I could not finish yesterday, and was not sure I should do this...I've prayed about it. I really don't have a clue how anything is going to turn out, but there are enough people who come to me with very odd comments about my writing. Curious comments. And really, this is part of a very long conversation I am having with God. So here goes...
Ash Wednesday was so wonderful. I probably visited 20 people and then was a lector at the morning service and a Extraordinary Minister in the evening. I listened to the problems and worries of so many people. And I offered God's comfort when and where I was able. The day ended in smallness though. I talked with others about things I felt did not matter, and it bothered me a great deal.
Thursday I willingly entered into my own hell. I'm not sure how this can help my ministry, but I know that if I am to be for God completely, I cannot allow any of my dark parts interfere with that work. I have to befriend all the little hells of my own life so that they do not trip me up when the bigger battles begin. And going into this cave...I did not want to go alone. I think of Luke in "The Empire Strike Back" when Yoda is training him. Luke must enter a cave all by himself and meet the darkness there.
And the worst part, I will not finish this work quickly.
Thought I might find a video to reflect my thoughts, and found a video of Dante's Inferno...and it made me laugh a bit. A 21st century interpretation of a 16th (??) century novel. Kind of cool. When I read the book, I had my own images in my head of what was intended. It was not so spectacular...but it relieved some of the pain I woke with this morning. And I think about how God reaches me through a video game movie...
I hate facing all of my truths, but I was suddenly deeply aware that I cannot take my hells into heaven with me and it would be better to work them out while I am still alive...and not in purgatory. At the end of the video, Dante says, "I did not die. And I did not live." I meet people everyday who continue to live in hell. By choice. People who are not really alive, but are clearly not dead. And I think I am giving them some water to relieve their parched throats...maybe I am...but the more complete I make myself, the more I have to offer them.
I am a priest. I can't deny it. And for those who are scandalized by that statement, I will clarify myself. I am a priest as I understand who and what priests are. I realized yesterday that I can never really escape that truth. And that truth condemns me to never having the full and complete life I know that, in another place and time, would be complete. I have no criticism of the Catholic Church. It is what it is. It has worked for centuries and I love it, even if I am 'estranged' from it in moments. I will work within its rules always, but I will also write and speak about my observations of what is in my heart. How I will live in this world, and how I will die in it, only God knows.
If God is love...and God is love...I have embraced the Divine. I am completely given over to it. I trust it. I live it. I sing it. I dance it. The work I must do now is embrace the humanity of Christ...which has been less than kind to me in my early years, where my formation of God was first conceived. I have the Divine. Now I must embrace the human.
I pretty much lost it yesterday when a priest friend of mine went to visit some children who have not always been so fortunate. By 'losing it,' I mean that I am always again surprised that someone out there actually gives a damn about the people most of us don't want to see. I see them because I was one of them, but I rarely see anyone reaching out to the poor who has not known poverty, giving love to those who haven't a clue what true love is. I often see priests...the ones with the collars...always in a place of status, rarely in a place of humility. I'm sure its true that many priests really are servants of God...I mean, not just standing before a congregation celebrating Mass...yes, that is a kind of servant...but the real servant washes the feet of his disciples...and I see priests do that once a year...and in ceremony. The real priest is the one who goes behind closed doors and holds a hand and weeps...
The words ended there yesterday. I realize a bit more now how and why I connect to priests. When the Mass is over and the lectures and the instructions...I am still enough...so as not to frighten them away...I hear the real story of the priest. Stories I cannot repeat here because they do not belong to me. But they are the real ministry of God. All the other, while important to the collective soul of the people, they are not the miracle. The miracle is in the middle of the night, or off in a small home that is not for a photo op...it is over a cup of coffee in a really messy house, or in a hospital room when you take a hand over to the bed of a dying woman and say, "Go ahead, touch her. Tell her what she needs to know."
The priest becomes truly holy when he/she can say, "It's not about me. It's about God."
Love, Cindy
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