The Sacrament of Home
That’s funny title… and it is only a starting point for my thoughts.
This morning I was reading my friend Susan’s reflection, Home in the Heart of Jesus, on her blog, Creo en Dios. She reflected on how sad it made her to know that the place that represents her “spiritual home” will close it’s doors in June. But she ended with the vision given her by her former spiritual director that her home is not a place, but in the Heart of Jesus. (forgive me Susan, if I am slaughtering your reflection — people should just go read it for themselves!).
As I read the reflection, it gave me some insight… an epiphany of sorts. I have a real, chronic problem with practices like Adoration and Benedition. Just bugs me — at times it seems like folks got God all trapped in that bit of bread — all safe and sound, and controlled. On reading Susan’s reflection on sorrow at “losing your home” — the realization that your home (our home) is in the Heart of Jesus, gives me a way to look at Adoration and see that it can be a way of sitting with the understanding and appreciation of just that reality: home is in the heart of Jesus. To be there allows me to more consciously realize and appreciate that. There are many times when we really need the concrete to be able to sense the reality beyond.
I know I’ve tried to write this out many times before. Each time I grasp a bit of the truth. Each time the light fades and I find myself back in a cloud of unknowing, a fog of non-comprehension. We, as humans so need something concrete to hang on to. That special place, the cross or crucifix on a chain around the neck, the hug that comes when we most need it, the water of baptism and the oil of confirmation. The bread and wine on the altar at mass. Sacraments: those physical realities that make things real for us now. And we do that for one another: we become “God [Jesus] with skin on” for each other. So, yes, my home is in the Heart of Jesus, but, I so need some things to touch and know in order to understand that reality.
And so, next time I am invited to Adoration, I will try to dig up these reflections. I will try to allow the Blessed Sacrament to be Sacrament and lead me to the reality. I will try to be open and listen to all the hope and prayers and Love that come from the Reality behind the physical. I will try to be open to accepting and growing in that love.
At least, I hope I will.
Transformation / Transfiguration
If a teacher would bring up these two terms, I fear the question would be: Contrast and compare transfiguration and transformation. They are different, yes, but, it seems also very intertwined. And, they’ve been on my radar for a couple of days.
Saturday night, USA ran Schindler’s List comercial free, wrapped only in an into and epilogue by Steven Spielberg who spoke about tolerance and about the Shoah Foundation. I had never seen the movie before, and found parts of it twisting my stomach into knots with horror. I can in some ways understand those Holocaust deniers who cannot accept that this happened. This bit of history reflects some of the worst of humanity.
So, how does this play into transfiguration and transformation? Oskar Schindler, of course. Schindler doing the right things for the wrong reasons. Schindler’s transformation into a man who would go to the ends of his world to save his people. Schindler who was transformed in a way by how the Jews he had under his protection had been transfigured for him into human beings, worthy of protection and care. By the end of the movie, the end of WWII in Europe, this man had been changed, almost in spite of himself.
Another theme I found in the movie was just a hint of how the cruelty and inhumanity of the entire cancerous Nazi philosophy and practices twisted those involved. I’m in no way defending Goeth, but there was a glimpse of a deeply disturbed man, fighting against his own humanity. I got a glimpse of how his choices and his world ate away at him, leaving behind a damaged, dangerous individual who couldn’t face himself and struck out at anything that came close to his “good” side.
Enter Sunday’s Gospel: the account of the Transfiguration of Jesus. I listened to this reading in the aftermath of the movie. I thought to myself that the Transfiguration sounded more like the transformation of the disciples so that they could truly see Jesus, more than any change in Jesus. I could be wrong, but I don’t think so. Who knows what can happen if we allow ourselves to see differently? To be transformed so as to see a transfigured world around us.
Think about it.
Seek and Ye Shall Find
“Seek and ye shall find” pretty much sums up today’s gospel reading.
The questions for me boil down to:
What am I seeking?
How will I accept what I might find?
I think of my husband’s approach to so many things: Don’t ask questions when you don’t really want to know the answers. There is some wisdom in that, I suppose. That attitude can certainly keep one from following some very painful paths, but it strikes me as a bit of “head in the sand.” The challenge is to seek, even when I might not particularly like the answers. My reaction to those answers might change over time though as I grow to understand and/or accept them. I’ve lived long enough to begin to realize that sometimes (not always, but many times) what seemed like a crushing blow turns out to be the very best thing that could happen. That horrible thing turns out to be so much better than the solution I would have suggested. At other times, the answer is immediately grand. And then there are times where the finding just creates the need for more seeking.
Seek and you shall find. Knock and that door will be opened. Be at peace and be brave and step through that door.
Sign
Crossing O’Neal Bridge
the welcoming sign
filling up the words
“Coca Cola”
fill, flash, drain
fill, flash, drain
Welcome! You are approaching home…
“Coca Cola”
fill, flash, drain
It seemed a forever ride
in the big back seat
from Sheffield, Tuscumbia, Town Creek…
From Birmingham and parts unknown
O’Neal Bridge is dated
and the river crossing replaced for many by
the Patton Island Bridge just upstream
The Coca Cola Bottling Plant
no longer graces the crest of the first hill
welcoming visitors with its filling and draining sign
And yet, to cross the Tennessee River, headed north
at times still feels a lot like
Homecoming.
Who Knew? Or encountering God in strange places
I read the readings before mass this morning. I listened to them again. I listened as [Fr.] Bruce reflected on them, and how each represented an encounter with God that made a permanent change in the person who had the encounter.
Isaiah — now he sees the Lord in the temple. That is is a powerful encounter, and a fairly frightening image of an ember touched to his mouth/tongue. But, it occurs in a house of worship, it seems. A place where we might expect to meet God. I found myself singing [in my head] a refrain from my experience in pentacostal circles:
We see the Lord. We see the Lord
And He is high and lifted up and his train fills the temple
He is high and lifted up and his train fills the temple
The angels cry “Holy”
The angels cry “Holy”
The angels cry “Holy is the Lord!”
Enter Paul and his description of how his encounter with Jesus changed and transformed his life in unimaginable ways.
But, the one that almost made my laugh, just because of the almost day to day ordinariness of the situation was Peter and the fishing trip. OK, the scene as I felt it went something like this:
Peter and his coworkers have been working all night. Yup, at work. Ordinary, regular, making a living, feeding the family work. Along comes Jesus and climbs in the boat. He hitches a ride out from the shore, so he can teach the folks on shore without being overwhelmed. Peter and crew go along with this. Then Jesus says – “Hey Peter, head out to the deep. We need to catch some fish.” At this point I can just hear Peter sighing as he grouses at bit. “Jesus, we’ve been working all night, and we have nothing to show for it. Are you nuts? But, OK. If you say so, I’ll do it.” It wouldn’t surprise me to see this said in a sort of “I’m not really thrilled with this, but if it will make you happy, I’ll give it a shot.”
Whoa! A catch of fish beyond belief. Riches beyond any expectation. A change in vision for Peter. The very idea of becoming a “fisher of men” is born.
Sometimes God catches us in the most mundane, boring, un-fun points in our life. All he asks is that we be open to the occasion.
Photo credit: Image was found on Fr. Dan Borlik, CM’s website…