will show you."
That is the beginning of today's first reading for Mass. It is well known, God tells Abram get up and go, and Abram gets up and goes. The rest of the reading consists of what God promises, who went with Abram, where Abram built altars, etc.. It's not a particularly inspiring piece of writing, since we know that Abram has a long way to go before his descendants will inherit the land of Canaan.
Today the bit Paul said about Abram acting in faith popped into my mind, and in the scriptures Abram says nothing, he just gets up and goes. That got me to thinking about faith journeys. My own specifically. I started in the Church of Christ, by my early teens it clearly was the wrong place for me, so I was called to "go forth from the land of [my] kinsfolk." That was a risky thing, because my kinsfolk were all, to the last one of them, solid Church of Christ.
My next stop on the journey was at the Episcopal Church. Just as Abram built an altar where he had a meeting with God, I made a home in the church I felt most comfortable with, half way between protestant and catholic. There followed years of in and out of faith and in and out of mortal sin, etc, this, that, the other, blah blah blah...until finally, a retreat at Gethsemani Abbey provided my next truly powerful encounter with God.
When the Episcopal Church split over sex issues, I realized that my home was ruined and once again God was calling me from the land of my kinfolk -- I spent 30 years in the Episcopal Church -- and into a new land. I became a Roman Catholic.
I can imagine any of you reading this saying, so what? You had a faith journey, big deal, we all have faith journeys. True, but what is it that brings the sticking power of faith into one life, and not into another? Why am I willing to remain a Catholic in a church that strikes me as largely sexist and phobic in many, many ways, not to mention often intellectually dishonest? Because I became quite clear what I do, and do not believe.
God called me on this journey, protected me when I wandered off, guided me back, took care of my faith when it sagged, and heard me when I repented. The Episcopal Church lost focus on Christ, I wanted to focus ONLY on Christ, and let the rest sort itself out. So why the Roman Church? Because it allowed me to use the word transubstantiation, which I knew the meaning of as a child, long before I knew the word. It also allows me to venerate the Virgin Mother, which I do, and have done for close to twenty years. Solemn Exposition and Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament! I can attend, worship, and not have to hide it from my coreligionists.
I'm really not trying to pat myself on the back, but today God granted me a great grace, to see that when he said get up and go, I got up and went. This could not have come at a better time, because I am in physical pain all the time, and in the past few months have seriously questioned my vocation to the solitary life. I was afraid I'd made it up. Today God helped me to see that faith sticks with some and not with others because some people will repent and others will not, some will tend their faith, and others will not.
I'm not special, I'm just willing to tend to my faith, and to repent.
There is nothing particularly compelling about the 12th Sunday in Ordinary Time, that makes me sit down and write; it's just another in a long round of ordinary Sundays. Yet, something does compel me tonight, a longing to reach out and try to express some of this movement of the spirit within me. Perhaps I can blame on the gospel of the day, or just being alone all day to ponder the text, and be nudged about by the implications of storms, and lack of faith.
During the homily the priest mentioned how we might look at this gospel as Jesus speaking to the apostles, saying in essence, "what are you so worked up about? Calm down." He also mentioned how the church always is in stormy waters and while you might sail along smooth for a little bit eventually the red sky in the morning, shows up, and everyone knows that means a storm is on the way.
Putting the universal aspect of church to one side, and bringing this gospel into the personal arena, it starts to become clear that getting personally shook up about something in the world, your town, or your church, is really a sign of a lack of faith. Taken at face value did the apostles really think that they would drown with Jesus in the boat with them? Did they really think he would drown too? That he would let them drown?
So I ask myself that question: do I think Jesus is going to let me be destroyed by this thing or that, because it seems to me that he is asleep on a cushion? Then, when problems begin to work their way into my life, am I able to keep my inner stability, my faith, and turn to Jesus? Isn't that really what this gospel is about? The boat of your, or my, life may seem at times to be nearly swamped, but Jesus is always with us by our faith, and to become fearful shows an appalling lack of faith.
I can think of hundreds of times I've let the fear of my nearly capsized life tear my focus off of Jesus and onto my own feeble efforts. God has called me into a way of life, and a vocation which requires my faith every moment of my day. I have to watch my mind continuously ... called nepsis ... to keep fantasy from diverting my eyes from God to my self. Or to some lesser object. Perhaps when I stop fearing the storms, and remember Jesus words, then my days and nights will go just that much more smoothly.
May God grant us all peace, faith, and love in this life, and salvation in the next.
87,000 times a day. That's how much the average heart beats in one days time. I wish I could train my soul to say the holy name of Jesus once per heartbeat. Think of that, repeating the holy name 87,000 times a day.
Or saying the sacred prayer "Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me a sinner," for every 7 heartbeats. Think of that, nearly 12,5000 repetitions of the most powerful prayer known to the Church.
Jesus wants to be in our hearts, "Let this mind be in you that was also in Christ Jesus." Or, "Do not harden your hearts." Or, "Let not your hearts be troubled."
Oh Lord Jesus, may we learn that your Sacred Heart is pure love. Amen.
To my half dozen readers let me assure you that I have not given up the blog ghost just yet, but am giving it a serious thought. Some people have deficits in checkbooks, or credit accounts, I'm having a deficit of sharing what goes on in my spiritual life, even in my lectio divina. All that begs the question: why?
I don't have people so that can't be it, and I'm not particularly closed off as a person, either. I think it is the paucity of what I have to say, that is said so much better by so many other people, that I wonder why clog up the blog world with one more blathering blithering blog.
For instance A Hermits Journal. That is a blog with something deep to say, and to be honest, I never share my thoughts on that level, and if I did, it would be in the form of a book, not as a blog. For me, tearing a hole in my brain in order to release my spiritual thinking onto something as impermanent as a blog seems absurd. The only really useful thing I did on any blog was to do daily commentary on the Rule of Benedict.
What I have learned about myself is that my gift lay in making ancient writings of the faith pertinent to today. That seems to be the consensus of opinion, as many people have asked me to put together a complete book of my reflections on the Rule of Benedict. That is in process, I assure you. The problem is other aspects of me need expression too, and that is why I can't leave the blog...yet. I keep saying yet, but the truth is I will never abandon it.
The Lord has lead me to understand that I am not the one to tackle political issues in the church, or in the world. That is the work of others. I am apparently not one to tackle the issues of Lectio Divina and sharing it. It does seem that I am good at making the old apply to us, in a way that makes sense. Okay, so I'll do that.
However, this blog, as you surely have noticed by now, often has music and not much else. The reason for that is explained in today's musical post of the Tantum Ergo. Words are just a bunch of letter, music is of the soul.
What my future holds I do not know, God knows. What this blog will be, I do not know, God knows. What I do know is that all of you should expect more music with a leetle tiny meditation to go along with it.
