Open our eyes to see your hand at work in the world about us.
—from the mass, Rite II C, Book of Common Prayer
You know the saying: Be careful what you ask for... This sentence from the concluding prayer before communion struck me this morning. In so many ways the request has been granted, time and time again, but the knowledge, the eyes-wide-openness of my understanding has felt very uncomfortable. I've kept it under wraps much of the time.
People look at you funny if you talk about seeing angels in the subway... real angels, not just the metaphorical nice people doing nice deeds. Yet I have seen them. Some roll their eyes if you comment that there are no accidents, or look back on a string of unconnected, supposedly random events and see a divine pattern.
This is one of several reasons I stumbled onto (and into) the convent. I can make outlandish statements about God's will or universal truths and some will actually nod in agreement. Sisters who see it differently do not argue, because one thing we agree upon is that each sister's path to God is her own. Nobody else can decide (or judge) if it's naive, immature, deep or shallow. I do not have to justify to anyone here that I believe in God, that I believe in divine intervention, or that I believe my purpose has been destined from before birth.
I have friends who think my wanting to be a nun is madness, or a lark, or an easy way to get out of the worry of retirement income. Some have witnessed the succession of career shifts, geographical relocations, or my constant search for the perfect life partner. That I can see a holy pattern in all of that is beside the point to them.
No... it is the point.
There's a real dark side to being flavor of the month. (I've experienced it more than once.) Look at how God treats His "chosen people" in the Old Testament. One minute they're chosen, the next a rebellious and stiff-necked generation. You can't ever believe your own press. Good to keep in mind.
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Thoughts for Today:
You can no more win a war than you can win an earthquake. ~Jeannette Rankin
They are not all saints who use holy water. ~English Proverb
We teach children how to measure, how to weigh. We fail to teach them how to revere, how to sense wonder and awe. ~Rabbi Abraham Heschel
The Gospel of Jesus is not a victory dance for well-to-do Americans who want it all, including eternal life. ~Tom Ehrich
God is nothing like us, but we are God's creatures, and the divine fingerprints are all over our experience. ~Barbara Crafton
Religion is a journey into the mystery of God. It is not a system of beliefs and creeds and when it becomes that, it always becomes idolatrous and begins to die. ~John Shelby Spong
America can be great again, not by asserting military might, but by standing for something more than big cars, big houses, big-screen TVs and big walls along the Rio Grande. ~Tom Ehrich
They are not all saints who use holy water. ~English Proverb
We teach children how to measure, how to weigh. We fail to teach them how to revere, how to sense wonder and awe. ~Rabbi Abraham Heschel
The Gospel of Jesus is not a victory dance for well-to-do Americans who want it all, including eternal life. ~Tom Ehrich
God is nothing like us, but we are God's creatures, and the divine fingerprints are all over our experience. ~Barbara Crafton
Religion is a journey into the mystery of God. It is not a system of beliefs and creeds and when it becomes that, it always becomes idolatrous and begins to die. ~John Shelby Spong
America can be great again, not by asserting military might, but by standing for something more than big cars, big houses, big-screen TVs and big walls along the Rio Grande. ~Tom Ehrich
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2 comments:
It's so odd that you said that - that some people think you are running FROM something instead of TO something because I wondered that at the very beginning of getting to know you but then almost immediately had an overwhelming urge that no, she's going where she's supposed to be going. And now...here you are.
Maybe wanting to be a nun IS a form of madness - holy madness, a Rumi sort of madness. But, I'm absolutely positive that it wouldn't be a lark or be easy.
My friends, family, and acquaintences all pretty much think that no one could seriously entertain the idea of becoming a nun. But, if you're led there it'd be a loss (to everyone) to resist...
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