Finding Hope in Our Mistakes

Comedian Sam Levenson offers this advice, which is especially worth pondering at the end of the year: “You must learn from the mistakes of others. You can’t possibly live long enough to make all of them yourself.”

Typically at year’s end many of us pause to review our accomplishments, perhaps for an annual Christmas newsletter. However, it might also be a good practice to look back at the mistakes we made in the past year. Why? Acknowledging our mistakes keeps us grounded and humble. It gives us a chance to be grateful for the patience shown to us by God and by our family, friends, community members, and colleagues. It allows us to forgive ourselves and move into the new year with a lighter heart and the intention to be more considerate and generous in our daily interactions.

So what’s your year-end roundup of mistakes? Did you insist on your own way at times, to the detriment of your relationships? Did you injure yourself because you insisted on playing a sport or doing a chore that you no longer have the strength for? Did you step on another person’s feelings, disappoint someone who was counting on you, buy too much food and let it go to waste, or indulge in gossip and criticism?

James Joyce said, “Mistakes are the portal of discovery.” Through our mistakes, we learn who we want to be and how to live a good life. Thus our goal shouldn’t be to eliminate all mistakes from our lives but to learn from them.

One of the vows that Benedictines take is to practice conversatio morum, or fidelity to the monastic way of life, which means being continually open to transformation. This practice is illustrated by a story in which someone asked a Benedictine monk, “What do monks do all day?” He responded, “We fall and we get up, we fall and we get up, we fall and we get up.”

The writer Neil Gaiman captured the spirit of conversatio morum when he said, “I hope that in this year to come, you make mistakes. Because if you are making mistakes, then you are making new things, trying new things, learning, living, pushing yourself, changing yourself, changing your world. You're doing things you've never done before, and more importantly, you're doing something.”

Blessings as you cross the threshold of 2023, and may your openness to change in yourself, your loved ones, and the world bring you vitality and peace of heart.

Venturing Through Open Doors

I recently came across a prayer for the new year by Debbie McDaniel that included these lines: “We ask that you open doors needing to be opened and close the ones needing to be shut tight. We ask that you help us release our grip on the things to which you’ve said ‘no,’ ‘not yet,’ or ‘wait.’”

Sister Wendy Beckett understood this prayer well. She spent many years as a teacher while longing for the contemplative life. Eventually she was able to live as a hermit, only to have God open an unusual door for her late in her life as the host of a BBC television series about art called Sister Wendy’s Odyssey. This experience gave Sister Wendy the following insight: “We will never find Him completely if we only want to engage with Him on the level we have chosen.”

The beginning of a new year is a good time to ask for the grace to venture through unexpected doors that open for us and stop rattling the handles of doors that are closed. If we want to meet God only on our own terms, we will cut ourselves off from the richness of the divine imagination that would infuse our lives with wonder, vitality, and sacred purpose. As Rainer Maria Rilke said, “And now let us welcome the year that is given to us, new, untouched, full of things that have never been.”

 

Cultivating Holiness Through Our Work

The mystic Meister Eckhart said, “Do not think that saintliness comes from occupation; it depends rather on what one is. The kind of work we do does not make us holy, but we may make it holy.”

I pondered this insight as it relates to Mary of Nazareth. Mary tends to be revered because of her occupation, so to speak: the mother of God. However, it is not this position in and of itself that makes her holy. Rather, it was her openness to listen, to trust God, and to act on the invitation extended by the Angel Gabriel that made her holy. Furthermore, once she made her decision, she accepted the responsibility and the consequences of her choice without grumbling or trying to renege.

Mary must have been an extraordinary mother, for we can surmise that she nurtured her son’s remarkable compassion for the poor and ailing, modeled the life of prayer that he adopted, and taught him to believe that God would fulfill God’s promises, even in the face of death. She could have brought up her son to be proud, selfish, entitled, and arrogant; instead, she made her work of mothering holy by drawing on her own humility, deep faith, and radical trust.

Just as with Mary, our work does not confer holiness on us, but we make it holy by the care and attentiveness with which we do it. I’ve known as many holy dental hygienists, certified nursing assistants, and preschool teachers as holy physicians, college professors, and chief executive officers. During the Advent and Christmas season, may holy Mary inspire us to attend to our vocation, whatever it is, with care, commitment, and the knowledge that God is always with us.

Cultivating Intergenerational Kindness

Benedictine monasteries have always practiced intergenerational living. In his Rule, St. Benedict states clearly, “The younger monks, then, must respect their seniors, and the seniors must love their juniors…. Whenever brothers meet, the junior asks his senior for a blessing. When an older monk comes by, the younger rises and offers him a seat… In this way, they do what the words of Scripture say: They should each try to be the first to show respect to the other (Rom 12:10).”

Many young people today don’t grow up around their grandparents, so they miss out on having nurturing relationships with their elders. For Ruby Chitsey, this was remedied when her mom suggested that she volunteer at her workplace, a nursing home. As Ruby developed relationships with the residents, she noticed that they didn’t have money to spend on things like haircuts, new shoes, or small treats, such as a favorite type of candy or a new novel. Ruby decided to remedy that, and her efforts mushroomed into the charitable organization “Three Wishes for Ruby’s Residents.” Since 2019 Ruby has raised more than $400,000 for her cause and has granted wishes for 25,000 nursing home seniors.

Ruby’s work was highlighted on the CNN’s 2022 Heroes Special, where she said something that caught my attention: “My hobby is kindness.” Most of us think of a hobby as a way to relieve stress or to express our creative instincts. However, as Ruby has shown, hobbies that entail outreach to others can help us practice kindness until it becomes a way of life.

As any Benedictine can attest, intergenerational living provides a fertile ground for practicing kindness, and we should foster these relationships in our society. As the writer Henry James noted, “Three things in human life are important. The first is to be kind. The second is to be kind. And the third is to be kind.”

Advent Emptiness

Advent calls us to have an empty head and an empty heart.

If that sounds rather foolish and bleak, consider the following advice by Bruce Lee: “Empty your cup so it may be filled.”

If our heads are full of what we think God is supposed to look like and act like, we risk missing the Messiah in our midst. Even John the Baptist had his doubts about whether Jesus was “the One who is to come”; he apparently expected a more triumphant, king-like figure, along the lines of King David. Yet if we acknowledge that God is uncontainable, should we be surprised at his choice to be born of a young Jewish maiden from the backwater of Nazareth and to spend his time healing and teaching rather than smiting others and residing in a castle?

If our hearts are full of our own dreams and desires, we risk missing the invitation to bring Christ to birth through service to others who need us in unexpected ways. Mary of Nazareth had questions about how she, a virgin, could conceive and bear God’s son, but she entrusted her heart to her God and became the mother of Jesus, God with us.

Let us put on the mind and heart of Advent—open, receptive, and empty of preconceived notions about God’s intentions and how our lives should unfold. Then our head and our heart will be prepared to recognize and receive God in ways beyond our imagining. 

Approaching Advent with the Heart of a Child

Spending time with a toddler is a great way to begin Advent, as I discovered during a Thanksgiving visit with my 13-month-old great-nephew, Robin.

• I had to wait in anticipation for him and his parents to arrive              

• I learned to be vigilant to keep small items and breakables out of his grasp

• I observed the art of welcoming as he gave a hug to every teddy bear in sight

• I awakened to the wonder of exploring the world as he delighted in everything he encountered

• I remembered how to be still as he rested in his mother’s arms

I was also grateful that Robin’s parents said yes to bringing him into the world, echoing Mary’s yes when she was invited to give birth to Jesus. We all are offered various opportunities to be open to new life, and even though it often leads to a certain degree of disruption, inconvenience, and self-sacrifice, saying yes leads to a richer and more satisfying life.

May you approach this Advent with the heart of a child as we prepare to celebrate the birth of Jesus, who never lost the capacity to welcome others, to be awake to God’s presence in the world, and to rest in the stillness of prayer.

The Bridge of Gratitude

When I talked to my younger brother the other day, he said his young step-grandchildren had never been taught why we celebrate Thanksgiving. I suggested that before his family begins their holiday meal, he might ask everyone around the table to name something they are thankful for.

Developing “an attitude of gratitude” is an important step in cultivating contentment, which is one of the keys to the good life. Abraham Lincoln noted that “Most people are about as happy as they make up their minds to be,” and recognizing our blessings instead of yearning for what we don’t have sets us on the road to happiness.

Furthermore, the Thanksgiving holiday is a bridge to Advent, because gratitude is an important way that we “make straight the way of the Lord.” As Joan Chittister explains, “Christmas is the obligation to see that everything leads us directly to God, to realize that there is no one, nothing on earth that is not the way to God for me. …The moment we begin to really celebrate Christmas, to look at everyone and everything as a revelation of God, to say ‘thank you’ for them … racism would be over, war would be no more, world hunger would disappear, everything would be gift, everyone would be sacred.”

This Thanksgiving, let’s set our Advent intention to make straight the way of the Lord by being thankful — even for dry turkey, family members whose political viewpoints differ from ours, and challenging travel conditions. Everything leads directly to Emmanuel, God with us, and so we can trust the words that the mystic Julian of Norwich heard Jesus say in a vision: “All shall be well, all shall be well, and all manner of thing shall be well.”

The One Thing Necessary

The impressionist painter Claude Monet said, “Everyone discusses my art and pretends to understand, as if it were necessary to understand, when it is simply necessary to love.” I can easily imagine God voicing a variation of this sentiment: “Everyone discusses the nature of my being and pretends to understand, as if it were necessary to understand, when it is simply necessary to love.”

Many Christological and Trinitarian treatises, books, and homilies have been written through the centuries. However, Richard Rohr, OFM, says that we come to know God by loving God. St. Gertrude the Great, whose Feast we celebrate today, demonstrated the truth of that insight. St. Gertrude is usually depicted holding a heart because of her mystical connection to the heart of Jesus, which is a clear and vivid image of Christ who became flesh out of love for us.

While some of the saints leave us with an impression of a rather severe, joyless life, Gertrude saw herself as “happy, carefree, and liberated.” Her wholehearted devotion to God allowed her to empty herself to make possible the Spirit’s in-dwelling, which gave her an inner freedom to overcome fear and worries and unconditionally follow her convictions.

We might not have mystical visions as St. Gertrude did, but we can follow her example of emptying ourselves of all that keeps us from God so we can love God wholeheartedly and without fear. Then we too will bear great fruit and, as it says of the wholehearted in Psalm 37, God will watch over our lives and give us an inheritance that lasts forever—an inheritance in the life and love of the Trinity.

Gifts of Strength and Love

November 11 is the Feast of St. Martin of Tours, a 4th-century monk who was close to the heart of St. Benedict. Martin became a catechumen at age 15, to the displeasure of his father, a Roman officer, who compelled him to join the army. A legend about St. Martin says that during his time of military service, he encountered an ill-clad beggar and cut his cloak in two, giving half to the poor man. That night, Martin had a dream in which he saw Jesus wearing the half-cloak the had given to the beggar. Not long thereafter, Martin was baptized and sought to live as a monk.

St. Benedict thought so highly of St. Martin that when Benedict destroyed the old temple of the god Apollo at Montecassino, he built a shrine dedicated to St. Martin at this site. St. Benedict says in his Rule that we are to welcome all guests as Christ, and it is plausible to think that the legend of St. Martin’s generosity to the beggar and his subsequent dream of seeing Jesus wearing his cloak inspired this teaching of St. Benedict. St. Martin’s act also echoes Jesus’ proclamation “I was naked and you clothed me … whatever you did for one of these least brothers of mine, you did for me” (Mt 25: 36, 40).

Psalm 62 notes that “Time and time again God said, ‘Strength and love are mine to give.’” St. Martin’s strength in turning aside from a secure, socially acceptable career and his compassion in responding to another’s need were gifts from God. These gifts are offered to all of us; what is unique about St. Martin is his choice to put God’s strength and love to use in the service of others.

I could easily give away half of the clothing I own to others who are less fortunate and still have plenty to wear. The story about St. Martin’s generosity invites all of us to consider whether we are using the blessings God has given us to serve our brothers and sisters with strength and love.

Saintly Vision

Halloween is over, and I’m missing it. Not so much because of the candy (there’s still plenty of that to be found) or the costumes (dressing up isn’t the only way to be creative and playful). No, what I miss is the spirit of inclusiveness and kindness that abounds on Halloween. As Steve Garnass-Holmes says, “Halloween is a day when we get it right. Strangers come to us, beautiful, ugly, odd, or scary, and we accept them all without question, compliment them, treat them kindly, and give them good things. Why don’t we live like that?”

The day after Halloween, the Feast of All Saints, is set apart to honor the people who have lived like that. Not all of them have officially been designated saints; an example is Dorothy Day, who opened houses of hospitality to provide places where the beautiful, ugly, odd, and scary would be welcomed and treated kindly. She never wanted to be called a saint anyway, because she knew that we don’t think we can do the things the saints have done. Yet as many thousands of people who have staffed Catholic Worker houses can attest, one doesn’t have to be canonized to make a pot of soup, clean bathrooms, sort through donations of clothing, or listen to a homeless person’s story.

Where the saints excel is in developing the vision to see Christ in others and treat them kindly not just on Halloween but on every day of the year. Every time October 31 rolls around, we are given the collective opportunity to practice hospitality and generosity. There’s nothing that says we have to wait a whole year to do it again.

The Best Day of Our Life

Painting by Sergi Cadenas

Today I saw a fascinating 19-second video of a dual-image portrait by Sergi Cadenas (you can view it at this link: https://twitter.com/i/status/1585263283602325504). At first the painting appears to be the face of a young girl, about 14 or 15 years old; her skin is smooth, her lips plump, her eyes innocent. However, as you change your vantage point, the painting changes in appearance; the face is lined with wrinkles, the lips have thinned, the eyes are rheumy. Suddenly you are looking at the face of an old woman! Cadenas achieves this effect by painting an image on each side of vertical strips, which allows him to include two completely different images in one piece. 

Watching a person age before your eyes within 19 seconds is a graphic representation of St. Benedict’s advice to “keep death daily before you.” For most of our lives, death seems far off, when actually we carry it within us; every minute, 300 million cells die in our body. Ironically, the death of these cells make life possible as new cells are formed to take the place of the ones that are worn out.

One thing I noticed about the Cadenas painting is that the images of both the young girl and the old woman are beautiful — the promise of youth and the wisdom of old age. Ralph Waldo Emerson said, “Write it on your heart that every day is the best day in the year,” but we can expand that notion. In one way or another, every day is the best day not just in the year but in our lives, full of wondrous things that will never be again.

Keeping death daily before us can help us live each day as if it is the best day of our life. Then, when the time comes to take our final breath, we can place a lifetime of well-lived days into God’s hands in gratitude for loving us into being.

A Life of Holy Curiosity and Good Cheer

Me and Sr. Seraphine

For the past three years I had the privilege of being the companion of Sr. Seraphine Tucker, who resided in the Dooley Center care facility at Mount St. Scholastica until her death on October 15, 2022. My role was to visit with her on a regular basis, help her send Christmas cards to her family, accompany her to community gatherings, and the like. In return, I got to learn firsthand how to live a good Benedictine life from one of the wisdom figures of the monastery.

I took an immediate liking to Sr. Seraphine because she reminded me of my dad and his siblings — plain spoken, tough as hickory, hardworking, faith filled, practical, and grateful for life’s blessings. Looking after her three younger brothers on the farm where she was raised made Sr. Seraphine an instinctual caregiver, and she set many an elementary and high school student on the right path during her years as a science and math teacher. She embodied the Benedictine value of stability (having celebrated her 75th anniversary of monastic profession in 2021) and was a faithful seeker of God, whom she found in the Eucharist, in other people, and in creation.

Two characteristics of Sr. Seraphine that I found particularly remarkable were her curiosity and ever-present cheerfulness. Albert Einstein counseled, “Never lose a holy curiosity,” and until the end of her days, Sr. Seraphine maintained her holy curiosity about the natural world, mechanics, and most importantly, other people. Her interest in the lives and thoughts of others was what led her to be so hospitable to guests.

Sr. Seraphine had few needs, and more than any other monastic I’ve known, she hewed to St. Benedict’s instruction to never grumble. Rather, she was habitually cheerful, and why not? She trusted implicitly in God’s care and providence.

Although I will miss Sr. Seraphine very much, I’m delighted that she has been reunited with her family and monastic sisters who preceded her in death. I don’t know that she’ll join the angel choir, but surely heaven’s maintenance department can use someone interested in the workings of the universe, and she’d make a mighty fine guardian angel as well. In addition, her holy curiosity and cheerfulness will continue to guide all of us who remember her with affection and gratitude.

Learning to Be Part of a Community

I’ve been sick with a cold for the past few days and have been hibernating so I don’t infect others in the community. Thanks to a cousin who gave me a subscription to Apple TV, I’ve been able to watch the TV show Ted Lasso on my laptop during my period of isolation.

Ted is a coach with a unique perspective; he believes his primary job is not to win ball games but to help young men build on their strengths, understand their weaknesses, and become the best person they can be. One member of his team is a hotshot, Jamie, whose father insists that he be the star of the team. Ted, on the other hand, is trying to teach Jamie to be a team player and pass the ball to others, sharing both the glory and the pressure to score.

Jamie needs to learn the Benedictine value of being part of a community. I myself was reminded of a benefit of community life this morning by Sr. Irene Nowell. I saw her in the hallway and told her I tried to go to morning prayer but had to leave because of my cold symptoms, and she said, “Well, that’s why the rest of us are here.” When you live in a Benedictine community, others pray when you cannot, and you pray when others cannot. Life in community is both humbling (when I can’t be there, life goes on) and reassuring (when I can’t be there, life goes on). It’s also comforting to be checked on several times a day by multiple people who invariably say, “Let me know if you need anything,” reflecting another Benedictine value: the primacy of care of the sick.

Illness, although not pleasant, is one of our teachers. This time, what it taught me is that it’s okay to rest. The community has my back and can carry the ball for a while.

The Goal of Humble People

Recently, The New York Times featured an article by Peter Coy entitled, “Humility Is a Virtue. But Can Humble People Succeed in the Modern World?”

Coy is asking the wrong question. By “succeed in the modern world,” he means building wealth in a capitalist system. However, the goal of humble people is not to become wealthy but to serve others and love greatly, as Jesus did.

Sometimes, humble people do make a lot of money. For example, Yvon Chouinard, the founder of the company Patagonia, became a billionaire by selling outdoor apparel. However, his goal was not to become a successful businessman but to help save the environment. Recently, he and his family gave the entire company away to a nonprofit organization that will use the money to combat climate change and protect undeveloped land around the world. In Chouinard’s hands, money was a tool to protect God’s creation and provide a livable earth for future generations rather than a status symbol or a means to live extravagantly.

Cultivating humility is a tricky thing. Meister Eckhart said, “My work is to free myself of myself so God can be born in me.” Metropolitan Anthony of Sourozh acknowledged the difficulty of such a task in his response to the question of how to achieve humility: “Humility is too exalted a goal, but perhaps you could aim for the halfway house of gratitude.” We will know we are the road to humility not by the markers of success in the modern world but by our level of gratitude for unearned gifts that God showers on us every day.

Invitation to Equanimity

We are entering into the season of autumn, one of the quarterly challenges to our human desire to be in control. As much as we may favor one particular time of year, we cannot keep the seasons from changing. Whether we prefer the heat of summer, the crispness of autumn, the snow of winter, or the greening of spring, we have to wait for our favorite season to cycle around.

This summer I watched the documentary The Green Planet featuring David Attenborough. The series gave me a great appreciation for plants, which do not resist change but adapt to it in marvelous ways. Whether they encounter light, dark, moisture, drought, wind, or predators, they react to outside conditions and their own inner nature by sprouting, growing, reproducing, diminishing, and dying in due measure.

If we pay attention to the vegetation of the green planet that is our home, it will teach us equanimity and the ability to sit with what is. In quietness and contemplation, we come to learn that instead of trying to change what is, we can use our own inner resources to adapt to our conditions. That might mean adjusting our hours for sleep and work according to the seasons, as St. Benedict outlined in his Rule, or using our technological advances to work from home when snowstorms or pandemics hit.

Nature has the power to humble us. However, when we relinquish or desire for dominion over the natural world, it is freeing to realize that we can be partners with soil, water, plants, and animals to nurture life and affirm God’s proclamation about creation: It is good.

Delight and Sorrow

In reading about the lives of medieval female saints, it appears that a great many of them experienced dismal arranged marriages. The wealthy ones attempted to distract themselves with frivolous diversions of society life, but the emptiness of their lives changed only when they had an encounter with God and responded to the love they experienced by serving others.

This is the story of St. Catherine of Genoa, who served the sick at a local hospital, even during an outbreak of plague. As Robert Ellsberg notes in Give Us This Day, “As she grew in love, she grew in her capacity for happiness.” Catherine herself said, “In God is my being, my me, my strength, my beatitude, my good, and my delight.”

Along with the delight of love comes sorrow, as we acknowledge on the Memorial of Our Lady of Sorrows. Mary, the mother of Jesus, expressed delight in God’s goodness in her Magnificat prayer when she greeted her cousin Elizabeth. However, her deep love of her son led her to profound sorrow as she watched him suffer and die. And so it is for all of us.

As Kahlil Gibran observed, “The selfsame well from which your laughter rises was oftentimes filled with your tears. And how else can it be? The deeper that sorrow carves into your being, the more joy you can contain.” Cynthia Bourgeault notes that sorrow “…at the same time call[s] forth some of the most exquisite dimensions of love ... qualities such as steadfastness, tenderness, commitment, forbearance, fidelity, and forgiveness.” Thus, as Rainer Maria Rilke said, “Why would you want to exclude from your life any uneasiness, any pain, any depression, since you don’t know what work they are accomplishing within you?”

Delight and sorrow are companions on our life journey. Despite the sorrow she experienced, Mary’s prophecy was fulfilled: all generations call her blessed. She teaches us that the sorrow that accompanies love will bear fruit because love always begets more love.

Love Languages

I recently learned about the concept of “Love Languages,” developed by pastor Gary Chapman 30 years ago. As noted in The New York Times, Chapman “…proposed that the ways people prefer to have love communicated to them fall into five categories, or ‘languages’: acts of service, words of affirmation, quality time, receiving gifts and physical touch.”

Understanding love languages can help Christians express God’s love more effectively. Different people may be more likely to see God’s love reflected in helpful acts, through words of encouragement, in companionship, through gift giving, or in hugs, for example.

Jesus, the supreme messenger of God’s love, was fluent in all the love languages. He constantly served others through his acts of healing; he affirmed those who were humble and generous; he spent a lot of time teaching the crowds and eating with his disciples; he gave food to the hungry; and he used physical touch in his healing (taking Jairus’ daughter by the hand and rubbing mud on the eyes of a blind man, for example).

We, too, can become fluent in the five love languages when we listen to others and observe their reactions when we offer service, verbal affirmation, companionship, gifts, and physical touch. It’s easy to tell when someone is delighted with a gift, touched by our assistance, brightened by our affirmation, appreciative of our companionship, or warmed by a hug. This is how we learn to speak this person’s preferred love language.

Jesus said that the greatest commandments are to love God with all our heart, mind, and soul and to love our neighbor as ourselves. He didn’t offer many specifics about how to do this, however. Love languages give us a basic framework for how to most effectively extend God’s love to others. 

Finding God On the Wild Edges

We often talk about being centered in God. However, as Christine Valters Paintner notes, “The holy one is at the very center of all things, but also waiting for you on the wild edges.”

Many of us would probably say that our lives are devoid of wild edges. Yet if we consider the things we avoid in life, we will probably discover that wild edges are all around us. What would it feel like to volunteer at a homeless shelter, a prison, or a nursing home and converse with some of the residents there? Is God waiting for us in those places? Might God be lurking in the art supplies that sit in our closet or in the piano that is gathering dust in the corner? Is God waiting to be noticed in a person you need to be reconciled with?

Being centered is terrific, but when we stay forever in that safe, comfortable place, we are excluding a world of possibilities of encounter with God. I once heard someone say “One of my favorite places to be is in suspense!” When we remember that God is present not just at the center of all things but everywhere, we can live in a state of delightful suspense about where our next encounter with God will take place … and if the Spirit has anything to say about the matter, that encounter is likely to occur on the wild edges of our lives.

Skinny Definitions of God

I recently began the Souljourners spiritual direction training program at Sophia Center, and during our residency week in July, instructor Lucy Abbott Tucker spoke about the need to avoid “skinny definitions” of God.

A “skinny” definition of God is one that places limits on the way God acts, thinks, and loves. We are envisioning a skinny God when we believe God won’t forgive us or others for something we have done, when we assume that God prefers Christians to Muslims, Jews, or Hindus, or when we believe God listens to only certain types of prayers.

According to the prophet Isaiah, God rejects our skinny definitions: “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways my ways,” says the Lord. “For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts” (Is 55:8-9). Paul echoes this wisdom in his letter to the Romans, “Who has known the mind of the Lord, or who has been his counselor?” (Rom 11:34).

When we recognize that God is not skinny but boundless, we give up trying to predict what God thinks or wants and accept that God is mysterious. Giving up our skinny definitions of God is satisfying because it means we are no longer placing limitations on our relationship with God. Now we have the pleasure of being surprised by God, and we transition from thinking about God to actually encountering God.

Humans love trying to figure out mysteries, but God is beyond our comprehension. The best we can do is set aside our efforts to define and understand and instead be open to God who is with us in a myriad of surprising ways.

A Living Prayer

Eunice Schriver, who was born into a family that included a president (John F. Kennedy) and two senators (Robert and Edward Kennedy), made her mark on the world not in the halls of power but in championing the value and dignity of the powerless. She did this by establishing the Special Olympics for persons with physical and mental disabilities.

In scripture, we often hear that God lifts up the lowly, rescues the weak and afflicted, and treats all people with compassion. Eunice partnered with God in this work, which led her family to say after her death that she was “a living prayer, a living advocate, a living center of power.”

St. Paul, in his first letter to the Thessalonians, says that we should “pray without ceasing” (1 Thess 5:17). Perhaps the way to do this is to become “a living prayer” — that is, seeking to share in God’s life of love and compassion. We are each called to implement God’s vision in different ways, according to our gifts and passions and often prompted by people we encounter in life, as Eunice was influenced by her sister, Rosemary, who had mental disabilities.

We have many examples of how to be a living prayer — Jesus, the saints, and the innumerable people among us who shine with the determination to live fully and bring joy and justice to the world. Whether the prayer we embody consists of consistent acts of kindness and welcome or the establishment of a worldwide justice movement, let us live in such a way that people will say of us after we die, “She/He was a living prayer.”

Live Gently

Jewish theologian and peace activist Abraham Joshua Heschel, who lived to be 65, said, “When I was young I used to admire intelligent people; as I grow older, I admire kind people.” Heschel had good reason to admire kind people, as two colleagues helped him escape from Poland six weeks before the country was invaded by Germany. Heschel’s mother and three of his sisters were killed by the Nazis. In his later years, inspired by the teachings of the Hebrew prophets, Heschel worked for African Americans' civil rights and spoke out against the Vietnam War.

Mattie Stepanek

Heschel would have found a kindred spirit in Mattie Stepanek, who was born 18 years after Heschel died. Stepanek did not have the luxury of gaining wisdom that comes with age, as he died of a rare form of muscular dystrophy when he was age 14. In his short lifetime, Stepanek too was a peace activist; he called everyone to be “a peace seeker, a peace maker, a peace bringer.” He also was a proponent of kindness, saying, “Think gently, speak gently, live gently.”

In a polarized world, living gently is a gift to ourselves and to others. When we think and speak gently, we are able to avoid the shame of treating others unkindly and contributing to a culture of violence through our speech and actions. Living gently helps us foster an attitude of reverence toward all of God’s creation that generates healing and peace.

We can reinforce our intention to live gently with a simple blessing ritual. After dipping a finger in water, hold it to your forehead and say, “May I think gently.” Touch your lips and say, “May I speak gently.” Touch the area over your heart and say, “May I live gently.” When performed regularly, this brief ritual can help us integrate our desire to be a person of peace by checking us when unkind thoughts, words, or impulses arise in us.

We do not know how long we will have to be bringers of peace in our world. Mattie Stepanek showed us that even in a brief span of years, our efforts to live gently can bear fruit and echo long after we die and enter more fully into the peace of our loving God.

The Bloodline of God

As we approach the Solemnity of the Body and Blood of Christ, I find myself thinking of an observation by Kaitlin B. Curtice: “The bloodline of God is connected to everything.” At Pentecost, we are accustomed to marveling at how God’s breath animates all of creation, but have we ever considered that all things are connected through God’s blood as well?

According to Wikipedia, “Blood is a body fluid in the circulatory system of humans and other vertebrates that delivers necessary substances such as nutrients and oxygen to the cells and transports metabolic waste products away from those same cells.” In sharing God’s spiritual bloodline with us, Christ provides us with nourishment (grace, love, belonging) and a way to divest ourselves of the things that don’t serve us (for example, pride, fear, and greed).

We are connected to all people in the recognition that blood is life and that to spill another person’s blood is a grave crime (“Thou shalt not kill”). At the Last Supper, when Jesus took a cup, gave thanks and gave it to his disciples, saying, “Drink from it, all of you, for this is my blood of the covenant” (Mt 26:27-28) he was giving them — and all of us — a share in the life of God who loves us unto death. Through this bloodline of God, we are connected to all others in the Body of Christ, which leads us to reverence and gratitude. We honor the new covenant Jesus extended to us when we recognize that we are connected to each other through the bloodline of God and consequently treat each other as sisters and brothers.

Practicing Resurrection

Unlike most people, I have had the chance to practice rising from the dead.

The part of my vow profession ritual that friends found most powerful was not when the community and I made promises to each other, when I read my vows and signed them on the altar, when I sang the Suscipe (song of surrender), or when I received my ring as a sign of my commitment. Rather, what everyone remarks on was when I lay prostrate in front of the altar and was covered by a funeral pall as community members prayed for me. The pall was then lifted and I symbolically left behind my former self and rose to new life in Christ.

In his letter to the Romans, Paul says, “Now if we have died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with Him” (Rom 6:8). Notice that Paul doesn’t say “After we have died with Christ”; he is talking not about the death of the body but about surrendering our desires, preferences, and prejudices so we can put on the mind of Christ, which means to know we are beloved of God and to extend that love to everyone without exception. Then we too may “walk in the newness of life” (Rom 6:4).

After my profession, I still find myself struggling to love others who, in my judgment, are not worthy of the generosity God shows them. When we attempt to die to self we don’t stop being human; as Catherine (Cackie) Upchurch says, “The human experience is a doorway to God’s truth.” In my encounters with others, I continually have the opportunity to experience God’s truth of love, inclusion, and patience. And now that I have ritually practiced rising from the dead, I know it is something I am called to continue to practice daily, albeit without the altar, the pall, and the prostration.

In Prayers for a Planetary Pilgrim, Edward Hays offers this prayer on Thursday mornings in the season of spring: “May my rising [from sleep] be my rehearsal for my resurrection from the dead.” Every morning upon awakening, we all have the chance to lay aside our old self and put on the mind of Christ. May God bless our daily rising to new life.

Learning to Be Astonished

I have seasonal affective disorder. It hits most people in the winter, but for me, I am smitten in spring, when my desire to spend all my time outdoors with the flowers in the garden affects my ability to get my work done. The answer to this problem is clear. I need to redefine what my work is, as Mary Oliver does in her poem, Messenger: “My work is to love the world.” She goes on to say, “Let me keep my mind on what matters, / which is my work, / which is mostly standing still and learning to be / astonished.”

Something I saw recently that astonished me was a macroscopic photo of the face of an ant. It has what appears to be small horns and needle-like teeth and pores in its skin and whiskers, of all things. I never would have known with what care God fashioned an ant’s face if someone hadn’t looked at it closely and shared it. It is easy for us to be swept up in God’s grandeur in mountains, storms, and ocean swells, but God is just as present to us in diminutive things — seeds and grains of pollen and ant’s faces.

It is perhaps the most important item on our daily “To Do” list — to stand still and learn to be astonished — because it generates reverence and peace, which is a great need in our world today. So don’t worry if you have seasonal affective disorder; it may turn out to be one of the greatest blessings of your life!

The Legacy of Our Acts of Trust

Many things had to happen for me to make my perpetual profession as a Benedictine sister — some reaching back all the way to 1863! In that year the prior at St. Benedict’s Abbey, Augustine Wirth, decided that a school was needed for the rapidly growing town of Atchison. One hundred families formed a society and pledged to pay 50 cents per month to pay for the new building. My great-great-grandfather, Lambert Halling, an immigrant from Frankfort, Germany, who worked as a carpenter for the Abbey, started swinging his hammer, and seven Benedictine sisters from St. Cloud, Minnesota, agreed to move to Kansas to staff the school. Lambert met the sisters at the Ferry on the evening of November 11, 1863, escorted them to their new convent and school, and stood guard until morning to protect them from harm. Thus the community of Mount St. Scholastica was established — the place where, 159 years later, I have found a home for my vocation.

Prior Augustine, the townspeople of Atchison, my great-great-grandfather, and the sisters from St. Cloud had no idea if their efforts in this frontier town during the Civil War would be successful, but they saw a need and came together to act on it. We can take inspiration from their story to do the same thing in our own time. Not many of us can build a school out of our own resources or meet any of the other pressing needs of our society alone. However, when we are united in the Body of Christ, we have the power to improve the lives of others, and our efforts come back to us as a blessing,

My great-great-grandfather cannot have known that in 159 years, his great-great-granddaughter would take vows in the community of sisters he helped to house and protect. None of us can foresee the effects of our actions, but as American Civil Rights leader Ralph Abernathy said, ““I don’t know what the future may hold, but I know who holds the future.” When we act on behalf of others and leave the outcome in God’s hands, we can be at peace, a peace the world cannot give. 

Yielding to Our Vocation

Sister Joan Chittister says that for anyone with a vocation, whether it is to be a nurse, musician, car mechanic, or monastic, “…there is a deep down, simmering fascination in the subject at hand. Or to put it another way, our vocations are already in us.”

I can attest to that; I have had a “deep down, simmering fascination” with God since I was a child. It took a long time for me to surrender to it, however. Monastic life is no longer a common vocation, and being countercultural is not an easy path. The world is not geared for those who crave silence, solitude, a simple life, and a primary relationship with God. Eventually I saw the value of “seeking my tribe” in the monastery. Some people expressed surprise at how readily I adapted to monastic life, but as one with a contemplative temperament, I have found it much easier to deal with expectations in the monastery than expectations in the secular world.

I’ll be making my perpetual profession of the Benedictine vows of stability, fidelity to the monastic way of life, and obedience on May 15. A few days ago, someone asked me if I was getting cold feet, and although I certainly appreciate the ramifications of making this lifelong commitment, I am ready to make these vows. For me, perpetual profession is an acknowledgment and affirmation of my vocation and a vehicle for me to be fully myself.

It's always a cause for delight when a person accepts and gives expression to her vocation, no matter the subject of her deep down, simmering fascination. I am grateful for the whole-hearted support of so many family members, friends, and colleagues who will be celebrating with me.

Knowing God By Heart

In the April 2022 issue of Give Us This Day, I was struck by this description of Sr. Margaret Brennan, IHM, by one of the novices she directed: “She knew God by heart.”

How many things do we know by heart? Perhaps the way to get home, or our mom’s recipe for chocolate chip cookies, or the lyrics to a favorite song. But God — how do we go about knowing God by heart?

First, we need to differentiate knowing God through our mind versus through our heart. The mind wants to understand God — who God is, what God does, what God wants. The heart, on the other hand, wants to experience God, to be with God, as Jesus did when he went apart from others to pray.

Knowing God by heart necessarily requires spending a lot of time with God. To learn a song by heart, we sing it over and over; to learn a recipe by heart, we make it time and time again; to know the way home by heart, we follow the same path until it is ingrained in us. We can never know the depths of anyone we love, much less God, but that isn’t necessary to know someone by heart. What is necessary is to be present and listen, day after day, week after week, year after year. When we do that with God, people will also say of us after we die, “She knew God by heart.”

Borrowing the Eyes of God

Most of us view “mysticism” as a mysterious quality that doesn’t pertain to us. We believe it’s a type of insight that is exclusive to saints, who seem to have a particularly intimate relationship with God. German theologian Dorothee Soelle provides a different perspective: she believes that mysticism is not a new vision of God, “but a different relationship to the world — one that has borrowed the eyes of God.”

How would our relationship to the world be different if we saw it through God’s eyes? According to the book of Genesis, God looked at everything God created and said, “It is good.” We can take that to mean that for God, everything has value and contributes to the wholeness of creation. Unlike us, God does not look at weeds and mosquitos and proclaim them “bad.” People tend to have an “anthropocentric” view that considers humans to be the most important thing in the universe, so we judge everything from the perspective of its benefit to us. God has a broader vision of a world in which everything is part of the body of Christ and thus should be valued and reverenced.

If we borrowed the eyes of God, we also would be astonished to view everything through the lens of compassion and mercy. Jesus wasn’t kidding when he said we should forgive others “70 x 7” times, because in doing so, we are imitating God’s way of forgiving. This doesn’t mean that our behavior doesn’t have consequences; as Joan Chittister has said, “Sin punishes sin; self-centeredness destroys itself; God doesn’t punish sin.” We are the agents of our own punishment through our choices. God sees the goodness that is our birthright and pities us when we cut ourselves off from the source of life. Because of God’s unfailing love, we can always trust in God’s mercy.

When we embrace mysticism and start developing a relationship to the world though God’s perspective, we are relieved of the burden of judgment, which is a great gift. We become more attuned to beauty, to wonder, to possibility. This is not an outlook that is confined to saints — it is available to each of us when we make a conscious effort to see with the eyes of God!

The Sacrament of Astonishment

In the acknowledgments to One Long River of Song, a collection of essays by Brian Doyle that was published after his death, his wife said, “I believe Brian had already been to heaven and back and found it irresistible not to return and restore astonishment, which is a sacrament.”

After his resurrection, Jesus appeared to his disciples before he had ascended to his Father, but he too offered them the sacrament of astonishment. The one who was dead is alive! Death is not what it seems! Nothing can keep us from the love of God! And Jesus did not appear only once, which might lead the disciples to wonder if they had been dreaming. No, as Elisabeth Johnson says in a reflection on the Working Preacher website,

“What is more, he keeps showing up. As he came back a week later for Thomas, Jesus keeps coming back week after week among his gathered disciples — in the word, the water, the bread, and the wine — not wanting any to miss out on the life and peace he gives.”

The sacrament of astonishment — that is, being present to the wonders and love of God that surround us — prevents us from missing out on the life and peace Christ brings. We cannot allow the routine, frustrations, and busyness of daily life to keep us from following the instructions for living a life, as articulated by Mary Oliver in her poem Sometimes: “Pay attention. Be astonished. Tell about it.”

The last of those instructions is important: Tell about it. That is the commission Christ gave us: “As the Father has sent me, so I send you.” Brian Doyle called attention to the wonders of life through his beautifully written essays. We may choose to do so through art, music, poetry, gardening, teaching, prayer, or a myriad of other ways.

Perhaps the simplest way to practice the sacrament of astonishment is to live a life filled with gratitude. You will be astonished to see the difference it makes to walk through your day with “thank you” on your lips. And what better way to tell others about Christ’s gifts of life and peace that are so desperately needed in our world?

No One Is Meant to Suffer Alone

In her spiritual classic The Way of the Cross, Caryll Houselander says that one thing we can learn from Jesus’ passion is that “no one is meant to suffer alone.” Those who helped Jesus bear his suffering included Mary of Bethany, who anointed Jesus’ feet with costly perfume in anticipation of his death; Simon of Cyrene, who carried Jesus’ cross during part of his march to Golgotha; and the disciple John, who at the foot of the cross agreed to take Jesus’ mother into his care.

Others failed to accompany Jesus in his suffering. As Houselander notes, “He asked the three apostles … for sympathy in the garden of Gethsemane. He did not ask them to do anything to avert his suffering, but only to be with him in it, to share it with him through compassion: ‘Could you not watch one hour with me?’”

We, who are called to see Christ in each other, also are asked to be with Christ in his suffering. As Matthew says so eloquently in his gospel (25: 31-45), when we feed the hungry, give water to the thirsty, welcome the stranger, clothe the naked, care for the ill, and visit those in prison, Christ says, “You did it for me.”

To be with those who are suffering when we can offer them nothing but our presence is especially difficult. We all encounter among our family, friends, and communities those who are facing death, have chronic, debilitating physical or mental illness, or are grieving a loss. We feel helpless because we can’t avert their suffering; all we can do is sit with them and listen. And yet, that is all Christ asks of us — to remember that no one is meant to suffer alone.

On Good Friday, we are called to watch and wait at the foot of the cross. On Holy Saturday, we are called to watch and wait at the tomb. If we are faithful in our presence in dark times, we will also be graced to witness the new life that always emerges through our communion with Christ.

Imperfect Timing

Most of us experience with some regularity what we would call “imperfect timing.” I’m in the midst of an episode right now: As soon as I started a week as acolyte (reader of prayers) at morning and evening prayer at the Mount, I came down with a sore throat/cold that impairs my ability to speak.

When it comes to a cold, “this too shall pass,” but other examples of imperfect timing can change a person’s life direction: an unexpected pregnancy, the need to care for an aging parent, or the loss of a job, for example.

In his poem The Guest House, the Persian poet Rumi says that the occasions we view as imperfect timing may be “violently sweeping your house empty of its furniture,” thus “clearing you out for some new delight.” Typically, we aren’t able to appreciate the value of imperfect timing in the moment. It is only in hindsight that we see how a cold may be signaling the need for more rest, an unplanned pregnancy may bring joy to our family, caring for an aging parent may strengthen this vital relationship, and the loss of a job may lead us to our true vocation.

If we believe that “the Divine Presence is everywhere,” as St. Benedict says in his Rule, we know our Consoler is always at hand to help us adjust to difficult circumstances and that love will keep flowing through our lives — perhaps not in the way we envisioned or desired, but bringing its own wisdom and delight.

From our human point of view, the timing of events in our lives is often imperfect. When we choose to dwell with God in the realm of possibility, we stop judging timing as good or bad and trust that what unfolds will lead to love in some shape or form, no matter how unexpected.