Translating a World on the Edge

My husband and I are “fixing up” our house.  We allotted ourselves a budget, so I looked through magazines for ideas to modernize and make our house prettier, and then I showed my husband the pictures. He wasn’t impressed.

“We have to start with the innards,” he said. “Those things that are not working correctly and really need to be fixed–like the AC, the hot water heater, the sprinkler system, better insulation, etc.”

Innards are the interior workings of a thing, the insides or guts. Innards don’t sound exciting, let alone beautiful. Often, they are hidden, so we don’t even notice them, and they don’t make a house prettier— they do, however, make a house last.

Not many of us want to look at the innards of things–especially the interior innards of our own ‘selves.’ One reason might be out of shame, because we know we could do better, and haven’t.

Another reason is that inner things are often harder to fix. It’s easier to spruce ourselves up on the outside with new clothes, hair-cuts, or make-up. We want the world to see a pretty outside, rather than do the harder work of BEING a better person inside.

How do we get to be a better person? We first have to take a good look at ourselves—especially the way we treat others. We have to be able to stand in the other person’s shoes in order to feel compassion for him or her.  If we have compassion, it’s easier not to get angry with another.  It’s also easier to forgive if we try to understand the person who’s hurt us.

These inner qualities can only be seen through the actions we take toward others—and ourselves, because we’re meant to love ourselves as well,  and to forgive ourselves, too.

Do we want to be just another prettied up face in the crowd?   Or do we want to be a person who matters in the lives of others?

Before we concentrate on our superficial looks, let’s first see if our innards need fixing.  and  start there.

Trunk, leaves, and branches, are important parts of what it means to be a tree.

Stem, petals, and stamen, are important parts of what it means to be a flower.

Bones, skin,  and muscle are important parts of what it means to be an animal.

Language, decision-making, and love are crucial to what it means to be a human being.

Those are only a few of the attributes that give these living things their meanings. And each of their meanings is different as it pertains to the world it lives in. (more…)

“In the novelist’s case, prophecy is a matter of seeing near things with their extensions of meaning and thus of seeing far things close up. The prophet is a realist of distances, and it is this kind of realism that you find in the best modern instances of the grotesque. Whenever I’m asked why Southern writers particularly have a penchant for writing about freaks, I say it is because we are still able to recognize one.” Flannery O’Connor

What are the “far things” O’Connor is talking about?—the connection between close-up realism on Earth and a higher spiritual Truth. God and our relationship with Him, however weak or strong or strange; this is what O’Connor writes about. This is what I strive to write about, too.

To show God’s presence in the world, a writer who wants to bring far things close up often uses the strange or the outlandish. O’Connor called it the ‘grotesque.’ She was an author who wrote fifty years ago, when not only the South, but most other areas recognized the outlandish as just that.

Today, the rules concerning what is strange have changed. Oddity has become almost normal. Yet God hasn’t changed. He is just as apparent in our world, maybe even more so. And to present Him in fiction, a writer cannot just whisper, or use sentimental fluff to show His action through people. A writer concerned with presenting the chance of salvation has to yell above an already noisy and distracted world.

Many of us yearn for a chance of restoration. And most readers have a desire for some redemptive act in a novel or story that offers the chance of restoration as well. We long for that moment of grace that will turn us, or better us, or lift us up to higher place in the eyes of those we love. Yet we often forget that the price of restoration sometimes takes the grotesqueness of a crucifixion.

I’m polishing up a novel about restoration now–and I ask for your prayers that I succeed.

When I go through situations that I don’t choose and don’t want to go through, I picture the end result as the shine on a diamond.

Our life is a process. Each of us undergoes pressure, and stress. Each of us must take on the heat of learning to live in a very flawed world. But our suffering is often a polishing. If we do it right, we can shine, we can sparkle like a diamond.

Natural diamonds are precious and expensive because of how and where they are formed–at extremely high temperature and pressure, and at depths of 87 to 120 miles deep in the Earth’s mantle. Using carbon-containing minerals, the time period in which they develop ranges from 1 billion to 3.3 billion years. Diamonds are brought close to the Earth′s surface through deep volcanic eruptions by a magma, which then cools into rocks.

That sounds very complicated and intense, doesn’t it? Just like our own lives sometimes are.

If we want a life that shines like a diamond, we have to remember that LIFE IS A PROCESS in capital letters. We may have distances between us at times. We may be bombarded by life’s eruptions–diseases of the body and mind, the financial strain of daily providing for ourselves and our families, grief, loss, and worry over the waywardness, or even the death of a loved one. In these difficult situations, we are like diamonds forming. We are deep within a dark Earth. Yet we can rise.

We can sparkle.

And we can shine.

It’s up to us.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W8OdhP0jxUY

May God Bless America.

We are in desperate need of His blessing today!

Some of you are way too young to remember Frank Sinatra. I know from my parents that his songs helped get them, and many others, through World War II.

Below are the lyrics to one particular song Sinatra loved to sing–a simple song about simple American things that may soon be lost to us, unless we speak out.  The song is “The House I live in.”

What is America to me?
A name, a map, or a flag I see
A certain word, democracy
What is America to me?

I sometimes wonder if we’ve forgotten what a great country our founding fathers came up with, how hard they fought for it. Why were individual freedoms so important to them?— Because they were being taken away by the  greed of a controlling English crown.

The house I live in
A plot of earth, a street
The grocer and the butcher
Or the people that I meet

We still have the right to live where we want, not where a government tells us to live. But we are taxed on property as if the government owned it with us.

The children in the playground
The faces that I see
All races and religions
That’s America to me

Our children on school playgrounds are told now, what they can play and what they cannot play.  And in school, our children are taught about a government imposed morality–what only parents have the right to teach at home.  To say that our Religious liberty is at stake is more than an understatement.

The place I work in
The worker by my side
The little town the city
Where my people lived and died

Small business owners, like the grocer and butcher and many others, are being told what to do. They don’t run a small business except by government imposed standards.

The howdy and the handshake
The air a feeling free
And the right to speak my mind out
That’s America to me

Can we really speak our mind–even through our representatives? What happens to those who do?

The things i see about me
The big things and the small
That little corner newsstand
Or the house a mile tall

What do we see about us now?  The strong values of America have weakened to the strength of a wet mop.

The wedding and the churchyard
The laughter and the tears
And the dream that’s been a growing
For more than two hundred years

The dream of America was Freedom. It’s being chipped away, one law at a time. Can you even decide your own healthcare?

The town  I live in
The street, the house, the room
The pavement of the city
Or the garden all in bloom

States rights are practically nil today. The government bureaucracy has a finger in every state pie.

The church the school the clubhouse
The millions lights i see
But especially the people
– yes especially the people
That’s America to me

But here is the saving grace–THE PEOPLE–you and I. Our hands, our mouths, our votes. I pray we will not be fooled again. I pray that America is restored to the great and noble country she once was.  I pray for a new day of Freedom—a day that truly is OF THE PEOPLE, and UNDER GOD, not the government.

Are you an ant, or a butterfly?

Are you self-motivated enough to finish what you start?  Or do you flit from one thing to another?

Sometimes we have a great plan, with great goals and values. But when the plan doesn’t  achieve immediate success, we jump quickly into something else.

We flit, like a butterfly, dipping from flower to flower. Maybe we do this out of fear of failure, or financial pressure, or some other distraction–but we do it. And we do it too frequently.

Butterflies are beautiful, but in their days as a caterpillar they can eat through a garden. You’ve heard of  The Hungry Caterpillar?

The tiny ant can teach us self-motivation. Ants  get organized. They stay focused. They see their plan through to a completed anthill.  (Unless someone comes with ant-killer!) And in the end, working together, they have created something good—not only for themselves, but for their cohorts.

So, I’m going to  stay a little bit longer with what I’m doing.  I’m going to ignore the beauty of the butterfly and concentrate on the ant. I’m not going to fold up my chair and leave the hall. I might miss the music of something really grand.

Now, can you hang with this video until the end?

For the lady involved, one of the first rules of Ballroom dancing is:  Let your partner lead.

Oh, is that hard to do for me! I like to be in control. I like to be in charge. I think it comes from having been the mother of five, as well as a business owner for a good portion of my life.

But I’ve come to see that this does not always work.

A few years back, I was in charge of driving one of my daughters to college at Belmont Abbey in North Carolina.  I had to drive through Atlanta, always a fearful drive to me.  In addition, two of my younger children were with me, making noise, causing so much confusion that I had trouble following the signs. I ordered them to behave. I ordered them to be quiet. Oh yes, I yelled out all the consequences they would face!

Then, in the busy traffic, I approached an overhead aqueduct with a scrawl of words in black paint: JESUS IS IN CONTROL.  How happy I was for that reminder!

Because Jesus is in control.

We don’t need to lead.  He will do it.

All we need to do is relax in His arms.

With no more yelling, I made it through Atlanta. I made it to the college.

I’ve made it through much more difficult situations over the years.

I’ve made it with the help of Jesus, the controlling partner in the dance of my life..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AOCttam63NM

On Earth, we don’t have the fullness of Heaven, where all is perfect and God’s presence is enjoyed eternally. But when we pray that God’s kingdom will come on earth (as in the Lord’s Prayer) we want  our devotion and our service to God to show that He is present, here, in some way. We do this by loving and caring for the people He created; all people, made in His image and likeness.

We can choose not to do this. We can choose to hate, or disrupt, or bring others down. We can choose not to see their connection to the God who made them, and us—-

But—-

This does not mean we should be blindly tolerant. This does not mean that we go along with everything. At times, it means that we are called to rock the boat. At times, we are called to ‘overturn the tables in the temple’ as Jesus did.

I think this is one of those times. I believe our country, our America is being threatened from within.

If you read this blog, you know I’m a fan of Aesop’s fables. Here is another: The Swallow and the Other Birds

“It happened that a Countryman was sowing some hemp seeds in a field where a Swallow and some other birds were hopping about picking up their food. “Beware of that man,” quoth the Swallow. “Why, what is he doing?” said the others. “That is hemp seed he is sowing; be careful to pick up every one of the seeds, or else you will repent it.” The birds paid no heed to the Swallow’s words, and by and by the hemp grew up and was made into cord, and of the cords nets were made, and many a bird that had despised the Swallow’s advice was caught in nets made out of that very hemp.
“What did I tell you?” said the Swallow. “Destroy the seed of evil, or it will grow up to your ruin. “

We find it so easy to go along with the crowd—and we find it so hard to stand up against what we know isn’t right. And often we throw up our hands and give up on something, or someone—a child, a friend, a co-worker, even a spouse.

Today, I ask: Have we given up on America? Have we become tired or indifferent to what our country was supposed to be, but is no longer? What can we do about it?

Of course, the first answer is prayer. But we should expect that our prayer will lead God to call for our  personal action. When we pray that God’s Kingdom will come on earth—who will bring it if not us? We are, after all, God’s hands, heart, eyes, and feet on Earth.

The call we discover through prayer will be different for each of us. It may be a tiny call by God. It may be a significant one. But small or large, if we don’t act on it, nothing will change for the better.

And so, I ask: Does the re-constructed path we’re presently allowing in America resemble God’s Kingdom on Earth? If not, then in prayer, each one of us should listen carefully to what we ought to do to make it better.

Last Saturday, I held a Stories of Faith workshop in my parish. The purpose was to consider a particular time that God had been present in the participant’s life, and for him or her to write about it.

At the beginning of the workshop, each person was to write down a single word that might express his or her own faith experience. There were 18 participants, and there were 17 different words expressed. Only two people picked the same word!

I was amazed at how varied the responses were. But aren’t we all so different? God touches us very uniquely in our particular situations. How vast, how great, how infinite He must be!

Some of the words were: relief, patience, love, thankful, surrender, acceptance, frustration, tears, lost, joy, and many others that escape me at the moment. But there was one word expressed that touched me personally. That word was Fear.

For most of my life, I’ve had to work to get away from of this emotion–in small things, as well as in larger ones. I happen to know that the lady at workshop who chose the word, Fear, had transported herself and her family to Dothan after surviving the terror of Hurricane Katrina that practically wiped out her small town. I cannot imagine what she lost. I can, however, imagine her fear. (more…)

Gratitude is one of the most truthful ways of finding the presence of God in a person’s life.

In a study done by Samuels and Lester (1985) it was contended that in a small sample of Catholic nuns and priests, out of 50 emotions, love and gratitude were the most experienced emotion towards God. And in the Orthodox, Catholic and Anglican Churches, the most important rite is called the Eucharist. The name derives from the Greek word eucharistia for thanksgiving.

So what is true gratitude for me? Today, it is having found the presence of God in Mobile, Alabama; in people whose faces I saw for the first time, in old friends I reconnected with after many years, and in the kind reception of new friends.

I returned from Mobile yesterday afternoon filled with gratitude.

To Deborah, and The Daughters of Mary at St. Ignatius Catholic Church, where I gave a presentation of ‘some’ of the sinners and saints in my novel, “A Hunger in the Heart.” I say, thank you.

To the Jesuits and faculty members at Spring Hill College, where I served on a panel discussion about the Catholic Imagination and Fiction, I say, thank you.

To Ron and to Susie, who hosted a beautiful dinner for us, I say, thank you.

To Peter, my publisher, and Joseph, my editor at Tuscany Press, I say, thank you.

And since I heard a little affectionate teasing about my Dothan accent, I’ll say again to everyone I met.  From the depths of my heart,  “I wanna thank ya’ll.”