"Be alive! God is always in our hearts."

This evening was L’Arche Greater Washington, DC’s monthly prayer night. It was - probably our fourth, maybe fifth? Instance of getting together virtually to pray since this all began. The format is always a few words from Executive Director Luke Smith, a lot of song, and time for reflection guided by prompts or questions. We end with everyone’s prayers, and the Our Father recited together. Many voices across a wide geography, lifting up to God together.

This evening I learned of this this wonderful song: Never Would Have Made It, by Marvin Sapp.

During reflection time, Luke proposed four questions:

• How are you remaining hopeful?

• What are you choosing to live?

• How are you using the gifts God has given you?

• What opportunities are we grasping for the work of humanity and justice?

Well - what do you think?

I made many notes to myself. One I will share: that taking care of oneself is hopeful. Isn’t it? It implies there is something worth living for; that one will survive to live that reality which one is working toward. Have you ever thought of that? To brush one’s teeth and take one’s vitamins is hopeful. Maybe not heroic, but evidently there are some seasons where God is not calling us to be heroes, but to just be. This is that season. In the silence and aloneness, which one must accept now, have fidelity - to the relationship with God, and with oneself. Go on, go forward, each day, and if your hope lasts for one day and must be rekindled the next, then so be it. Keep going.

At the end, Laurie spoke up with a word. “Be yourself, follow your heart,” she told us. “He is always with us, in our hearts.”

She wasn’t done: “Be alive! God is always in our hearts!”

Five months of lockdown and the current state of things is, at best, trying. It is a hamster wheel. It is the fear and uncertainty of where this is all leading, and where we will end up. And yet: God is with us - He is in our hearts. Thank you, Laurie, for the reminder, which could not have been more clear or more needed than now. That was the Holy Spirit moving, as He has through all of this. Even - perhaps especially - when we feel we cannot see Him.

Audio from this morning's Relevant Radio interview

Friends, I was pleased to join John Harper on the Morning Air Show this morning. You can catch the audio here.

I enjoy the times I get 10 minutes, as opposed to three, because usually there are a few points to get through. Very much the case on this topic! I appreciated the point John raised about the common tendency to divide faith along political lines: liberal Catholics and conservative Catholics. My response was: if you’re putting politics before faith, and identifying as [political party] before “Catholic,” something has gone awry. The truths we believe, grounded in the Gospel, supersede all else. And what we believe is not left or right, it is just - it is life. It is the Gospel of Life, as the great Pope St. John Paul II put it.

Peace.

The austerity of the current Mass

I did a great interview with John Harper on Morning Air Radio this morning, and as soon as the recording is up, I will include a link.

I came across an article by a fellow Catholic Stand writer named Alicia Connoly-Lohr, called, “The Pared-Down Mass is Better.” I saw the headline and though, how interesting! That is exactly what I have been thinking!

Admittedly, it is because I did not realize how much I dislike the music during Mass. Many people make fun of hymns and I used to come to the defense of said songs, but now I realize - eh, they are a rather lukewarm distraction much of the time. Sorry! Just calling it like it is!

Alicia has a better point, though. Like me, she was at first disturbed by how unrecognizable Mass had become (to the point where I thought, ugh, I’ll stick with the livestreams - which is kind of saying a lot). The caution tape, the masks, the distance between people and pews - it’s like an obstacle course to holiness.

She makes comparisons, though, to other times when Mass has not had its usual shape, like during war, and in prison camps. She makes the excellent point that in simplicity, or even anguish, we can find beauty, as in Michaelangelo’s representation of the Pieta.

Her point is that without the frills, the Mass becomes more innate and internal. I think that can be said for much of this year’s experience. When the external is taken away, one must look inward at what lasts.

So anyway, I recommend her article. Here is is again: The Pared Down Mass is Better.

Other things I have been thinking of: waiting, in general, and especially on God. Patience. The need to work with God, and not force one’s own will. Being the water that flows with him, not against him. Accepting that God gives, and he takes away. And as always, blessed be the name of the Lord.