We are the weird ones. We sign names of the dead on Christmas cards. We hang their photos on our walls. We count them in our family when strangers ask at the grocery store. We tattoo their memory on our skin. We know you may think this is strange. We are trying to tell you a secret. It is the truth we learned the hardest way. It is the other side that changed everything we knew. And today is one of our handful of holy days. Today in the Catholic Church we remember the faithful departed. Which is a fancy way of saying God's beloved. All the souls that came from God and returned to God, changing lives in whatever span of time they passed through this earth of here and now. All Souls' Day is the quiet cousin to All Saints, the overlooked neighbor next to the feast of fanfare. Almost an afterthought - if it did not hold the secret to everything. Which is that we hold within us the promise of eternity. The truth is so quiet that noise clamors to drown it out and despair … [Read more...] about for all our souls
thin places
the hardest and holiest of weeks
Thin places. The ancient Celts gave us this phrase to capture the feeling of space and time when heaven and earth are scarcely separated. My life has held a handful of these sacred moments and holy grounds. I imagine yours has, too. I always recognized these encounters in space and time by their sheerness - the sense that I could simply reach out and touch a Presence that I did not feel elsewhere. Where walls once stood solid and strong between here and heaven, everything collapsed for a brief, beautiful instant. Holy Week has often been a thin place for me. One year I suffered a deep hurt during these days and had to start a long learning of what it means to forgive. Another year someone I love came to a point of crisis in this week, and I had to witness another kind of suffering unfold too close to home. Over time I have journeyed through these days inside and out. Trying to make sense of the stories we tell of death and resurrection. Trying to make sense of my … [Read more...] about the hardest and holiest of weeks
