Tag: comfort

Finding Jesus

Finding Jesus

How is it that you sought me? Did you not know I must be in my Father’s house?

Recently, I’ve been getting a lot of comfort from the fifth joyful mystery of the rosary: the finding of the child Jesus in the temple. Mary and Joseph anxiously search for Jesus after He stays behind in Jerusalem following the Passover feast. When He is finally found, listening and talking with the teachers in the temple, He seems to have expected them to know where He would be, instead of traipsing across Jerusalem looking everywhere. But they didn’t just know He would be in the temple and they seem even to struggle with His response.

Why is this comforting to me?

Mary was conceived without Original Sin, she bore the God-man in her womb following a conversation with an angel, and she humbly bears the honor being Queen of Heaven and earth. Yet she did not know that Jesus would be in the temple.

Joseph was a man who was clearly directed in his dreams, nobly labored to provide a life for Mary and Jesus, and lived a life governed by faith, justice, and wisdom. Yet he did not know that Jesus would be in the temple.

Those closest to Christ during His earthly life, those who raised Him from a small baby, those who were perfect or nearly so did not understand what Jesus was doing in this moment. The same would be true for many other moments in their lives, too.

And I find this to be extremely comforting.

When I cannot see what God is planning for my future…
When I do not understand how any greater good could be brought from this present pain…
When I do not find much reason to hope…
When the sadness of the present blinds me from seeing the joy that is certainly to come…
When I seek but do not find, ask but don’t receive an answer, knock but do not find an open door…
When I wonder but seem to get no closer to understanding…
When I cannot find Jesus in the present moment although I know He must be close…

Continue reading “Finding Jesus” →

You Can Waste It

You Can Waste It

Not too long ago, I was helping with a retreat and someone at the table was commenting about experiencing a cold shower that morning. It wasn’t presented as a major concern, but it was definitely something not desired by the individual. Another person at the table mentioned that he could offer up the cold shower. His reply was, “I don’t want to.” And I, quick with a witty and brisk response, jabbed, “You don’t have to offer it up. You can waste it.”

My own words have kept, for lack of a better word, haunting me over the weeks since that moment. Alongside it is the recurring question, Am I wasting it? Am I wasting my present suffering?

It is incredibly easy to look at someone else’s life and to see the moments when they should choose virtue. While it might take some learning and study, it is simple to offer words of wisdom, guidance for how one ought to live. Yet it is remarkably difficult to choose to accept one’s own wisdom or to live in the way one knows one should. The words which easily rolled out of my mouth have continued to stare back at me, probing me and provoking me, asking if they bear any resemblance to my own life.

I don’t want to waste my suffering.

Yet it seems that to offer up my suffering means I need to really be aware of it and consider it more deeply. If I’m going to offer it to the Lord, I need to recognize it. This, however, it not what I want to spend my time doing. Ignoring the present pain is a bit more comfortable. Instead of staring my longings and unfulfilled desires in the face, I want to avoid them and distract myself with something else. I think I tend to waste my suffering because I don’t want to keep acknowledging it and relating it to the Lord.

Underlying this avoidance of facing my suffering is perhaps the fear that if I keep looking at it, really seeing the tender point of pain and longing, then I might be prone to bitterness. It is already far too easy for my heart to grow bitter, with the Lord or anyone else. I think there is a worry woven into my heart that if I keep seeing this suffering and keep offering it back to the Lord that I will instead just tire of the process and get angry. If I avoid it, the slow-burn of annoyance will maybe just stay in the background. If I continually confront it, who knows what it will become?

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A Beauty Filled Life

A Beauty Filled Life

As I walked the Camino, I found within myself a longing for beauty.  Mile after mile passed beneath my feet and I made commitments to myself about how I would like to live my post-Camino life.

Read poetry every day.
Look at new artwork.
Listen to classical music.

All of those commitments and ideas didn’t translate as neatly into my reality as I had hoped.  In the rush of the daily grind, it is difficult to intentionally set aside time to experience beauty.  Most days, my taste of beauty happens when I remind myself to take in the fall foliage before winter sets in.  But an intentional pursuit of beauty?  Generally, that is non-existent.

Last night, I flipped through a book of poems entitled Poems You Ought to Know.  My English degree (with a concentration in British and American Literature) meant that I recognized most of the names in the table of contents.  Some of the poem names even sounded familiar, but few were ones I could stop and say, “Oh, I love this one!”

Edgar Allan Poe’s “Annabel Lee” was there and I recalled that in college I taught a lesson on this to a classroom of high schoolers during an education class.  It is a beautiful poem, I think, even with the natural morbidity found in Poe’s works.  The poetic devices that I had reviewed with the class came to mind dimly.

It makes me wonder why I don’t read poetry like my heart desires.  Why do I not sit down and read a Shakespearean sonnet in the evening?  Why don’t I learn about the famous classical composers?  Why don’t I use the gift of the internet to virtually explore art museums and learn about the different periods in art history?  I desire it.  Why don’t I do it?

Because it is easier to not.   Continue reading “A Beauty Filled Life” →