03/27/2006

If you spend all of your energies waiting for that perfect moment that will "make" your life, you will have missed the point entirely.

When I get that big break....

When I hit the lotto.....

If I can just scrape enough money together......

If only he/she could see the real me......

When I get to pitch this project to him/her, I know in my bones that it'll all connect.......

Life is not waiting, life is living.

Love is not just around the corner, Love is here, now, vibrantly present.

Grace is not stored/waiting, it saturates existence.

Each involuntary spasm of the diaphragm that draws breath into my body is a miracle.

Every vagrant thought that flashes into and out of existence in that ephemeral concept of mind/soul/self is inconceivable, yet present nonetheless in spite of it's absurdity.

To wait for "the" moment, is to miss "the moment".

Live unabashedly in the now, on the way to whatever tomorrow your life's tale points you toward.

Be an ear to hear. Be eyes to be looked into. Be present to those who need you this very moment.

03/14/2006

Pray even when you're uninspired.

I catch myself doing it....

Waiting for the right moment to pray.

That's like saying to a friend "Not now, the moment's not right" when they come up to you with a smile on their face and a thought on their tongue.

You can get away with that once in a while (friends will understand) but if the stars have to be in alignment in order for you to say "word one" to them, they will quickly stop referring to themselves as your friend.

Prayer is relationship building.

Be brave. Allow the messy, disheveled you that is already apparent to you, be the honest you present (and presented) in prayer, ever acceptable to the Father who wishes you nothing if not well.

Push the myriad failures of the day to the side. Let them whisper to themselves "unworthy", "Hyppocrite!", "Is he kidding?" as you remind yourself of the everpresent quality of God and are given, once again, the grace to pray. Pay them no mind.

Remember the communion of Saints. We are surrounded by those who know perfect peace, perfect joy. They are "rooting" for us as we slog through the day to day. They are there to talk to, they are not simply fond remembrances of the past.

03/13/2006

Happy Birthday mom


The harder you try, the harder the going gets.

So get going.

The myths say that the cyclops lived a life of desperate resignation, because with their one eye, they could see the exact circumstances of their own death. The day, the time, the method, the circumstance.

We can tend to a cyclopian vision of the life we live. Today is all. Yesterday is gone. Tomorrow is ephemeral.

Don't tell me that Heaven and Hell, God and the Devil, good and evil are merely delusions dreamed up by an accidental convergence of meat and mentality, in order to assuage it's fear of the awareness of it's own eventual demise. There's more involved than that.

Temptation is not an accidental reality.

Lent is a journey.

Not all such trips are made on endless flat roads.

Lent is a reacquaintance with the dips and rumble strips and steep inclines of our lives.
We've trained ourselves to ignore, avoid, absolve ourselves of these deviations from the straight, uninvolved path.

The road to hell is paved with good intentions.

So I start my lenten journey on the road to hell.

I intend to fast.
I intend to abstain.
I intend to be introspective and learn from my errors.
I intend to be at peace with my fellow travelers.
I intend to pray more.
I intend to hold my tongue when anger rises.
I intend to be a better father.
I intend to feed my soul, to pay attention to that poor neglected, emaciated thing.
I intend to be the saint, not the sinner.

Free will has nothing to do with smooth sailing.

Free will is the ability to choose to do the right thing.

It is also the ability to choose to do the wrong thing, or worse, to fall into the habits of sinful behavior.

Ash Wednesday is like the day that a 20-plus-year smoker takes the pack out of her pocket and throws it away.

The rest is a breeze, right?

Not Quite.

I believe in God, therefore I believe in the Devil.
God is love and wants what is best for us.
The devil wants us to Forget that both God and He exist.


I intend to fast. (Little dizzy today at lunchtime, better just grab a little something)
I intend to abstain (Beef stew sounds good......After the last spoonful: "What day's today? Friday! Oh well....)
I intend to be introspective and learn from my errors (I don't have the time right now. Too much going on. Maybe later)
I intend to be at peace with my fellow travelers (Unless that fat broad in front of me on the subway knocks that d*mn purse of her's into my newspaper one more time.....)
I intend to pray more (as schedules permit)
I intend to hold my tongue when anger rises (Who exactly do you think you are kidding?)
I intend to be a better father (When the kid messes up, I still end up coming down on him like a ton of bricks. Nice changeup!)
I intend to feed my soul, to pay attention to that poor neglected, emaciated thing.


You get the idea.......

The intentions are great in a Platonic sense.

Their inherent goodness is in the execution, the doing, the work of striving for perfection.

03/03/2006

A Pure heart create for me, O God, put a steadfast spirit within me. Psalm 51

Medical emergency on the A this morning.
Bounced from the A to the B (or D) at 125th.
Local stops all the way down to 34th street.

I'm trying to at least get through Morning Prayer from the breviary every day. In my seasonal reading I hear over and over again about trying to carve out a "quiet space" where my focus can be on God, His presence in everything that I experience.

Then the doors open at the next stop, and another 60 people push onto the already crowded car. Nobody seems to be getting off. Swell.

No quiet here. No lingering scent of incense (how I miss incense!). No echoing stone walls. No cultural touchpoints to whisper in my ear "This is a sacred space."

But, this IS a sacred space.

It is filled (to the brim) with people who are intensely loved.
An entire train full of them are waiting because ONE of them is in need of assistance.
The cacophany which is a train filled with individual souls is music like no hymn could every aspire to be. It is creation in motion.

That thought sinks in and I let it color my reading of the psalms this morning.

Psalm 51 is an entreaty. With the psalmist I acknowledge that I sin, and ask forgiveness. I cannot and should not hide from God's unobstructed view of who I am. He loves the messy me and constantly encourages me to "clean up" my act. I look around me. How many times have I made rash decisions, judgements about the people I come into contact with? Maybe those strict frames of reference that I carry around in my head could use some review.

And then, the day rushes forward and sweeps away this quiet moment in the midst of a crowd.

But the memory of it is a shiny something that catches my eye on the beach. I stoop, pick it up, and put it in my pocket to take out and remember another day.

03/02/2006

Med appointment early this morning for the boy.
Not overly concerned, but concerned.
A reminder that there are no guarantees, except for the love of the father.

The love of the father.

I sit in the waiting room and I worry in spite of of my exterior calm.

I look at the small, innocent children who are here. A stroller with an infant. Her two young Orthodox parents both dressed in black; conversing in whisperous breaths. A little girl in pigtails wanders through the brightly coloured rooms. Her eyes bright. Her complexion a little sallow. My son is in a room "back there" somewhere conversing with a stranger, looking for answers to replace the question mark that hangs over our heads. The Orthodox couple is called back there.

I"m reminded that this life is imperfect.

Any control that we assume we have over circumstance is illusion.

Everything is Grace.

Everything is Gift.

When we think that God has abandoned us at any moment of our life, we have failed only in discernment.

When I fail to see God in the everyday and in everyone, it is not because I have been blinded.

I have purposefully closed my eyes.

At the beginning of the day, at the beginning of the liturgy of the hours, we recite "Lord, open my lips and my mouth shall proclaim your praise."

I have a tongue to speak through grace.

With that gift I ask for another; Lord, open my eyes.

Ash Wednesday 03/01/2006

7:30 Mass
Missed the Liturgy of the Word.
Shower went a little too long this morning.
The big old church is a warm memory springing into vivid life.
The ashes are distributed.
Communion is received.
A blessing is asked and given. (A gratuitous unconditionally loving God, ours)
The day, and the season are well begun.

Lent
A penitential season.
A tool for remembrance.
Quiet, sacred spaces carved out of the busy flow of our lives.
Moments to reflect (a modern luxury)

Opportunities to manifest the community.
We're all here again. The reassuring cycles of the church season have come full turn and greet us once again.
Friends embrace, and chat and share a smile.
You're never in it alone.

"Remember that thou art dust, and to dust thou shalt return"

Remember that this gift of life is transient.
Take the time to reacquaint yourself with your center, the indwelling spirit of the living God.

Remember to take the time to pray.
Prayer is a relationship that you choose to build.

Remember that it's not all about me.

Remember who it is that you are called to be. A light. A witness. A window through which grace can shine.

Seek out quiet. It's only there that one can truly hear.

Listen.

Walk with me.