The Celtic Monk

I pulled my car out of the garage, heading first towards the end of the block and ultimately to I-75. As I came to the end of our street, I looked east down a deserted 8th Avenue which runs alongside a nearly empty canal from which there was enough moisture for steam to be rising in pleasant curly wafts. I had an unobstructed view the mile or so before 8th dead-ends into Hendry County when I caught my first look at the sun, bigger than the geodome at Epcot and more intensely coral than the ripest apricot, rising ever so slowly. As you know from earlier posts, gazing at natural phenomena is something I do with some regularity. It's as though God call's out my name in these images. "Come look Kathleen, see what I made for you this morning!" The sun was low enough on the horizon and filtered through enough of the atmosphere that the perimeter was sharply defined against the sky. It had not yet cleared the ground...so the bottom edge appeared as though it might ...

It was last fall that I finally answered an invitation on Facebook... the social networking website, to play Farmville... a social networking game. How fun I thought, that rather than playing solitaire or mahjong by myself, I would play Farmville and be able to catch up with friends at the same time. What could be better? I was brand new to the world wide web of all things electronically social and it appeared to be a simplest of avenues to keep in the loop. I’d have a small interaction with friends and acquaintances from miles away as I decompressed from my day. What better way to spend 10 minutes than with that 6” x 6” plot of flat screen soil while sending and receiving trees, chickens, fences and lambs with friends. It even felt familiar, this sensation of a momentary connection. I remembered that when Sean was two and just getting his own little sense of self he practiced a ritual of comfort as he took those first steps of independence. He would make a foray into another room, ...

While visiting St. John's last fall, I purchased a beautiful handblown glass orb called "The Tree of Enchantment." It's a crystal clear softball sized sphere with deep jeweltones blown into the very top portion. When you look inside, you see several different glass channels that look very much like the trunk of on old tree. They are the vehicle through which the colored glass flowed to the top. It's artful. It's stunning. While taking it out of its box this week, as I've done several times, for the first time I noticed the very bottom of it. Where the glass blowers pipe connected to the bottom of the piece, it looked like a gnarled blemish. It was reminiscient of a scab I had on my knee in 8th grade after a bad fall on some rough concrete! But even as I noticed it, I knew that without this scar... my precious purchase would have none of the beauty inside and out, that drew me to it in the first place. It would be plain, uninteresting, unable...

Okay, so I know I should pay attention when speeding down an interstate at excessive miles per hour. And I do. Or I think I do. Or I am trying to do so. But sometimes a "God-thing" as my friend John would say, interupts. Like on Wednesday morning this week... It was early enough in the morning for the sun to be rising on my left just coming over the tops of the trees in the distance, a sphere of ginormous proportions. It was so wonderful a sight that I wanted to stare. Yet when I looked back at the road in front of me, all I could see from even that first peek, were green circles. It made me laugh, first the looking and then the circles... none of it conducive to driving. When I looked back a second time (once is never enough when gazing on splendor) the golden-orange glistening ball had made its way into a cloud bank that acted as a veil. It was enough cover to dim the shining, but not enough to obliterate the magnificence. There it was in all its glory behind an organz...

This week as I drove to Moorings Park to lead morning worship, I had one line from my text stuck in my mind. The passage was from the Gospel of John where Jesus is telling his disciples that just as God has loved Him, He is passing that love along and we should remain in His love. Remain in His love; the phrase kept coming back to me over and over again. What does it mean to 'remain' in Christ's love. How do we 'remain' in a love that is the continuation of God's love for His Son? I don't remember anyone teaching me what it means to 'remain' in God's love. Is it important to our life of faith... why won't these thoughts go away? I was driving down I 75 south at 70 miles an hour (the posted speed limit) as these thoughts came to me faster than I was driving. Remain in my love. NPR was on the radio and I managed to focus for a moment as a woman began talking about being a friend of Dian Fossey and visiting her a decades ago ...

I visit a site regularly put together by a group of Irish Jesuits called sacred space. I've been following the site for 10 years and it always seems fresh to me. When I visited Sacred Space on New Year's Eve I came upon the following prayer which I found thought provoking and wanted to share with you: Lord, 2009 was a difficult year across the globe. As it slips away in these short days, I pray about what you have done to me, and to my world, since last January. How was I touched by the recession which put millions of people out of work? Have I become more compassionate, or more selfish and defensive? The year saw failures on a massive scale, in banking and business and government. We could easily droop with depression, crying in the old Gaelic lament, ‘Ochón agus ochón agus ochón!' Success is what we do with our failures. Somewhere in all this misery, Lord, you have a lesson for us. We do not learn it if we simply circle the wagons and defend the way we have always been...

For the first time in I can't remember how long I'm not running at break-neck speed towards Christmas. Monday was my only day in the office at the church this week. The bulletins for Christmas Eve and the Sunday after Christmas were mostly done before the 4th Sunday in Advent and needed only some final touches. No department nor grocery store will see me this week. All the packages are wrapped and tagged and waiting to take their place under the tree. I will be making some more cookies however. We've managed to nibble our way through the cookies we made the week after Thanksgiving. There are no cookies left to give away...and I always give away some of our favorites that are only baked at this time of the year. I'm aware of being able to 'sense' Christmas in a way that's impossible when holiday obligations have me in a strangle hold. There have been ordinary moments, doing just ordinary things that have seemed like a gift. This morning even the late arr...