So, sometime in the last few days, I got 5000 hits on this little blog...not counting my own...most of the reasons I started this particular blog are completed now, if completion is a proper term. The wounded birds and healed and have flown away. I did what I set out to do. At least for the moment.
I have to keep writing, that is certain...but perhaps now is the time to do it with better care...instead of a Markan gospel style, it is time to work on a a Luke or a Matthew style...although neither of those style speak to me right now. I no longer need to try to prove to the Catholic Church that women can be priests. Should be priests. Whatever. So the Matthew argument style of 'natural progression of the Jewish faith' is pointless in a group with so much power that has decided women have no role in the clergy. The Lukan argument that everyone is included no longer works, either. It's been shut down with the heavy hand of Tradition. I understand it. As a Catholic, I support it. I will live it. But I cannot, in good conscience agree with the arguments presented. They will have to come up with a better one before I can definitively say that "the Catholic Church is right" on this issue.
But, with all my struggles, I realize it just doesn't matter anymore. I will no longer lament that which could have been done by and within the Church, and was not. I will instead focus my energies on what the Church can do as it is. And it can do a lot.
These gender issues, these sexual abuse issues, the slapping down of the women religious...they get in the way of a complete evangelization of the world...but perhaps that is how it is supposed to be. Perhaps, like Babel, we aren't supposed to all be in agreement...that dissent is necessary in order that we never consider ourselves gods...
I had a discussion with someone recently. I said that death was a gift and this person disagreed. I was kind of shocked by the response. Perhaps because I have been abandoned by nearly EVERYONE who has entered my life...I live in great appreciation for the NOW. I have learned, the hard way, that everyone leaves eventually...things, people, places. You can choose to be sad about that...but like in Job 38...I can't help but think of God saying to us who are sad now: "You know, I didn't have to give that beautiful thing, or person, to you at all...but I did...and now you whine because it's gone? What about the gift? Does that mean nothing? Can't you see that if you keep EVERYTHING that comes your way, there is no room in your life for something new...or perhaps better?"
Henri Nouwen wrote well about this idea in his book, "Gracias!" About learning how to know and live that everything is a gift...including death.
How dull it would be to live forever. At least in this place, where people misused and abused each other, are forever greedy and self-centered...and just generally dissatisfied with what comes their way. I think joy arrives inside us because we recognize how finite we are, how very mortal...and there is a little child comfort is remembering that we are more than flesh and blood...and that our souls are immortal. What we feed them here, what we teach them here...we take with us into the next place...and that is heaven (where all is love) or hell (where all is hunger and want)...
This time is precious...and we have to love each other now...and forgive each other now. A line from an Angel episode (spin off of Buffy the Vampire Slayer): Darla tells Angelus, after he has killed his family (killed his father for not loving him and then the rest of his family as collateral damage...and to prove the label of evil his father had given him), Darla says, "Who we were informs who we are now. Your little victory (meaning Angel's) lasts but a moment. Your father's disapproval of you will last an eternity." Imagine an eternity of unforgiveness. That is the real hell.
So, without the collar, I ask you to love each other better. Not because of what you can get...today...or tomorrow...but because loving is the only thing that matters in this world. Because the poor will always be with us, as will hate and meanness and injustice and violence. Someone will die before I finish writing this passage. Someone will die with a hand of love in theirs...and someone will die alone. No one should die alone.
So suck it up, remember everything you have is a gift from God. Be grateful. Reach out, not looking for what someone might give you...but give away that which you have been given...His love. The more you give...you will find the more you get.
And the more you die...the more you live. There's a bird singing outside my window...I get to hear it today...and when I am gone...a bird will still be singing...I find comfort in that. The world goes on, with or without me. But you must love one another. You must love.
Because He loved you first.
Love, Cindy
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