Once upon a time, there was one little uptown boy, riding a downtown subway. And he wanted to do something beautiful, spiritual. But something encouraged him to reflect upon goodness and hope. And then he examined the direction of his life.
He is a fabulist, reluctant. Words are his allies. And he began to write.
ushers, ministers of hospitality, Extraordinary Ministers of Communion, RCIA newsletter, cathedral, meetings, priests, lay people, Deacons, Archbishop, service, prayer, love, compassion, confession, marble, art, inspiration, St. Francis, St. Anthony, Mary, Joseph, nativity, concerts, music, choir, bulletin, altar servers, acolyte, host, chalice, wine, bread, organ, water, altar, pew, kneel, stand, hymn, responsorial psalm, Gospel, lector, the elect, ordination, charity, adventure, work, discovery, tradition, history
Somehow I too allowed these words to make things; concrete visions, two blue ink columns of rushed handwriting; but the realities that accompanied the exercise moved my gaze beyond the scribbles on the page, to a private spot within my mind. Somehow I too discovered the smallest, basic element, the courtyard of my being, searching innermost for frequent and familiar signposts on God's highway.
Perseverance is necessary to discover clarity. Many distractions and diversions always remain on the periphery of faith and loving and serving God in the abstract asks for the extraordinary and the enormous because we live in an age of selfishness, an age angst, an age of rampant restlessness. Finding God and maintaining a relationship with him can be difficult. It is often easier to do this in a community. Faith, to grow and to prosper, needs a community.
Friendships with others can provide visible traces of God and God's love. Work and dedication and love can help us to see God; love, natural and overwhelming and free, can lead us on a journey that simultaneously leads us outward to the expansiveness of the exterior world and inward to the innermost places of the interior world, the soul.
The experience of church leads to reflection, to action. There is strength in believing, strength in hoping, strength in praying.
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