Broken Glass

I haven't written here in nearly a month. For me, that means I have been involved in some kind of active ministry. It also means that I have been involved in other writing assignments. Things are well enough. The second full moon of the year arrived Sunday. It's been 60 days since I "changed" my life and not a minute of it has been dull. I suppose I thought some part of me would grow calmer by now, but new challenges arrive daily. Some of them, I meet with joy. Other ones, I would prefer to run and hide from. But I can report that I count it all as good.
Writing out a kind of Augustine confession earlier this year was mildly traumatic. But it has been done and processed. The good part is that I pretty much feel certain chains have been removed from my soul. I know I have been of greater service to others as these chains were unbound. The only problem with that is that it exposes other chains. Sigh.

I choose the word "chains" because last Friday night, while trying to enter a Catholic Church I had never been to before, I hit and broke a chain to a parking lot that I was not supposed to enter. I did not see the chain across the drive. I only heard it...as it scraped across my car, cracked my windshield and finally broke from the stress and the chain laid helplessly on the church driveway.

I was surprised that I did not get angry about it. I just sighed. Didn't see it. It happened. Could be worse.

I've decided to not get my windshield fixed until some time during Holy Week. The windshield is cracked and scraped. Long lines run across the glass. I look at them and think about the scourging of Jesus as I tried to watch the movie, "The Passion of Christ." I still can't get myself through it.

I look at my windshield and I think about Jesus. No, I can't fix the windshield yet. "By His stripes we are healed."

I need to remember that as I walk into my own truth. The Examen and the Spiritual Exercises of Ignatius are difficult and dangerous. To really see ourselves as we are is humiliating. To know ourselves is hard, to face our truth seems impossible, but by His stripes, we can look, we can know ourselves and then live in the reality that He has redeemed us. And receiving that whole gift eventually brings on a bliss of heavenly proportion. Jesus loves me. Jesus loves EVEN me. Jesus loves me ANYWAY. Wow.

Back to the chain: Then there's the idea that I couldn't see the chain. I turned and it was there. Trying to keep me out of the church. Or maybe trying to keep me from going in the front door. Or maybe not really wanting me there at all. Or telling me I was doing things wrong. I made a wrong turn and was wounded. That happens often enough in my life. Only I wasn't wounded, it was my car. I didn't feel a thing.

Maybe Jesus feels it. When I make a wrong turn, I'm not just hurting me, I am hurting him, too. All over again. I've got to look more carefully at the road. I have to keep paying attention. Even when it is dark and I am tired and in a place I don't know. Especially when it is dark and I am tired and I am in a place that I do not know.

Yet, even in the unknown, dark places, He shields me. He takes the brunt of the attack. He guards. Even when I make a wrong turn.
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For two hours on Sunday, I "held" the hand of a dying woman, mother of eight, who carried the load for the family. I was allowed to stay as the priest administered "Last Rites." I have never witnessed Last Rites. I had long conversations with daughter, son-in-law, and son. These are sacred moments, the thin lines between living and dying. They are tender moments, these births and deaths. Sacred moments. All moments are sacred moments, but these live in exclamation.

Such exclamations have happened quite often in the last 60 days. Or I am noticing them more. I feel as if I am living a truly holy life. Not that I am a holy person or anything like that, but I have become deeply aware of the holiness of being alive. The sacred permeates everything I see, everything I do, everything I touch. Nothing feels the same as it did a year ago. And I pray to God that He continually pulls me forward into Him. I don't ever want to go back to who I was, but I celebrate who I was because it has given to me a Divine Now.

I can't even begin to describe the levels of humility I have started to enter. Seems quite odd to be writing about them at all. Seems to be a contraction to the action of humility. But there have been what feels like a thousand little deaths in the last 60 days. Of course, there were little deaths of which I am aware that began at least a year ago, but these deaths...are like the peeling off of very tender, very old skins. Ones I once needed to survive but now are obsolete. Little truths that are actually quite big truths...that turn out, when exposed to the light, are really lies.

Have I confused you enough today? Well, I'm not ready to say more...but you could pray for an editor for me. My grammar seems to have fallen considerably. But I need to publish this as is right now.

Seek Him and you will find Him. He's waiting. And He has NEVER stopped loving you!

Love,
Cindy