"Staying Home" by Eileen Scofield

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“Staying Home” by L’Arche Greater Washington core family member Eileen Scofield

I received this image in the mail as part of L’Arche’s annual report. I was enchanted by it. It’s drawn by Eileen, Scofield, a core family member in the DC community, an avid artist and the organization’s chief friendship builder.

She named this drawing “Staying Home,” and I realized after a day that I initially looked at it incorrectly. But I like both interpretations.

The first is that you are looking into a single room where many people are socially distanced, in their boxes (whatever you would like the boxes to stand for). I thought of this at first because I know within the L’Arche homes now, everyone eats dinner at least 6 feet apart. So it kind of looked like that to me. And I was moved, generally, by the depiction of apartness, with each person in their square box. It feels like that, doesn’t it?

Then I realized this is actually a view of a tall building - say, an apartment building - with all its residents home. You see them in their windows. Notice they are smiling, as if they are still enjoying life and carrying on, despite. I liked that message, too. And I like how Eileen captured the fact that even though everyone is separate, they are still truly all together. I lose sight of this in my own day-to-day, when I focus just on how I am soldiering on. It is easy to forget that all those around me are doing the same, in quite close proximity.

One other nice thing to share: I truly enjoyed this video, A Day in the Life of Kelly and Alice, from Arlington’s Highland House community. Eating breakfast, going for a walk, running through the sprinkler, watching TV and playing games. Pandemic has taught me to enjoy these very simple things. Or maybe not to take them for granted.

"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.