My daughter-in-law Amy recently posted this photo on Facebook. She captioned it "Why I need new living room furniture."  As you can guess, my son Paul, her husband, owns more guitars than one can count, true life for a professional musician, but a detriment for any interior decorator. His children Claire and Stephen also play instruments.  Claire plays the piano, Stevie plays the saxophone, and both love singing with their Dad.   
    We've recently been to music concerts for Claire, Stevie, and also daughter Mary Beth's children Katie and Ian, who play clarinets as well as guitars with Mary and husband Mike. ( Their family guitars also multiply like rabbits!) What a joy it is, watching youngsters in concert, eyes fixed to their conductors' hands, their own hands so in love with their instruments and the heartfelt music they can make!
    Beautiful music of any type has something Divine about it. It stirs our minds, hearts, and souls, awes us, inspirits us. When a community sings together, whether it's "The Star Spangled Banner," or "We Shall Overcome," or  "Amazing Grace," there's something deep and spiritually unifying happening.
    Which brings me to my favorite, Psalm 33, and the verse: "Sing to God a new song; skillfully play with joyful chant.  For the Lord's word is true; all his works are trustworthy."
    When our eyes are fixed on God our conductor, our lives are brought into both melody and harmony, and we become a new, unique song for the Lord. No one else can sing our unique composition. Somehow, if we allow Him to,  God can even take the notes of our failures and limits and forgiven sins and even our sufferings and deaths and transform them into the harmony of an ever more glorious arrangement. Vow to make music for our God as long as you live!

    The storm increases in my head and heart, flood-waters of fear rising higher and higher...
    "I can't risk that!"
    I can't risk loving him or her.
  I can't risk revealing my weaknesses.
    I can't risk leaving my job to take this new one.
    I can't risk giving away that money.
    I can't risk trying out that new skill I have.
    I can't risk going to visit her - I wouldn't know what to say to someone who has had such a tragedy.
    Have you ever stopped to think about how often fear tries to rule your decision-making?
    Yet how often God says to us "Fear not."  Jesus says "Fear is useless."
    Once we let fear rule us, we can't think clearly, we can't measure a situation with realistic faith, hope, or love.  Instead we drown in a torrent of fear before we can even try, because fear is the greatest Enemy of faith, hope, and love.
    Once we turn a situation over to God, once we humbly ask God as our greatest Counselor to guide us, to lead us, once we begin to step out of ourselves, trusting Him, we are filled with His Spirit's power and enlightenment.  As St. Paul says in his second letter to his young comrade Timothy, who must have been frightened of his call to leadership, "For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind."  (2 Timothy 1:7), 
   

    The only time I've been in a race is when I've hurtled after a toddler intent on playing in traffic - very scary moments until I've grabbed that tiny body out of harm's way.  But there's a larger race we're all in, and that's our daily  spiritual race, our daily spiritual struggle.  It's personal, yes.  But we're not alone, ever.      The prophet who wrote Hebrews  says in Hebrews 12:1 that we are surrounded by a great cloud of witnesses as we struggle to rid ourselves of burdens and sin and persevere in running the race before us, following Jesus as our leader.  He was originally speaking about the great Jewish leaders like Abraham who had their trials of faith before the early Christians.  But we know also that these witnesses are all the holy men and women who have lived and struggled and died before us and cheer us on from Heaven. You know many of them!
    On Facebook, I'm always touched when friends post old photos of much-loved grandparents, aunts, uncles, parents who are now with God. Very often you know how hard they worked to take care of their families and their community.  Do you know that they know what you're facing in this world, and are praying for you constantly?  Cheering you on like the onlookers at every Marathon, half marathon, or 5 K? They are united with you always - that's the Communion of Saints.  Catholics believe that all the saints come into our hearts and souls with Christ as members of His Body every time we receive  His Real Presence in Holy Communion.  What a gift!
    The spiritual race is so hard!  We struggle, sweat, cry, carrying our daily burdens, taking care of the people who need us, sometimes ready to drop out.  We have to take time to listen to our hearts, hear their voices: "Beloved, we did it before you.  We struggled to keep the faith. You can make it to the Finish Line too! But remember to take the time to pass your faith on to the next generation, as we gave it to you - it's the strength and discipline your children need to make it to their Finish Lines!"
    

    How do you go about finding God?
   We can and will - because He promises us we will find Him, if we keep our eyes, ears, minds, and hearts open and aware - everywhere we go, every situation we're in.
    That's both harder and easier than it sounds. Harder because we're often so wrapped up in ourselves and our concerns that we're not aware of the numerous ways God waits to grace us.  Easier, because He's persistent!  And never gives up on us!
    I might be too preoccupied to think of God.  And then an unexpected hug from an exuberant teen illuminates my heart with God's joy.  I might be anxious.  And a smile and wave from an eighty year old parishioner in a neighboring Church pew reminds me that God is always On the Job.
   A friend told me today of missing his dead wife one Easter, then unexpectedly finding biscuits and gravy on a restaurant menu, a dish she'd often made for him that he missed too.  Smelling and eating biscuits and gravy  that Easter morning, he knew his wife was near to him and God was reminding him that we will live forever in His Presence.
    Even His creatures are His messengers. I remember being in front of my house two years ago, in the Summer, shortly after my son had died.  A neighbor, father of one of Pete's boyhood friends,  walked by with his dog, a dog my son had grown up around.  The dog passed me, stopped, turned around, straining against his leash, gazing at me with the most soulful, pitying eyes I've ever seen.  As he and his master walked, he kept turning around, gazing into my eyes, body leaning toward me as if he wanted to come to me. I swear I experienced God's love and compassion transmitted through the soul of His dog.
    Years ago, my husband and I visited friends Deacon Dave and his wife Brenda in Denver, and trekked around the Rocky Mountains.  God's grandeur seeped into my soul.  I was awed by the Power and Beauty of the One Who created such gorgeous immensity.  And we heard a lone bagpiper, dwarfed by the peaks around him, making soulful music that echoed and re-echoed off the surrounding peaks like the praise songs of angels.
    Lately I sat beside my mother's wheelchair in silent pain - as I always sit in pain when I see how cruel dementia is - and one of the nurses passing me stopped unexpectedly to share Jesus and trust in God's Will with me. Once again I saw the never-failing Presence of God in her beautiful eyes.
    Sometimes, I gently touch my newly-blooming cactus or orchid or touch the rough bark of a tree I walk past, and I swear they murmur to me in voices too soft to hear, reminding me that we are brothers and sisters, born of the same Father. And, touching them I feel healing and peace.
    God knows who we are.  We are hard-wired to experience Him, in ways unique to us and our journey. As Psalm 25 says "Every path He guides us on is fragrant with His loving-kindness and His truth."

    Sometimes I feel like God is constantly casting me on His potter's wheel to re-throw me like a piece of rebellious clay.  He's putting His whole body into centering me, and I won't be centered so He can't get me into the middle of the wheel to re-build me.  "I like who I am!" I cry. "Don't change me!  Don't form me into a new me and then re-cast me in the furnace!"    But God - in the reality of my life, my challenges, my joys, my sufferings, works to re-make me over and over.  He works to strengthen my faith by throwing me on the potter's wheel of suffering so I yell at Him "Why? Why should I believe in a God like you? Why are you allowing this to happen to me?"
    "Do you still have faith in Me?" He questions softly and I cry "Yes, I believe in You. Lord, to whom else would I ever want to go?"
     He works to strengthen my hope by confronting me over and over with death. And I yell at Him "When he, when she, left that body so it's a lifeless shell, is he or she gone forever?  Do they still exist? Can I trust there's life beyond this physical plane?  Can I trust YOU?"
    "Do you trust Me?" He whispers. And I cry even more "Lord, You know I trust You. To whom else would I ever want to go?   But sometimes, it's all so hard..!"
    He throws me on the potter's wheel of suffering and failure and death, all the while saying to me "But of course I ask you to continue to love people while you're suffering and failing, to be patient, to be kind, to bear all things, believe all things, endure all things, because otherwise - you're a hypocrite.  You talk a good game, child of mine, but that's all that it is.  A game.  A front.  Not really who you are in Me. If you can't love when you don't feel like loving, when you're too scared to love, when you're too tired to love, too bereft to love - do you really think you know how to love?"
    His pierced hands, pierced because He loved me to the point of death,  caress me, turning me, molding me into someone new, unrecognizable, beautifully strong, unbelievably resilient, with a wider mouth to open to the world, to life, and a softer heart capable of greater compassion and love.
    He sings to me as He rotates the wheel " When you die and come to me, faith will no longer be needed because you'll know Me the way that I know You. Hope will no longer be needed because you'll see Me and all that I've promised you brought to fulfillment. But oh how you'll be ready to love and love and love, because I'm building you into a perfect vessel to love Me and everyone else in this world, and continue the joy of loving for eternity."

    Stop for a minute and think of all the ways life gifts you with happiness.  A family picnic.  Attending a good baseball game. Getting your garden in. Smelling the fragrance of flowers or burning leaves. Taste-testing a new wine or ale or gourmet meal. Purchasing a guitar/motorcycle/car. Graduating from High School/College/ Grad School. Looking forward to your wedding. Cuddling a child or grand-child. Completing a painting or sculpture or song. Building a solid and beautiful deck or cabinet.  Working in a Food Pantry or teaching reading to a grateful adult. Speaking out at a Hearing on Fracking. Donating to Doctors Without Borders or Cancer or Autism Research or Reaching Out to Africa.
    The answers to this question are as various as individuals are - that's what makes our species so interesting!  But the bottom line is that the more love we put into an occasion, a relationship, a "work," the happier we are. Even the happiness that comes from owning a new possession comes, in part, from the happy occasions we envision in which we'll "share" this possession with others - a bike run, a family trip in the new car, lugging a passle of kids to camp. The deeper our capacity for God Who is Love, the deeper our capacity for happiness.
    Proverbs chapter 3 in the Book of Proverbs ("Mishle," to our Jewish friends)and in early Christian circles called "Wisdom," gives  an even deeper perspective into what makes us happy:
    "Happy is the man/woman who finds wisdom, the man who gains understanding..."  And what is wisdom? " Trust in the Lord with all your heart, on your own intelligence rely not; in all your ways be mindful of Him, and He will make straight your paths.  Be not wise in your own eyes, and turn away from evil. She (Wisdom) is a Tree of Life to those who grasp her, and he/she is happy who holds her fast."
    If we are truly wise and trust in the Lord, Proverbs tells us, we serve the Lord with confidence, and serve our neighbor with kindness. Wisdom teaches us to let go of our envy of the rich and famous, to let go of senseless quarreling, to let go of dishonest talk. 
    If we "get our heads straight" with Wisdom we allow the Lord to lead us unerringly, and life, whether awake or asleep, whether we are troubled or questioning, has a sweetness and peace that at times can seem unfathomable. We are lifted up into the gently swaying branches of God's Tree of Life, and its roots reach into the depths of the Universe.

    Every time my Jewett grandsons, Cam (left) and Zach (right) come to visit from Whitney Point, I feel like I'm beginning all over again in getting to know them.  They grow and change so much in between visits!  When they were younger, we stocked up on Honey Nut Cheerios and bananas for visits; now it's Gala apples and turkey bacon.  Before, they'd snuggle on my lap; now they look at me eye to eye, grinning at their height and my increasing shortness. Once we'd watch Dora and Diego together; now it's giggles at Sponge Bob.
    Then again, every encounter with anyone I know is always a new beginning, a new connection with who that loved one really is.  Relationships go sour the minute we think we've plumbed the depths of another's personality and soul. Being open to new insights is the sure cure for boredom! Like telling Zack he couldn't have Coke with caffeine at bedtime because it would keep him awake and having him deadpan "That's the idea." I now know that kid has the strategic moves to learn chess!
    In the same way, every time we turn to God, it's a new beginning.  Maybe once we thought of God as Santa Claus, who'd give us exactly what we wanted if we said enough Our Fathers or Novenas, read enough Scripture, or attended Temple or Synagogue or Mosque every week.  Then He didn't answer a want of ours and we had to struggle with the relationship until we understood He gives us what we need.  Maybe we lost a home or a job or our health and we were angry with Him. Until enough time elapsed that we could see He was writing straight with crooked lines and we'd grown into new stronger people through loss.  Maybe we'd always thought of ourselves as unlovable. And when Life itself kept gifting us, we realized we are all God's beloved children, and nothing good that happens to us is an accident.
    Maybe there are times, thinking of God, that words refuse to come, and in the silence we feel Him close, and we just - are! with Him, relaxing as we relax in silence with a beloved friend. Or, in this silence, there is darkness, because we recognize how far beyond us He is, how unknowable - and He teaches us that our loving yearning for Him and His loving yearning for us bridges the distance between the Divine and human beings.
    So - as children, grandchildren, spouses, and friends continue to amaze and delight you in ever-new twists and turns in your relationships, be alive and aware of the new ways God leads you in your relationship with Him. "The Lord longs to be gracious to you; He rises to show you compassion." (Isaiah 30: 18)


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Memorial Day Weekend is a family holiday, time to invite the clan and extended family to enjoy each others' company, time for nostalgia. Here is a family/extended family photo I took years ago that I treasure. 
    My Mom in front, head tilted, beautiful proud smile. My husband Paul, face aglow, in his striped shirt.  My oldest child, Mary Beth, the mellow counselor, next to her Gram. Above my oldest, her sister, dark-haired, flashing-eyed, dancer Cathy, the perfect middle child. Next to Cathy, my youngest, John, still in his Cool Rapper, hair-over-the-eye, phase. Directly opposite John, his dark-haired, bearded oldest brother Paul, the guitarist, still in HIS Jazzy rock star stage. Between the brothers, middle brother Pete, another rock star, more inclined to angst and Pearl Jam when he wasn't cracking  jokes.
    Next to Pete is family friend John Wilde, and above my husband, Laurie Weaver, another family friend, because we, with five youngsters, were ALWAYS an extended family.
    Looking at these beautiful, smiling people today, I know their coming joys and sorrows, the ways they've grown, the illnesses and challenges they've endured and are enduring. The ways they've caused our family and extended family to wonderfully grow through their weddings and their children. Their children who have died. My child who has died, Peter.  My smiling mother's eventual battle with dementia. Above all, I remember eternal, enduring joy and love, the incredible intimacy of knowing that traveling to where any one of them is, I am at home. That's Whitney Point, with Cathy. New York City with John. Cheektowaga with Paul.  South Wales with Mary Beth. Beacon, N.Y.  with Pete's wife Merritt and their children.
    If you ever want to understand the concept of God as Trinity, look at a family photo. Because we were created in God's Image, and God is Family - three unique Persons, living in a perfectly loving, intimate relationship with each other in a Mystery of perfect Unity  we can't begin to fathom. That's why every bit of our genetic make-up impels us into loving relationships.  We weren't created to be alone!
    One day our human family will become part of that much greater Family called the Trinity - and the most perfect of eternal Family Holidays will be in full swing! With no more tears, no more separations. Only togetherness.
    

    My grandson Elijah endured one of the worst traumas a child could endure a little over two years ago.  His father - our son Peter - died of a brain tumor.  To make matters worse, Eli is adopted, and his birth father has not been part of his life since he was a baby, although his birth mother has remained a wonderful part of his and Peter's wife Merritt's life.  We have a video of Peter's hands as, awestruck, he gives his new son his first bath. 
    When Peter was slowly dying, two years ago, he kept saying to me "Will Elijah be O.K.?"  And I kept saying "Yes."  Because, in spite of my grief, in spite of my angry "Why, God? Why?"  I trusted God would take care of one of His little ones. 
    Awhile after Pete's death, Eli, his two younger adopted brothers (twins Say and Jay) and his Mom Merritt moved to Beacon, New York, where God's miracles of new growth began in earnest. Merritt found Eli a school which he loves as much or more than his school back in the Buffalo area.  He started guitar lessons, which he loves.  He loves the big old house his Mom bought, and  the surrounding yard - he's always loved solitary rambles outside. The grieving boy who back in Buffalo used to stare at our T.V. while he ate his peanut butter and jelly sandwiches  without a word finally has began to smile a lot of the time. 
    So here is a photo of God's newest way of healing this little boy - a new puppy.  Cuddling this wriggly little  life, Eli told his Mom that the "gap" left in his heart since his Dad died is finally being filled (almost).
    In the last book of the Bible, the book of Revelation, or the Apocalypse, Christ, the One Who sits on the throne, says "Behold, I make all things new." (Rev. 21:5) That last book, those words, bring us into the present, the Now, where He still sits on the Throne, still acts slowly and tenderly to bring newness, freshness, healing to us, in spite of - sometimes because of - the greatest hurts and tragedies in our lives.  The only thing that can stand in the way of His working for us IS us - if we remain bitter and angry and turn away.         Open your heart. Invite God in. Let Him produce unexpected miracles of newness in your life.

    How often my life seems like a trek through an unknown forest, full of paths that take me first in one direction and then another so that I'm lost, terrified, and night is drawing near. "God, help me, I don't know which way to go! Which path should I take?"
    I'm paralyzed, fearing that the decisions I make will result in even more problems than the ones I have already.  Exhausted, I decide to rest.  Mentally I sit down on the low stone wall that meanders through the forest. I hear sounds - the chittering of chipmunks, the rapping of a wood pecker.  The wind soughs peacefully through the tree branches, green leaves fluttering in a dance. In the distance, i see graceful brown shapes, necks bending.  Deer - grazing. I gaze, bewitched by their unselfconscious beauty.
    I hear a soft voice.  "Good.  You're taking time to enjoy the journey."
    My back straightens. "Yes,"  I agree. "I stopped panicking long enough to look around, to relax.  But where are You in all of this?"
    "If you draw near to me, I draw near to you, remember?"
    "Yes."
    "Then look around you."
     I crane my neck, looking in every direction. The tall, beautiful trees.  The sun, slanting through the branches.  The chipmunks and squirrels, the woodpeckers and deer.  The bewildering paths. Then I feel the sun-warmed surface beneath me, my support, and look at it, winding through the woods ahead of me.
    "The wall," I whisper.  Quiet, unobtrusive, it will unerringly lead me through the forest to a plain of safety.
    "Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you." (James 4:8)
    And sometimes He is as unnoticeable yet dependable as a low stone wall.
   
(Thanks to Michael Dibble for the photo.)