The image this week is speaking powerfully, wordlessly into my being, my life. The phrase from John of the cross has been a long time companion, this week with a new incarnational twist, the me, the you is no longer me, myself alone, what a liberation! The paragraph by Fr. Brendan McGuire disturbed immensely this week. Week three of the Ignatian exercise only, the Christ absorbs, transforms. What can this mean embracing a new sense for me of the Incarnation. The many, many people I have accompanied, walked with, who have been bruised, broken absorbing what was not theirs to absorb. As an incarnation person I hold all that harm, that hurt, so the bruised, the broken can see beneath, so they can claim I am a good person, I’ve been bruised, broken by circumstances beyond me, but I am a good person! As an incarnation person I listen. The biggest compliment I have received : no has listened to me in this way. Holding, listening, I don’t absorb “stuff” mine or others, I don’t do transforming, that is what is so beautiful Incarnation. And so, this 2024, I am deeply grateful for “incarnation continua”: my part consenting, accepting. surrendering, embracing ever-deeper purification. And perhaps, delight of finding myself into the bigger box of my being. I AM GRATEFUL FOR ALL OF YOU WHO, HOLD, LISTEN. The kind of nourishment I get with you, WoW-companions I find nowhere else.
