Celebrating Grace

7:19 AM

I am in the rocker at the window with a glorious mug of caffeinated goodness...the proportions fell just so and settled into a fullness beyond the average...A nice morning for that to have happened, too--today is the fourth anniversary of my final vows.

And here I am, celebrating this life in Canada...who'd have known? When I think of all that has happened since then...how that moment--or period--was a time of conversion and coming together and moving forward all wrapped up into your absolute grace... Thank you for that. Thank you for This.

Four years ago, I made "final vows"--but now, as I look back and look in a mirror and look ahead, it could be that they weren't "final" in the conventional sense...but rather a lifelong commitment to Beginning. Beginning with Yes. Beginning where I am with the cumulation of experiences that have brought me there. Beginning, setting out, open and free and curious. Beginning, attentive and 'lista' (ready and intelligent)... Beginning kindly, with compassion and understanding and "alegria profunda" (deep joy)...open to my own humanity and responding to what and to whom I encounter as you would have me and inspire me to respond...

Beginning while promising to follow Jesus Christ more closely in the Society of the Sacred Heart... Vowed to simplicity...vowed to "...letting go enough, loosening until/ it no longer matters or is possible to know/ spark from fire from sunrise/ and whether the glow is inside or out." (from Chastity Oct. 2010) Vowed to "love that frees me and compels me/ to choose you again and yet again.../ that I might respond as I wish to respond.../ openly, knowingly, even a little mysteriously.../ as the bush in the desert responded to flame." (from Obedience, published in The Review for Religious, January 2012.)

The commitment is with my life and with my sisters and with the people of God...the living of it is ever new, ever alive, with each rising sun. The commitment is with you and to you and grace upon grace, world without end. Amen.

 

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