This Path

I took those words, "It is not what you are nor what you have been that God sees with his all-merciful eyes, but what you desire to be." with me to Mass this afternoon. I felt a quiet joy within me as I went.

It was one of those Sundays where tears just kept welling up within me. Good tears. The kind of tears, had I been in solitude, would have become a torrent. It's been a long time since I felt so weepy at Mass. Every time I turned around [what, you didn't know we turned around at Mass?! :)] hearing God's word proclaimed reduced me to tears. It's been a long while since I felt pierced by God's word. Or had pictures come into my head in response to prayer.

One picture that came into my mind was that of being carried into rehab in the arms of Christ. And after it came into my head I thought to myself, wait, that doesn't make sense because where is he carrying me? Shouldn't I be getting carried towards him not by him? I mean is he carrying me to the counselors? They aren't going to heal me. Or are they? I had quite the little arguement in my mind about it all. Eventually I let it go and kept with me the picture of being carried by him into rehab.

Then, after receiving the Eucharist I felt like I was being held and rocked within safe arms. I turned, lifted my head and told Jesus, with one finger, you could heal all of me....the physical, the emotional, the addictions. And as soon as I said that I got a picture of myself with bleeding knees and a rocky path ahead of me. And he seemed to say, this is your path. Tonight I trust that this path I'm on is right where I'm supposed to be and that healing will come. It just might not look like what I'm expecting. But I do trust that I'm being carried, being held as I go.

Real Hunger

Sometimes matters of faith are too personal to write about. Today my husband crossed the Tiber. This weekend all our kids and their partners came home to be with us. It feels like there is a ribbon of grace being woven through all the circumstances of our life right now and for that I am deeply grateful.