It was around this time of year, late summer, that we sold our house and moved into an apartment. After 25 years in the same home, I found the whole moving process a bit stressful as we tried to decide what to keep and what to give away or throw away. It’s hard to separate the memories from the objects themselves. Some things are so cherished that they take on a priceless quality, far beyond their market value.
First, we struggled to sell the dining room table, an inheritance from my beloved mother-in-law, Josephine. Then came the sale of my old record albums of The Rolling Stones, Aretha Franklin, Janis Joplin, and Prince. It didn’t matter that I hadn’t had a turntable to play them on in nearly 30 years; they were special to me, holding all my faded dreams of one day being a rock star. But what I dreaded most was dealing with an old, dust-covered box in the far, dark corner of our basement. You see, I am a photographer—well, an amateur photographer, that is—and in that box were nearly all the 35-millimeter pictures I had ever taken. That dusty cardboard box contained the historical documentation of my lifelong quest to answer the questions, “Who am I?” and “Where is my place in the world?”
These are the same questions that Jesus often addressed with the disciples. He was always trying to prepare them for the time after the resurrection, when his physical presence would no longer be with them, and to show them what he meant by “As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love” (John 15, 9-17). He knew that nothing in the entire universe would ever be the same after his death, resurrection, and ascension, and that the only answer to those questions was to remain in his love.
Regardless of our age or life circumstances, most of us spend a lifetime searching for answers to the questions: Who am I? Where is my place in this world? That’s why we sit in silent contemplation, living in the present moment through Centering Prayer, and realize that our search for those answers is ultimately a search for Christ. We know the answer is always right in front of us, but at times the questions grow more desperate, such as when a loved one dies, a marriage ends in divorce, or a cancer diagnosis is made. During those moments, we need something to hold on to, to comfort and console us, and to remind us that things are OK. Something like photographs.
That’s when I began sitting in silence with Centering Prayer. Then one day, as I looked through each of those pictures, I realized that it wasn’t the pictures themselves that held the story or the gift of that moment, but the experience itself that held the presence of meaning and love. Without making space for contemplation and Centering Prayer in my life, my fear, desolation, and desperation can lead me to frantically gather my photographs and store them in boxes all over my life, and I may miss the reality that my life already embodies the timeless presence of God’s eternal love. In Centering Prayer, I realized that my actions, decisions, and journey embody all those picture-perfect moments that have guided and carried me to this present moment and place in the world.
In many ways, Jesus is not just giving me something in Centering Prayer; he tells me who I am. If I remain in his love by loving others, I have what Jesus has with the Father and am complete. In that love, I come to know that God’s presence transcends time and space, as well as good and evil, life and death. Ultimately, it is all about me, in the best sense of the phrase.
Who am I? I am the love of Christ. Where is my place in the world? To be the love of Christ to one another.
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Brad Huard is a spiritual director and writer residing in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, USA. He has been practicing Centering Prayer for 25 years.
