On Checklists and Relationship

 Last night in OCIA, we had a discussion on Lenten practices.  As I listened, I got to thinking about checklists and relationships.  It's not really a question of "either/or," since both are important to maintaining our lives.  We tend to love checklists because of the sense of accomplishment, the feeling of doing something to create order and progress in an otherwise chaotic existence.  I have a friend who makes me laugh (with her, not at her) about her obsession with checklists:  Make the coffee: check.  Drink the coffee: check.  

The feeling of accomplishment is important to us, especially for a new mother whose life has been completely upturned by unpredictable care of an infant.  We are mostly desperate to regulate our lives with a sense of being in control and successful.  Even in the area of relationships, checklists are critical.  The partner who fails the tasks of daily organization -- checking the gas gauge in the car, washing the clothes, seeing to the meals, etc.----soon sabotages the relationship altogether.  We can't live in chaos without imposing frustration on our life partners.

But life is not all about the checklists either.  Sooner or later, routine alone also sabotages the relationship.  Jesus mentions those who say to Him, 'but we prophesied in your name and drove out demons and performed miracles in your name!"  But Jesus' answer is, "But I never knew you!"  Many of us think the whole point of being Christian is to be "good."  But clearly, God has something else in mind --- relationship.  He seems to be drawn especially to those whose checklists have dwindled into insignificance.

When it comes to Lenten practices, our checklists are important--- it's kind of a spiritual housecleaning: getting rid of the spiritual clutter, the distractions, the things that have crept into our lives to make us slouch spiritually.  Springtime is a time for clearing the winter debris and for planting new habits that refresh us.  (Not sure about giving up chocolate, but it's probably a good starting place, I guess.)  Personal discipline is not something most of us ever consider.  

But ultimately, the goal is our relationship with God.  Someone said last night: I don't sit down and pray every day, but I talk to God all day long.  Surely, Brother Lawrence teaches all of us about practicing the Presence of God as a path to relationship--- no worries there.   I talk to my husband, now that we are both retired, all day long too.  But I find that the 'Sit down conversations" (even if we are standing up) are the ones that nourish the relationship the most --- as opposed to "What do you want for dinner?" conversations.  It's the conversations that reveal to me what he's thinking on a deeper level that I enjoy: when he tells me about something he just read and how it touched him, for example.  It's the time we spend in the afternoon doing a puzzle together that enrich us, rather than the morning checklists.  

So, no, God is not keeping a list of our lenten practices, although they are undoubtedly good for us as human creatures.  But I think He is waiting to hear what's in our hearts and minds so He can tell us what's on His mind too!  A little time dedicated to sitting down with Him every day goes a long way! 

The Starting Point

Last week, we started a Lenten series on prayer in the parish, opening with the question: What is the greatest difficulty in prayer?  One of our discussion partners suggested that the answer is "finding a starting place."  Somehow, that answer resonated with me, and I wanted to think about it more, so I wrote it down.  What is our "starting place" in prayer?

The next morning, I came to my regular prayer time with that question.  For years, I've been using a daily prayer guide based on the readings and feast of the daily Mass.  I really don't have to think too much about my starting place as I grab a cup of tea, settle in and begin to read what is right in front of me.  Usually, there is something in the Blessed Among Us article, in the readings of the day, or in the reflection that gives me a jumping off place for my own prayer and reflection.  And that satisfies me.  But on this day, I wondered if my "prayer" was really connecting with God, or if I was just completing a routine that I had started years ago.  

I think it is a good routine for most of us, and I do think it "clears space for God" to meet us, as Bishop Barron says in his book on prayer:  God is like a helicopter pilot, hovering over our lives, waiting for us to clear a landing place for Him.  But like all routines, our prayer life probably needs to be refreshed at times to keep it fresh and meaningful.

It's funny how when you ask a question, and begin to think about the answer, usually, somehow, a new door in the universe begins to open.  And open it did!  First, a video found its way to my phone: 

Grok AI analyzes every prayer in the Bible.  What an eye-opener!  The video is about 45 minutes long, but worth every minute.  What AI discovered is that there is indeed a pattern to every prayer in the Bible, from beginning to end, from Old Testament to New Testament.  Eureka!  And guess what!  There is actually a starting place for every prayer in Scripture!  Who knew?  And the starting place is not reading someone else's prayers or reflections, wonderful as they may be!  

The Starting Place for prayer in the Bible is Acknowledgement of Who God Is, His character, His power, His relationship with his people, His faithfulness, His greatness, etc.  Even the short "Our Father" prayer given by Jesus begins with acknowledging the relationship:  Who is God to you?  (Father).  See Psalm 111 for a good example from the Old Testament.

Once I began to see to pattern, I realized why it took so many years of developing a relationship with the Jewish people before God sent the Messiah:  They had to know God before they could recognize Him in Jesus.  As in any relationship, to "know" God means that we have to spend time with Him -- in prayer, in nature, in reflection, in pondering our lives before Him.  Scripture says, Walk before me and be perfect (complete).   Enoch walked "with" God; Deborah "sat" with God; Abraham "stood" with God.  Our conversation with other people depends entirely on the experiences we have had with them. Little or no experience equals superficial and meaningless conversation, or "prayer."

Who is God to you?  Where has He been in your life?  If we answer those questions, and if our 'starting place' in prayer is to acknowledge Who He has been for us, I think we might at last begin to pray!

Soaking Up the Son

 I walked into adoration utterly depleted, shaking and almost unable to function.  I had just been to Walgreens to pick up a prescription and found myself disoriented and confused.  When I went to pay for my purchases, I fumbled around trying to extract my credit card and Walgreen's card.  "Take your time, Lady," said the clerk; "I get paid by the hour."  Embarrassed, I wanted to explain that I had just been through a traumatic and physically exhausting week.  No one ever tells you that at 83, it takes longer to recover from unusual stress and physical exertion; your body and mind go into something akin to post traumatic stress syndrome.

My daughter had had emergency surgery with complications in New Orleans.  (Ordinarily these days, I find that just driving into New Orleans through the "wild west" of 18 wheelers and pickup trucks in New Orleans East puts a great deal of stress on me.)  After two days of vomiting, she had been dehydrated but after tests, they decided she needed emergency surgery and as as result, refused to give her any liquid, even in an iv.  Unfortunately, the "emergency" surgery was delayed, delayed, and delayed once again as the surgeon was swamped with emergencies.  No one could tell us when my daughter's surgery would actually take place. For 24 hours, the report was "momenarily," so no liquids.  The more dehydrated she became, the more uncomfortable she was.  From about 6 pm through 8pm, she was on watch for immanent surgery --- and more and more thirsty after two days of vomiting.  In the ER observation room with her, I too was suffering knowing what she was going through.  After awhile, I began to identify with Mary watching Jesus on the cross -- although the comparison may be profane and inappropriate.  

Finally, they agreed to put my daughter in a regular room for the night so she could rest, and give her a re-hydration iv, plus jello until 11 pm, with surgery re-scheduled for the next day.  At 7 am, she was still thirsty as they wheeled her into surgery -- and then there were complications.  

During her 3 day hospital stay, I found myself back and forth between her house, where I had left the water running to prevent broken pipes; the parking garage, where I had to park distances away from the entrance; and an unusally long walking distance between the garage and the West Tower, the furtherest distance in the hospital.  With lung cancer, I found it difficult to walk carrying all the baggage one needs to spend time in the hospital.  After a week, I was physically and mentally exhausted.   By the time I returned to Mississippi after my daughter's recovery, I found it almost impossible to recover my strength and stamina.  

The next day, I debated whether I could actually get to my scheduled adoration hour.  My visit to Walgreens had not gone well at all, but I figured I needed time with Jesus more than anything else. As I sat before the Blessed Sacrament, I found that I was not able even to say the rosary, I was so mentally blank.  "How should I pray?" I asked. "I'm so tired."  

God rarely speaks to me, but this time He did:  not exactly words, but more clear impressions -- which I translated to words in my mind: 

Imagine yourself stretched out on a sandy beach, soaking up the sun.

Immediately, I understood my task;  Relax and soak up the Son.  With that image in mind, I almost fell asleep -- but not quite, as gradually phrases from Scripture began to float through my spirit and mind: 

God is our refuge and our strength, an ever-present help in distress.

God is close to the broken-hearted, and those bowed down in spirit He saves.

When the enemy comes in like a flood, the Spirit of the Lord will put him to flight.

By the time I left the chapel after an hour, I could feel strength coming back into my legs as well as into my body, mind, and soul.  I've always said that adoration is like a divine radiation treatment; from now on, I'll think of it as "Soaking up the Son."

The Third Person

 Recently, we had a visiting priest who told us that the previous day, he had said Mass for the local boys high school, and he had asked them to promise him something before he told them what it was.  Of course the boys were pretty hesitant about commiting themselves to an unknown request, but they did it reluctantly (if perhaps insincerely) when he insisted.

He asked them to pray every day for 3 people:  someone they liked; someone who seemed lonely or isolated; and someone they did not like.  I can only imagine that after the boys heard the request, at least some of them would not have minded agreeing to it at all.

And then the priest asked us to pray for 3 people from the parish daily -- he did not place the same specifications on the prayer, thank goodness.  Immediately, two people came to mind that I would pray for, and I figured Jesus would show me the third person before too long.  On my way out of church, I saw one of our parishioners who I had not seen in quite awhile --- and she looked as if she were suffering greatly.  She was waiting for Father to anoint her with oils and pray over her.  Several of us who knew her stopped to pray with her as she was anointed --- a usual practice if we know the person.  Immediately, I understood that this was my third person to pray for. (She has stage 4 kidney failure).

This morning, I awoke at 3 am -- a not unusual occurrance these days-- and I decided to pray the rosary for my 3 people.  I remembered one of the original two names I had chosen, and of course, I remembered the woman who had been anointed.  But I could not remember the third person -- one of the two original choices.  I prayed a decade for each of the two I recalled, but the name of the 3rd would not come to me. 

 In the ensuing mental search, I started remembering other people that needed prayer, or that I wanted to pray for:  first, one, and then another, and then one more, and then another.  I had ended the rosary, but the names kept coming to me.  I started laughing, thinking that God was using my poor recall to sneak in all these other people that I should be praying for.  To this moment, I still cannot remember the name of the third person I had decided to pray for.

But maybe that's how it's supposed to be.....who knows how the Holy Spirit gets the job done these days?

Small Epiphanies

 This weekend, we celebrate the Feast of the Epiphany in our church.   It seems to me that all of us, whether lowly shepherd or princely king, have epiphanies, or revelations, in our lives.  And it also seems to me that, when we do have an epiphany, the experience is not complete until we are able to tell someone what we have "seen and heard."  

For example, someone just told me that rice, normally a high-glycemic food, is no longer high-glycemic once refrigerated.  I didn't know that, and so, for years, I have been trying to choke down brown rice, a food I don't really enjoy, just because it is not as high in sugar as white rice.  I also learned that LSU agriculture has developed a low-glycemic white rice available for purchase.  Now, these are not earth-shattering epiphanies by any means, but knowing these facts help me to enjoy a food I have tended to avoid somewhat for years.  In my "joy" over this "epiphany," my first thought was to tell my sister, who has also avoided white rice for years.  I wanted to share "the good news" with someone else who, forgive me the analogy, was "suffering" in ignorance.

Epiphanies, no matter how small, always bring a measure of joy --- and our joy is not complete until it is shared.  When we experience profound beauty, or stillness, or goodness, we immediately want to say, "Do you see that?"  or "Look!"  One time, while visiting Sicily, my son took us "cross country," so to speak, to see a still-preserved Roman villa.  On the way back, I found myself so moved by the combination of the history and beauty of the country that I could not hold back the tears.  I wanted to share the experience with someone else; I wanted someone else to see and feel what I was seeing and feeling.  The people I was with had been living in Sicily for some time, so they had already been through their own epiphanies of history and beauty.

St. Therese once said, "Beauty opens my soul and makes room for God!"  Any kind of epiphany, small or large, has that effect on us.  And that is why the church is so important.  I don't mean "going to church," for that may or may not lead to epiphany; it might be just a social occasion.  What I mean by "the church" is called by St. Paul and St. John "fellowship," a word that carries more import than "friendship," although it certainly includes friendship.

It is when we can share our experience of truth, beauty, and goodness with at least one other person, and that other person reacts from the heart --- is touched for a moment with the same truth, beauty, or goodness --- that we experience fellowship with one another.  And our joy is then complete, when the other person sees and knows what has touched us so deeply!

One of the things I love the most about my husband is that he loves the church as much as I do, and, as a historian, he sees it from a different perspective than I do. He continually explores what is happening in the larger church from a historical perspective---something I am not inclined to do.  And I continually explore the truths of our faith from a spiritual perspective.  So on a daily basis almost, we are able to share our "epiphanies" with one another, both perspectives enriching our experience of our church.  

In the weekly bible study with a small group of friends, we explore our individual insights and inspirations with one another, constantly opening and enriching our experience and understanding of the Word of God.  No one of us, no matter how deep or profound our personal epiphanies, has the whole truth, the whole beauty, the whole goodness for which we are destined by God.  St. John says, We proclaim to you what we have seen and heard, so that you also may have fellowship with us. And our fellowship is with the Father, and with his Son, Jesus Christ.  We write this to make our joy complete (1 John 1).

If we want our own epiphanies and joy to be complete, it would help to find fellowship with at least one other person, as did the shepherds and the kings, who spread the word concerning what had been told them about this child, and all who heard it were amazed (had their own epiphanies ) at what the shepherds said to them (Luke 2).

Born of God

 I can think of nothing more beautiful and more powerful to read than the Prologue to the Gospel of John:  In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God....

It seems to me that anyone who takes the time to read these words slowly and reflectively would have to be moved by them. And those who are moved by them, again it seems to me, must respond to them:  

his own people did not accept him, but to those who did accept him, he gave power to become children of God, to those who believe in his name, who were born not of natural generation nor by human choice nor by a man's decision but of God.

....born of God,
born of truth, born of goodness, born of light, rejecting the darkness,
born of justice, of loving-kindness, born of mercy and gentleness to all......

I have a remarkable book on my shelf called Why Can't We Be Good? by Jacob Needleman, a professor of philosophy at San Francisco State University.  Needleman explores the question of why mankind (we) repeatedly violate our most cherished values and beliefs.  According to him, we know what is good, but we mysteriously fail to live by the ethical, moral,  and religious ideas that will guide us to authentic life. According to him, we are unable to be good!

Two thousand years after giving the Law to Moses on Mount Sinai, God sent His Son into the world for that very reason ---- we were (and are) unable to live by the Law!  The Son pitched His tent among us -- the literal meaning of the phrase He dwelt among us --- in order to give us the "power," the ability, to enter into divine life -- to be born of God and no longer of men.

ANd how will we know that we have been born of God?  St. John tells us in his first letter:  If we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from every sin.....Anyone who claims to be in the light but hates his brother is still in the darkness. Whoever loves his brother lives in the light, and there is nothing in him to make him stumble.

In The City of God, St. Augustine writes about the universal sin -- the lust to dominate.  This scourge seems to lie at the very heart of all mankind.  We can see it in two-year olds in nursery school and in every year thereafter:  I must have the toy you are playing with; I must be better than, smarter than, prettier than, funnier than..... I must be right; you must be wrong.  We never outgrow the lust to dominate.  

But when we are born of God, the Spirit of God in us begins to gently but surely move in us to change the lust to dominate into a passion to serve:  I am among you as one who serves.  I have said before that when we open the door to Jesus (Rev. 3:10) , He comes in and begins to re-arrange the furniture in our house.  He gives us the power to become like God!  Yes, it takes a lifetime, but He continues until the end to overcome in us the lust to dominate others.  He has pitched his tent among us! The question is whether we will allow Him to contine dwelling in us and among us.

Right Turn

It was an early morning trip to church, as usual.  I think I may have had a meeting.  When I got to the railroad tracks, my car seemed to have a mind of its own.  Instead of turning left, I turned right, for no apparant reason.  Maybe I was still half asleep.  Suddenly awake, wondering why I had done that, I decided that since I was now half way to the local gas station/pit stop, I'd go ahead and get a cup of coffee on my way to church.  

As I opened the door to the store, I was met by a very frightened and desperate young man, about 17 years old.  "Please," he said, "can you drive me somewhere?"   I hesitated, not sure of his character or motives.  Would I end up in a ditch somewhere?   More frantic, he said, "I have money.  I can pay you for gas money."   "That's not what I'm worried about," I said.  

I went to the cashier.  "Look at me.  Look at him.  If I end up in a ditch murdered, he did it."  

"Please," said the young man, desperately.  "He dropped me off to get something and he's coming back for me in a minute."  

With that, I hurried him into my car, and we took off at his direction.  He was guiding me into an area of Pass Christian that I was unfamiliar with, and I began once again to wonder about where I would end up.  But as we talked, I discovered that he was being trafficked, and that there was a warrant out for his arrest.  Now he was afraid that I would take him to the police station.  I reassured him:  "I'm not going to do that.  You've suffered enough already."

I found out that he wanted me to take me to a gas station owned by the father of an ex-girlfriend.  He was sure the man would take him in and keep him safe, despite the fact that the girl needed an abortion.  We talked about abortion, but he was not in a position at that moment to think about the right or wrong of abortion.  His own life was in danger.

Looking back now, I wish that I had thought to ask him one question:  What happened the moment before he met me at the door?  Had he desperately prayed to God for help?  Had he asked for a way out?  I'll never know if I was an answer to his prayer, or if God reached down before he could even think to ask.

At any rate, that's one right turn that turned out to be the right one!