From about a week ago, the bold is today.
At Sunday Mass two weeks ago, Fr Kelly said something important in his homily that explained the Gospel of John to me in a new way. I love the Gospel of John more than any other book in the Bible. I love the metaphor and the theology...where time is irrelevant and God is the light of the world.
But Fr Kelly made an observation, in the ways in which Jesus spoke His words...Jesus kept repeating the same idea over and over, in several ways...
Fr Kelly said that no doubt the disciples were in shock when they were told what was going to happen next. That perhaps, in the reception of bad news, they remained in disbelief. If Jesus was really God, then what is this business about suffering and dying? No God suffers and dies. It made no sense.
How can I have cancer? I never smoked.
Why was she killed by a drunk driver? She was so very good.
What do you really mean, "never walk again?"
Are you sure?
Bad news is not easy to hear. Sometimes we need a helper. That's why they call a chaplain into the room as the doctor tells a family bad news. Someone there to listen, someone to get the facts straight...just in case.
I did it just today. Facing my own demons, I was given a task to do. All I could feel was hurt inside. I knew that if I opened the door again to my past, it wasn't done...and would never be done...but I had to open it so that its secrets would not control the choices I needed to make now.
But I could not remember what she told me. I had to call her and ask again. And this time I wrote it down. Each time I see her, she says, "Well, are you coming back?"
She knows it hurts to heal. She reminds me each time I visit that I have a choice. I don't have to do this work anymore. Yet I come back. Back into the cave where the the rules of the games don't work. Where the difference between truth and illusion are exposed. Where it hurts like hell...mostly because the other pain...the pain of illusion...has just grown so comfortable because it has been around to very long. We get used to bad food, bad health, bad behaviors, bad movies...because we let them into our lives...and they become familiar. Then we forget what good really looks like and feels like...and happiness...these days bought with a pill, when in earlier days, was bought in the realization of gentleness and kindness given and received.
He told us what was good. What would make us happy. What would make the world a better place...we just forgot...we forgot to remember. And now we are sad and disillusioned and we don't understand why.
So many changes during this year. Some friends have grown closer and some have fallen away. Hopes for a good job were dashed. Health issues improved somewhat...truths have been told, some in cruelty and others in kindness...but each day I look assess what has been given and what has been taken away...and I learn to say "thank you" to God for both.
I have been betrayed, lied to, injured, disappointed, violated, marginalized and dismissed...
I have also been cherished, loved, appreciated, received and encouraged...
It is just the way things are. In the extremes of the good and the bad, it is easy to forget what He told me. That I needed to stay connected, that I needed to listen for His voice, remain in His light and celebrate His presence.
Because when He leaves, I will feel abandoned...there's no getting around it. And He tells me
Do it anyway. Love them. All of them. Now. While you can. And love yourself.
Love, Cindy
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