Tag Archives: prayer

Here and Now with Mary & Martha

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MaryMarthaI am back from my visit with our sisters and associates in the United Kingdom. It was a wonderful trip and always so good to be with our community in the various regions where we minister.

Transatlantic travel means I woke up very early this morning. By nature I am not a morning person, although these days I am becoming more so. I am coming to appreciate the quiet of the morning. For one thing it is a good time for prayer.

In the little booklet I use for prayer and reflection, today there was a reflection by Henri Nouwen:

Somehow we don’t fully trust that our God is a God of the present and speaks to us where we are. “This is the day the Lord has made.” When the people of Nineveh heard Jonah speak, they turned back to God. Can we listen to the word that God speaks to us today and do the same? This is a very simple but crucial message: Don’t wait for tomorrow to change your heart. This is the favorable time!

I came back to New Jersey yesterday with a very long running to do list in my mind. It was great to be with our UK community for a few weeks, to sit at the feet of wisdom women and experience the movement of God in their lives and ministry. But my practical side is anxious to get busy about many things.

How fitting then that today we have the Gospel of Mary and Martha, one sitting at the feet of Jesus, the other anxious and busy about many things. If sit in the quiet of the morning and listen to the word that God speaks to me today, I realize it is good to be here, it is good to be in the present moment. It is good to sit and be present to my sisters. It is also good to be about the work I have been called to do for the community. God is here, now, with me. God is with us, always, if we but pay attention!

And so this morning I pray in gratitude for the Mary moments of the past few weeks, even as I get ready to face my to do list and channel Martha for a bit. I also hold the promise of many Mary moments with our Sisters and Associates in our two US regions. I am feeling very blessed for the opportunity to soak in the presence of such amazing faith filled people. Fairly often these days, I give thanks to God who broke through all my resistance to religious life a decade ago and led me to this community of peace. I am all the better for it, and have come to know and love and serve God in a whole new way in the process.

God is good.

Peace.

Praying our sorrows

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Today the church celebrates the feast of Our Lady of Sorrows.

Mary who stood at the foot of the cross, looking on as the son she bore and cradled, the young boy she searched desperately for when he was lost, the young man she called to ministry at the wedding in Cana, as this God/man who was also her child died a violent death in and for love … She knows love. She knows sorrow.

It is good to pray with Mary, to bring the sorrows of our lives and the sorrows of our world to her. She who know love. She who knows sorrow.

And sorrows abound. Who is not moved by the wave upon wave of desperate people fleeing violence and war, entire families seeking safety on foot just as the Holy Family did 2,000+ years ago. Indeed, Mary knows.

Who is not moved by the sorrows of embedded structural racism, ever increasing income inequality, exploitation, violence and oppression?

There is so much sorrow, it can be overwhelming. Yet Mary knows. Mary prays. Mary is with us.

My own mother had a very special relationship with Mary. It was a quiet and personal relationship, but I know my mother drew strength from her.

And so today, touching the sorrows of our wounded world, I pray on this feast day with Mary as one who know sorrow, as one who knows love.

Pray for us woman of hope, holy mother, queen of peace.

Seeking peace in this modern world

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Margaret Anna Cusack, known in religion as Mother Francis Clare, founded the Sisters of St Joseph of Peace to promote peace in family life, in the church, and in society.  I often pray with what Bishop Bagshawe, who supported the new community, said at the profession of the first Sisters in 1884:

“To secure this divine peace for ourselves and procure its blessings for others in the midst of the sin, turmoil, and restless anxiety of this modern world is the object of your institute.”

No small task, this mission of peace that Jesus speaks of in the Gospels.

And 131 years later, what would Bagshawe make of the sin, turmoil, and restless anxiety of our early 21st century. In some ways we are more familiar, too familiar with it, brought into our lives as it is each day through television screens and Facebook feeds. We look, we see, we are moved … And then what? To what end?

Fourteen years ago many of us woke up to sheer terror on our television screens, watching planes crash into towers of glass and steel, knowing that human beings were inside them.

Fourteen years ago in response to terror, we launched our wars on terror. Wars beget wars. Suffering builds on suffering. And our sisters and brothers in Iraq and Afghanistan and now Syria are caught in the mess, striving to live lives of laughter and love in peace.

Fourteen years ago today I became a peace activist, reorienting my personal life and mission. It is good to be reminded of that as I go into this day. How can I be a peaceful presence with those I meet today? Where are my opportunities to influence policies and practices that promote peace? How am I called to conversion in my own heart, my own way of being in this world?

In the midst of sin, turmoil and restless anxiety, I am called to hold fast to the vision and mission of peace, in the company of other people of peace. I have to believe that even that makes a difference.

Finding God (I AM) where I am

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Last week I had a tremendous opportunity to join 800 or so other women who are in elected leadership of their religious congregations at the Leadership Conference of Women Religious assembly. It was an amazing experience on so many levels, but if I had to share just one take away, it is this line from the keynote by Sister Janet Mock, CSJ: 

“Notice that God does not say I WAS nor I WILL BE. God is I AM. What a profound consolation that is for us today, in these times. I AM here, I AM with you. I AM light. I AM within Mercy, Charity, Providence. I AM Divine Compassion. I AM in the many faces of Mary, Joseph and Jesus; of Benedict, Scholastica, Catherine, Dominic, Clare, Francis. I AM with you until the end of time. Allow yourselves to sink into that truth: I AM with you.”

I have indeed been letting myself sink into that truth. God’s very name, spoken and recorded in our sacred texts, means that our God is a God of the present moment. God is there in every moment, with me, with you, with us. Loving us, present to the mix of confusion and joy and frustration and grief and satisfaction and generalized grumpiness and inexplicable peace that is life as a human being who is paying attention, or not paying attention as the case may be.

Perhaps that is why the movie Inside Out touched me so much. I recognized my own mix of emotions which drive me, and the ones that I push to the outskirts or send on wild goose chases so they stop bothering me. My main driver of course is anxiety. 

But what Janet said adds a whole new dimension to the equation, and one that is so obvious when I stop and think about it.  God says I am there no matter who is in the drivers seat. 

I remember when my mom was very sick, and later after she’d died when my Dad was in ICU after emergency surgery and I was there on my own until my siblings could get there.  In those days which felt like a lifetime I had some of the most intense experiences of God I have ever had. My defenses were down and my need was outsized, and so I suppose I was able to notice the I AMness of God in the moment. It was pure grace, and in that moment my relationship with God began to be more mature and real.

Other times when I am at the ocean or I’m among the trees  I am so awestruck at the incredible beauty of God’s creation that I catch my breath and have a fairly intense burst of gratitude and a definite God moment. At those moments when I cannot help but see the God who is and who created every good thing, it is easier then to be present to God and God’s love.

But God is I AM even when I am not paying attention. When I am distracted by many things to do or anxious about this or that. When that person does that thing, again, and pushes all of my buttons. Or when I push hers. When I am just tired out or confused or busy just making it through the day. When I am too busy to notice that God, I AM, is with me, nevertheless so it is, even then. 

Of course, if little old me is honest, these moments are the majority of my life.  I can get stuck too in the past, in what I should have done or what I missed out on, just as my anxious planning self can miss out on the present moment by having my head too much in the future.
But the invitation of Janet’s words is to let it sink in that God is present, with me,  even then. I AM with you, God says, when you are too distracted or anxious or annoyed or tired or confused or busy to notice.

The spiritual life is just that, life, and the invitation to growth and transformation and compassion and love and peace and justice is to let God be God … Always.

Morning Star Rising

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When I professed my perpetual vows as a Sister of St Joseph of Peace four years ago this November, I felt great joy planning the liturgy and carefully chose  the readings and songs. For the meditation song after communion,  I chose a somewhat unusual song: “We Are” by Sweet Honey in the Rock.

This morning as I prayed with the readings for today’s Feast of the Transfiguration,  I remembered that moment, sitting in the chapel at St. Mary-on-the-lake, surrounded by community and family and friends, after proclaiming my forever yes, after remembering together Jesus as bread broken for us, in the silence, the song played.

“For each child that’s born, a morning star rises and sings to the universe who we are.”

It was a powerful moment of the love of God for me, and I wanted that song to help the moment sink in for all those present, to reflect a bit on the light they bring to the world, that we are called to bring together.

In today’s second reading from Peter we hear about Jesus and the “unique declaration:” This is my son, my beloved,  with whom I am well pleased.

That is powerful enough, especially when we imagine that declaration being proclaimed from the heavens, to the universe,  that each of us is indeed a beloved son or daughter pleasing to God by our very existence!

This morning I spent more time with what follows in the reading. “Moreover we posses the prophetic message that is altogether reliable. You will do well to be attentive to it, as to a lamp shining in a dark place, until day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts.”

God is love, and we are invited into that love by our very existence, pleasing to God. We are called to share in that love, to share that love ever more deeply and widely, that it may rise in our hearts like the morning star.

God’s love is altogether reliable, and we are part of that love.

Retreat Videos – Good to Me

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This is the last video I made on retreat, and it sums up the week for me. In the words of Audrey Assad:

Your goodness and mercy shall follow me
All my life
I will trust in Your promise
Because You are good to me, good to me

Indeed. Thank you God for the many graces of my life, for the opportunities to grow and be transformed, for the chance to share my gifts, for the gift of life and love, and, and, and …

God is indeed good to me and you and all of creation.

Laudato Si!

Retreat Videos – Letting Go

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The spooky internet algorithms that led me to the music of Audrey Assad also led me to discover Steffany Gretzinger, a singer with a non-denominational Christian music project.  She’s got a very unique voice, sort of reminiscent to me of a Christian Bjork meets Beth Orton. In any case, I found this song very moving and helpful for inviting God into the messier spaces of life. It’s called Letting Go. It speaks to me of the invitation to be vulnerable before God, to trust and most of all, to let God be God.

You’ve brought me to the end of myself
And this has been the longest road
Just when my hallelujah was tired
You gave me a new song

I’m letting go
I’m letting go
I’m letting go
Falling into you

I confess I still get scared sometimes
But perfect love comes rushing in
And all the lies that screamed inside go silent
The moment you begin

You remind me of things forgotten
You unwind me until I’m totally undone
And with Your arms around me
Fear was no match for Your love
Now You’ve won me

Retreat Videos – I Shall Not Want

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Here’s another video I made on retreat pairing my photos and videos of God’s creation with Audrey Assad’s beautiful prayerful music. Enough said. I’ll leave the rest to her words, inspired of course by Scripture and tradition.

From the love of my own comfort
From the fear of having nothing
From a life of worldly passions
Deliver me O God

From the need to be understood
From the need to be accepted
From the fear of being lonely
Deliver me O God
Deliver me O God

And I shall not want, I shall not want
When I taste Your goodness I shall not want
When I taste Your goodness I shall not want

From the fear of serving others
From the fear of death or trial
From the fear of humility
Deliver me O God
Deliver me O God

And I shall not want, I shall not want
When I taste Your goodness I shall not want

No, I shall not want, I shall not want
When I taste Your goodness I shall not want

When I taste Your goodness I shall not want

Retreat Videos – You Speak

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Sometimes on retreat I read. This year, I barely cracked open a page. Instead I read the pages before me of God’s creation and took oodles of photographs.

I was also recently introduced to some new to me music, thanks to the wonders of internet algorithms which accurately (and a bit spookily) suggested music I might like.  That is how I discovered the Catholic singer-song writer Audrey Assad. I spent a lot of time during retreat listening to her independent release, Fortunate Fall. It’s available on Amazon Prime, although I highly suggest downloading your own copy.

I made a few videos matching my photos with her words and music.  I’ve shared one of them above, set to “You Speak” by Audrey Assad.

You liberate me from my own noise and my own chaos

From the chains of a lesser law you set me free.

In the silence of the heart, you speak.

And it is there that I will know you and you’ll know me.

You satisfy me till I am quiet an confident in the work of the Spirit I cannot see.

In the silence of the heart, you speak.

And it is there that I will know you God.

In the silence of my heart, you speak.

Her words so beautifully capture the desire to listen to our loving creator God and trust in the movement of the Spirit.  I found myself singing her words as I watched the sun rise and the birds fly and the waves crash.

Enjoy some of your own quiet time with the beauty of God’s creation speaking in your own heart.

Magnificent book of God’s creation

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I am back from my annual retreat, renewed and refreshed after days of blessings with the Holy One.  I never made a silent retreat until I was in formation with my religious community, and now I truly cannot imagine what my life would be like without this regular gift of time and space and quiet to just be with my loving God.

Every retreat is different, with its own graces and challenges too. One grace of this year was letting this time spend itself, allowing myself to be open to God’s presence all around me in every moment.  I can’t really explain the movement of God in my life these days, other than to say that God is very good.

In his encyclical Laudato Si’, taken from the opening line of the Canticle of the Sun, Pope Francis invites us to spend time with God’s magnificent book of creation:

“.. Saint Francis, faithful to Scripture, invites us to see nature as a magnificent book in which God speaks to us and grants us a glimpse of his infinite beauty and goodness. “Through the greatness and the beauty of creatures one comes to know by analogy their maker” (Wis 13:5); indeed, “his eternal power and divinity have been made known through his works since the creation of the world” (Rom 1:20).” (Laudato Si, no. 12).

If I had to sum up this past week, it would be accepting invitation upon invitation to get a glimpse of God’s beauty and goodness.  And that, my friends, is gift upon gift upon gift!  Here’s just a sampling.

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