Presby-Musings

There is a thing that happens to us when we experience trauma, or we find ourselves the victim of abuse, violence or a tragedy. 

It's a thing that sometimes finds us sometimes later in life when repressed memories or feelings come flooding to the surface.  Or in many cases, it simply hangs over us like a cloud, always there, never really allowing the sun through. 

What am I talking about? 

It's the thing that happens when we lose our identity in what happened to us so completely that we believe we are defined by it.  It's when we become synonymous with what happened to us, and without that identity, we don't even know who we are. 

I know this intimately, as do many of you who are reading this.  But we don't have to live this way.  The self that has been created when we lose ourselves in what happened to us, is a false self.  It is not who we really are.

Who we are instead is defined by the great love of God, the One who is constantly speaking into our brokenness and th…

When I was a kid and used to read the comics in the newspaper, one of my favorites was Family Circus, created by Bil Keane.  

Keane would often run comics that depicted the circuitous paths that his son Billy would take on the way home from the bus stop, to the mailbox, or a short cut with his grandma.  

Here's one that I found today that shows Billy's journey from bed to bus: 



I often find myself asking my 8-year-old son where he is going when he heads off in the wrong direction on an errand.  I want him to move in straight lines, but he seems programmed to do the exact opposite. 

At what age do we lose the desire to take a long way home?  

I think it happens slowly over time as we grow busier and busier, and so full of ourselves and our abilities.  

At some point, we stop longing to wander.  We don't get lost anymore.  And when we do, we immediately pull out our smartphones to show us the way.    

And this inability to make the road by walking affects our life of faith, I'm…

I'm always looking for prayers, poems, quotes, and lines that inspire me and make me think... Or ones that convict me to be a better human... Or give me a platform from which to leap further into the world, rather than away from it. 

And sometimes the thing I discover is so unbelievably perfect that I can't help but write it down, ponder it, and sometimes share it with you here in these little reflections I write every day. 

I recently discovered a prayer that was adapted by Fr. Thomas Keating, and then adapted again by Fr. Richard Rohr, and adapted by me. 

Feel free to shape your own adaption to it---apparently, this is a thing. 

Welcome, welcome, welcome. 
I welcome everything that comes to me today
because I know it's for my healing and growth. 
I welcome all thoughts, feelings, emotions, persons,
situations and conditions.
I let go of my desire for power and control. 
I let go of my desire for affection and esteem,
approval, and pleasure.
I let go of my desire for survival and sec…