Embers like lava
Ignite flaming arrowsDangling remnants signal
Its need for ashes
To become soul soil
For new plants to grow
The hardest part of being wounded by the actions of another person is never to hear the words “I am sorry,” along with never the attempt to reconcile or repair the harm. It blocks total forgiveness.
Over a lifetime, these embers stack; keeping flesh burns from fully healing.
I easily accept and forgive in thought, but its embers, do not automatically extinguish. As time passes, I can distance myself from its heat, but embers and smoke remain in my soul, keeping me bound in the past.
Jesus said, forgive seventy times seven. He also said:
“Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.” And they divided up his clothes by casting lots.
Luke 23:34
Jesus on the cross did not say, “I forgive them,” or ask God to help him to forgive. He directly asked God – to forgive them. Maybe the moment was too much for his humanity. I see this within myself and I can do the same.
I can turn to God’s mercy rather than hold myself to an unrealistic standard of 100% forgiveness.
And may many others find it within their will to be the same for me.
I look back on my childhood as coming from the generation of black and white. TV shows were black and white. Most of the photographs in our family collection were black and white. And the many “White Only,” and “Black Only” signs seen in the marketplace. The latter was not anything I understood.
As a young boy, I would watch my grandpa hitching and handling his mules. Watching him farm row crops, I’d see him stop his two mules mid-row, take off his straw hat, wipe the sweat off his bald head, fill and relight his pipe, and then return to gee-hawing on.
My other grandpa had retired from full-time farmer and leased the land to a sharecropper. I’d sit on the back porch gazing across the pasture toward the tenant house and see the activity of the black family who lived there. It was all a curious mystery to me.
I remember my father talking to me about how he grew up working in the field alongside the black man, as equals. Considering that his parents owned the land maybe it seems a bit idealistic. Regardless, it says something about how his parents raised him. And it also says something about how I and my five siblings were raised to think of other people.
I was 52 when my dad passed, and I never saw him or my mom contradict this ideal in raising their six children. I am grateful to both and hope my children take the same from me.
Yes, there is individual and systemic prejudice, … without a doubt. In ways that I have experienced and quite sure, so have everyone else. But I cannot imagine its roots exist in the color of skin.
We don’t pick the culture we were born into, nor our parents. And there is no justice by holding guilt nor taking the blame for what someone else has done. Justice is rendering to another human being what they are due; a basic dignity.
The only thing that we can positively change about the past is a “letting go” of what is not life-giving and living our lives forward.
Both justice and injustice are sourced in one’s heart and lived out as a choice of one’s (free) will.
We will not resolve social injustices by allowing ourselves to be distracted by media falsification that looks or feels like the truth?
I have received your letter and accept retirement from your obligation of service.
When we last met you said, “You’ve done nothing wrong,” and “it was not our intent to harm you.” Also, your most recent letter writes an appreciation for me doing “everything asked of me.” Nevertheless, it puzzles me why you continue harm against my person and for the greater community; Especially since Jesus’ teaching on truth, justice, and mercy is clear.
I asked only to be returned to “good standing.” It was, and remains, my invitation of Reconciliation and a way of repairing the harm done. It is the same Sacrament you preach and I am saddened you chose not to accept.
You reason that married, widowed, or divorced people would not accept a cleric who had experienced the same. Holy Wisdom tells me it is these very people who by their own lived experience of marriage in both grace and the cross; possess the necessary compassion. Just think, …compassionate care.
For the entirety of my 60+ years, I’ve held the belief that the institution “at least” strives to resemble its founder and mission. Sadly, in these past ten years, I’ve experienced much of what “NOT” Christ has called his Church to be. And for this, my conscience will not allow me to be silent or complicit.
My passage of tears has gifted greater clarity, trust, and gratitude in God Alone; as the sole source and arbiter of holiness.
And through this dark night, comes deeper gratitude and consent in Divine Presence and Action as the sole formation of my heart, mind, and soul. My sacramental identity and its service to the eucharistic liturgy and Communion of Souls remain.
So, in this contemplation, the Divine Indwelling, calls out:
While in college, I bought a nice guitar but nothing came out of it. I sold it after getting married. Following my divorce at 38, I was driving through a small Louisiana town and saw a “Going Out of Business” sign at a music store.
Out of curiosity, I decided to stop.
And walked out with a guitar thinking, “if not now, then never.”
About a year later, I had learned basic chords and skills. I decided to extend my learning in front of people. Gratefully, I was accepted into a very forgiving church choir.
It took a risk to expose and practice my spirituality and prayer life from under the proverbial “bushel basket.” This is no small feat for an introverted personality in a dominant social culture where it “ain’t manly” to show such things.
What transpired since that simple beginning in 1998 contains more words than I am sure you are willing to read but I will say “it brought personal and spiritual transformation – in ways I could not have imagined.
Song became my prayer and soul exposed.
I no longer sing or play in front of groups. Yet there remains a spirit of melody and lyric deeply embedded in the expression of my soul to my Beloved. I sing sometimes silently and sometimes out loud – as my thoughts, heart, and spirit prompt. It is a gift given and received.
How are we to express our soul’s longing and consummation for what cannot be satisfied with finite things of this earth?
The merging of Little Red Riding Hood, St. Francis and the Wolf of Gubbio, the Cajun Rougarou, and one’s inner journey toward wholeness.
“Grandma is sick, take her this basket of cakes.
Be very careful! and don’t listen to the wolf.”
“Don’t worry”, he said.
And started his long trip through the woods.
... Soon a very big voice said: “Hello, little boy.
Why are you walking in the dark all alone?”
“Brother wolf, thou hast done much evil.
If thou no more hide: thou shalt no longer suffer.”
In agreement, the wolf placed one of his forepaws on the boy’s hand, and a friendship was formed.
“It’s safe to go home now. Rougarou is now friend.”
Take a moment, and use the comment function and write how you would caption this final image.
ps. The primary character is a little boy with his red hat and the rougarou (french for a werewolf). The red hat the boy wears is a metaphor for one’s false sense of security or comfort. The werewolf is a metaphor for things we fear in our psychological-spiritual lives. The “Gubbio” influence shifts the “little red riding hood” narrative of killing the wolf to making friends with it (ie. our fears). The “two-headed” image is the acceptance of our true selves (both good and evil). The sixth and final image reflects personal transformation to wholeness and love of self and others.
In the final image, the boy’s hat is gone and the color red has shifted to the heart representing the acceptance and love of one’s total self; both light and dark.
A few weeks ago, our family lost a close relative and dear friend to covid.
After hearing the news, I went to Christine’s Facebook page. A few months earlier she posted, “I can’t believe I made it to Medicare.” Sadly, only a few months later, she is gone.
I try to imagine her last days of life. Were her husband and children able to be with her, …hold her hand, and accompany her? What thoughts, emotions, and pain were passing through her as life was slipping away? And now, for those left behind, what are they experiencing in their shock, loss, and grief? Certainly, not the future they envisioned.
What I do know, is that my imaginings cannot come close to answering these questions.
It has been a few weeks since her passing, yet I remain saddened on too many accounts. I still feel off-balance and tear up when I reflect upon the times that Christine made me feel appreciated and important. It was her nature and personality. And this memory is what remains of her – in me.
If, or when, I am ever called on to hold someone’s hand as they pass from bodily existence;What would the sacredness of the moment expect of me?
In these ponderings, I’ve come to realize that we are already accompanying each other on our journey toward death. We claim this from our very moment of conception, as we began accompanying our mother on her journey toward death, and she accompanies us. As well as our fathers, albeit in a different way. Then at birth, we join the rest of humanity on theirs, and they with us.
It is not when given a terminal diagnosis or when reaching a certain age that this walk begins. It has begun at conception.
Mahalo: used to express gratitude(mainly in Hawaii)
Last month out of the blue, I was contacted by a Navy buddy (Lyle) who I had not heard from since our discharge in 1979. We talked on the phone for about an hour and caught up on our lives. It was great.
I asked if he heard anything about some of the other guys we worked with including Henry and Sully who were close friends to both of us. Both Henry and Sully were native Hawaiian, from the Big Island. I had been trying for years to locate them.
Henry was an easy-going soul. We spent many occasions on the shoreline; He playing ukulele and singing Hawaiian folk songs and I enjoying the moment.
Lyle heard Henry had passed but was not 100% sure. I was deeply saddened and realized that for the past forty years, I held to a memory of what used to be. And now seemed that for all those years, I had been hoping and trying to contact a “dead” man. I was unsettled with the uncertainty and not knowing. I renewed my Internet search to include Hawaii obits. Still, no luck with either Henry or Sully.
I was about to give up until I found a pictorial of our squadron that showed Sully’s first name: James. By a stroke of luck, perseverance, or holy happenstance, I came across a lead that connected me to James. Bingo!
If it wasn’t for one picture on his FB page from his younger days, I doubt I would have recognized him. We both lost our youthful head of hair, in our mid 60’s, and aged. A far cry from the young kids who were experiencing the good and not too good this world offers. Regardless, my decades-long search had ended.
James and I spoke on the phone and caught up on the past forty years. It was a surreal experience for me and great joy. After reconnecting with a long-lost friend, I could now let go of unanswered thoughts of what had become of long-lost friends who shared experiences in both work and play.
And yes, Henry had passed; some thirty years ago. So, in memory of an old friend and the good but outdated memories, I say to you, Henry: Mahalo.
And to James, the old friend of many years ago I am grateful that we’ve had a chance to talk again and to hear of your life these past forty years and the worthwhile things you are doing these days. I sensed once again, the same friendship from our past and a degree of surprise of our shared spirit of the present.
On the day I was discharged, James, along with Henry, and Nelson (another sailor and native Hawaiian) drove me to the Honolulu airport in a red VW bus for my flight home.
I asked James about Nelson. Nelson also passed away about fifteen years ago with Leukemia, leaving a wife and young children.
Of the four of us in James’ VW bus that day, two have passed. Two remain alive.
My day of passing will certainly come, yet it makes me think and contemplate, why Henry and Nelson and not yet me?
This recent episode surfaced a great Maholo (Gratitude) within my person. It refreshed lasting memories of long ago- to the present. And that (my) our passages through the light and shadow of this life – have perpetual worth and sacredness in the present. Not only to me but also to others – long after we are gone.
Equally, in body and soul, in the unity of its nature,
the Spirit dwells among us and grants us a clearer vision.
All in all.
Last week, a friend of mine wrote,
“Guy, I wish I had your eye and art for beauty.”
Deep down, I welcome her compliment, but my impulse is to say “but you do have these same eyes!” We all have these innate capacities by virtue of being created. And if there are any differences between us (and I am not sure there are), it may be how I nurture this faculty…nothing more.
It is an intriguing thought how our mind’s eye works. We see something and fool ourselves into thinking we are seeing its objective reality. Yet all we can see is “reflected” light directed onto the photoreceptors of our retinas that turn into electrical signals. These electrical signals travel from the retina through the optic nerve to the brain. The brain turns the signals into images. Eyeball vision is totally subjective yet we most often frame it as absolute truth or reality.
When I remove my eyeglasses, vision and understanding of what I see change, objective reality does not. When I close my eyes – the same thing occurs. What we think we “see” is nothing but electrical impulses triggering mental illusions of image and thought. It is why ten people can look at the same thing, and each will see differently. Not necessarily a bad thing, but just as it is.
The more I recognize how limiting my eyesight is, the more I question what is real and what is not. At first glance, it seems a very insecure place to be but a “cloud of unknowing” is the foundation for spiritual poverty and essential for the practice of voluntary humility and contemplation.
…if your eye is sound your whole body will be full of light.” Matt 6:22
Once I can recognize the divine image where I don’t want to see the divine image, then I have learned how to see. (Richard Rohr)
It prompts me to nurture and trust deeper faculties of vision such as intuition, imagination, conscience, unknowing, spirit, soul, memory, consciousness, knowledge, and love (to name a few). This nurturing of our spirit is worthy at any age.
“During this night, rest in heart, seat of the soul and breathe anew”
“Stepping Stones,” writes Dr. Progoff, are the significant points of movement along the road of our lives, how we got from there to here, and what steps we selected along our path.
“Stepping Stones, or stumbling stones, …I am not sure.”
Childhood/ Family Foundations
Working Class
Five Siblings
Familial/ Cajun Legacy
As a boy, I cried easily. I recall an episode with my father when I was around 14 or 15 years of age. It was a simple misunderstanding, and I broke into tears in which he could not understand. I still remember his agitated and manly voice, “What are you crying for!” It triggered a felt sense of shame in front of my father. At that moment, I made a conscious decision it was time for me to grow up, stop crying, and be a “man.”
At 64, I’ve hardened a bit. I still cry when my heart is stomped but no longer ashamed of showing my tears.
Military/ Following Footsteps
Worldly College
Naval Aircrewman
Honorable Discharge
At 18, I had no plan for what I wanted to do or become so I enlisted. By the age of 22, I had circled the globe experiencing good and “not so” good in myself and the larger world. And my curiosity for electronics emerged.
University/ Satisfying Curiosities
BS Electrical Engineering
IEEE Centennial Medal
Average Grades
Teaching Certificate
Diaconal Certificate
After college graduation, I sat in my parent’s living room gazing at my diploma; Six years and thousands of math problems – now behind me. My dad said, “I sure did not think you would finish.” I was surprised by what he said.
Someone who knew me best – didn’t know or believe – some “thing” in me. I had proceeded at my own pace, and my grades were often borderline, but I never considered not completing. I held singular determination on what I had envisioned for myself.
1st Marriage/ Shattered Illusions
Fatherhood
Divorce
Split Parents
Grand kids
We choose our spouse but our parents are chosen by the hand of God; a child gets no choice in the matter. The great gift our parents offer is their example of how to live, and equally valuable how “not” to live. Once we leave our parents, it is our free will to keep what is good and let go of what is not. There is no life in victimhood.
Career/ Economy of Obligations
Veteran
Engineer
Chairman’s Award
Teacher
Twenty years ago, I asked one of my coworkers for feedback on how he thought I performed in my work. After a moment’s pause, he said, “You stick your neck out very far.” He was right, but it was from a conscious choice to be open, honest, and secure in who I am. Consequences come as they may – but what I valued more was that at the end of the day, to lay my head on its pillow and my conscience be clear.
Ministry/ Icon of Christ the Servant
Altar Boy
Peer Ministry/ BE
Liturgical Music/Art
Teacher/ Catechist
Holy Orders
When I was a child, I was taught as a child and did as a child.
My formal entry into adult ministry was borne from my first experience of major loss and grief. The seed was planted when told by others I was a good person and worthy of love. I hung onto Jesus and through the process of recovery decided to publically share my prayer and spirit with others.
In many ways, I am still that little boy. But each stage and circumstance of my life cooperated in some form of Grace inviting and other times pushing me to grow beyond childhood. My spiritual path at this juncture in life is to grow in consent to Divine Presence and action in my life.
2nd Marriage/ Friendship First
Cajun Boy/ Cajun Girl
“Marriage is for Life”
Divorce
Years ago, my father shared with me that his intent with other people was to extend trust upfront. They did not have to first earn his trust. He said if and when his trust was betrayed, he felt strong enough to take the “first” blow and recover. He would then adjust the level of trust in the relationship. I’ve done the same and learned; It is a hard choice to be vulnerable and trusting in this world but its fruits are authenticity, intimacy, and communion. I’ve also learned it to be a road less traveled.
Elderhood/ Unexplored Territory
Confront Mortality
Still the Mind
Open the Heart
Fruitfulness
Elderhood is both “Sunset” and “Sunrise.” To accept it as an invitation to cooperate in a sacrament of surrender; a graceful transition in letting go of what is no longer life-giving, or necessary. This gift comes to all of us by choice, age, infirmity, and ultimately death.
The grace of elderhood is that it offers liberty and deeper meanings for life. There is now time, space, and necessity to explore new landscapes, pathways, and other seekers along the way; without rush and with much less baggage to carry.
Fr. Ron Rolheiser offers another “stone” of elder wisdom. “The aged person as “a stone in the river,” giving the river its character:
An old woman may be helpful simply as a figure valued for her character. Like a stone at the bottom of a riverbed, she may do nothing but stay still and hold her ground, but the river has to take her into account and alter its flow because of her.
An older man, by sheer presence, plays his part as a character in the drama of the family and neighborhood. His character brings particular qualities to every scene, adds to their intricacy and depth by representing the past and the dead.
When all the elderly are removed to retirement communities, the river flows more smoothly back home. No disruptive rocks. Less character too.”
I first encountered the sixteenth-century mystic John of the Cross in Thomas Merton’s book titled, The Ascent to Truth. Not only in Merton’s book did I encounter the Carmelite theologian but also a deeper understanding of the spiritual path of purgation, illumination, and unitive.
Its timing was a gift through Grace as I was journeying through my own Dark Night. John’s poetic writings especially his Spiritual Canticle pierced my soul and wakened me to his soul and place of writing.
John of the Cross played a significant role in the reform movement of the Carmelite Order known as the Discalced Carmelites. The following narrative from Mirabai Starr’s translation of Dark Night of the Soul offer a short bio.
“John (of the Cross) paid for his participation in this (Carmelite reform) effort. In 1577, at the age of 35, he was captured by a group of friars committed to upholding the traditions of the established Church. He was taken to Toledo where he was interrogated and tortured. They tried to force him into denouncing the reform but he refused. And so he was imprisoned in a tiny dark closet that had previously served as a toilet. He was brought out only to be flogged in the center of the dining commons while the monks ate their dinner.
John himself suffered virtual starvation. That first winter, he endured brutal cold and was offered neither cloak nor blanket. In the summer, the heat was stifling and his clothes began to rot on his body. At first, he took comfort in his quiet interior connection to God, but over time the divine presence began to fade and John could not help but wonder if his Beloved had abandoned him. He was Jonah languishing inside the belly of the whale.
In the depths of his despair, John composed passionate love poems to God. Although his creative flow saved his sanity, it could not save his life. Convinced after nine months that if he endured another moment of incarceration he would die, John tied knots in scraps of cloth and slipped through a tiny window at the upper edge of his cell. He lowered himself down the long wall of the monastery and into the safety of the night.
He had traveled through perfect darkness and emerged to find the living God waiting for him in the depths of his own heart.For the next two decades he John dedicated himself to the reform, and the sweet simplicity of guiding the spiritual lives of his Barefoot Sons and Daughters.”
Toward the end of the saint’s life, envies and disquietudes led to a secret effort to remove him from the sphere of influence. He died in 1592 at the age of 49. He was canonized in 1726. Today he is one of thirty-six Doctors of the Church. He is also considered the patron saint of poets.
Sacrament of Surrender
Legacy of violence shows no heart: Only power and its pride Adding harm to wounded souls: not work of God The good shepherd recovers the lost: Not abandon
From the throne: “You did nothing wrong” Rendered judgment: Empty words Under what circumstances: Truth, justice, and charity ignored?
Back laid bare, branded: Worth-less No satisfaction, no absolution: Paper speaks a self-indictment Stay in the dark, hide: Shame does as shame is
In Light, you would see: Scandal of your making In Light, you would see: Spirit and soul transcend fortress walls In Light, you would see: A thread left for redemption
Idols fallen, veil torn: Tears melt the scales Advocate, Counselor, and Healer: Walking and talking Burning heart, breaking bread: Consent in Silence
Outside the Word: There are no vows Called by name, Grace bestowed: Not by man, nor to be hidden Communion of Saints, Church: Welcomes, heals, …does no harm
It is finished: Only in God, …not in man.
“When members of the Sanhedrin heard this, they were furious and gnashed their teeth at him.” Acts 7:54
