As I meet Jesus’ gaze and accept His challenging invitation to let go of everything, what surfaces most frequently is esteem/approval. I pray “Lord, I am loving to the best of my ability, help me love better.” Or, as Father Keating says is the short form: help! <3 linda

“Love beholds emanations of light and beauty even in the dire and distressing.” I can affirm this is most certainly true. <3 linda

Henri Nouwen’s sentence resonates: “Compassion means full immersion in the condition of being human.” Embracing my own brokenness, fears, confusion and anguish allows me to come alongside others also experiencing these emotions and states of being, especially those closest to me. To be able to help them navigate difficult situations helps me navigate them. We buoy each other. <3 linda

The short phrase “holy unknowing” speaks deeply to my journey of late. A major health crisis with my beloved husband thrust me headfirst into holy unknowing, trusting God and our health care professionals. All I could muster was “heart sight” – trying to see the situation from God’s heart. I can say from a vantage of three weeks later it is well, it is well with my soul. <3 linda

My family and those closest friends know when I feel deeply about a topic, when I attempt to express myself, all that comes are tears.

Jesus asks, “who do you say I am, Linda?” All I can do is gaze back at Him and weep. My heart is full of love, my mouth empty of words. Somehow, I know Jesus understands this response. <3 linda

I can honestly state my “willingness to suffer [my] slice of the human condition for the love of God and the healing of humanity” comes with a sizeable portion of trepidation. The “love of God” part is easier. The “healing of humanity” starts at home, with me, and therein lies my unease. With daily practice the apprehension lifts gradually. With a lifetime of practice, I may be able to “suffer my slice of the human condition” with peace. <3 linda

Rumi gets it. No matter the thought or emotion, allow it, welcome it. I am learning to welcome fears of declining health; I am not just yet able to meet them at the door laughing. The door, however, is open, and the Welcoming Prayer ushers them inside.

Merton gets it. We have to withdraw “from the noise and the confusion of a world that does not understand itself…” I must maintain a contemplative discipline to carry on God’s work and find the peace God wills for me.

My breath prayer this week: welcome; peace. <3 linda

“…our will-to-God is equally our will to be. We can now accept ourselves and our human lives without fear of going contrary to God, because now there is no contradiction of wills.”

Warts and all, as the saying goes. I have come to accept my human life, after a lifetime of searching for God’s will, because me being me is God’s will. Daily I walk in the silence, awestruck by God’s loving me, warts and all. All I can do in return is to be the me-ist I can be. <3 linda

“This is the joy of the Kingdom – to be free of our personal and ambiguous confusions about what happiness is and to allow God in God’s infinite wisdom let happen to us what happens.” (Father Keating)

I readily admit my own ambiguous confusions about what happiness is. I must deeply trust God in order to allow God in God’s infinite wisdom let happen to me what happens. Not easy for a self-identified reforming control freak – yet it is my walk at this time. Lord, I believe; help my unbelief! <3 linda

As I read today’s meditation this morning, I was drawn to the very first sentence: When we have exhausted our resources and are quite frankly ready to give up our sense of call, or at least to walk it back to something tamer and more humanly “reasonable”, we are invited to accept our powerlessness and embrace a radical dependence on God.

Typical Sunday here. I gave my spouse a haircut (I have been barbering since the start of Covid). Launder bedding, cook, routines of a practical nature, yet deeply infused with God’s love and grace. Each task performed with my hands, met with God’s strength. I trust God strengthens me as I lean into my radical dependence. <3 linda

“Forgiveness arises out of creative love;”

“Forgiveness is the act of making a new future…”

“Forgiveness is resurrected life;”

It is as if each person of the Trinity is calling me to respond to each of these verses from Ilia Delio’s poem as from Father, Son and Spirit. My desire to love as God loves births forgiveness, an act of making a new future – not only for myself but for all I encounter. The weight lifted from me when someone extends forgiveness is resurrected life. I pray I can remain connected to this creative love and forgiveness. <3 linda

Choosing love and peace above all options this week, I found I had more compassion for those in pain, physically and emotionally. I pray peace into situations that appear in the news. My breath prayer: “surrender all judgment to God.” <3 linda

Ilia Delio’s sentence resonates deeply: “By nurturing our inner life through prayer and reflection, we become vessels of God’s boundless compassion, capable of bringing hope and healing to a fractured world.” St. Francis’ prayer came to mind as well: make me a channel of your peace. Vessels carry, channels flow, to those who need hope and healing. I don’t have to go far to encounter a fractured world. I pray peace and compassion be my offering daily. <3 linda

“Centering Prayer is a training school for accepting failure, unknowing and even more so, overflowing Divine Love.”

We are chosen and destined to live in Christ, as Christ, in and through our ordinary lives.”

These two quotes speak deeply to being fully present in each moment. Our daily life is our training school. A loved one’s embrace amidst acceptance of failure means so much, lets us know we tried our best and Christ still lives in us. I am holding tight to “the light of love, until you know the fire you were made of and your invitation to burn!” <3 linda

After reading Father Keating’s complete writings on “Powerlessness”, I am drawn to two passages. “Finally, powerlessness is the greatest power there is because it enables one to simply be more an more a channel of God’s power and love, because the project is not our aggrandizement or perfection.” …and… “With time you become content with your weakness and happy to be utterly dependent on God.”

The only way I can become a channel of God’s hope to the world is to become as powerless as a water conduit – just open, no role except to stay open, allowing God’s hope to flow through me to the world. Am I always content with my weakness? No, yet progress is faithfully made, twenty minutes, twice a day. <3 linda

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