A Week Named HOLY!

A businessman known for his ruthless practices bragged to Mark Twain, “Before I die I mean to make a pilgrimage to the Holy Land. I will climb Mount Sinai and read the 10 Commandments aloud at the top.” Twain retorted, “I have a better idea. You could stay in Boston and keep them.”

As we enter into this week named HOLY there is no need to make a pilgrimage to a far away land, or to climb a sacred high mountain, or shout out commandments once given to Moses!
The HOLY can be found within our own hearts and lives.  The land upon which we live, walk, and have our being is holy.  The "mountains" of joyful and sorrowful events in our everyday world call us to be open to tranformation.  And the Beatitudes of today invite us to live with justice, mercy, forgiveness, and compassion.  All is HOLY this week. 

Thank you for visiting Streams 'N Stirrings!

In the gospel of Mark (8:22-27), there is a story of how people from a village brought a blind man to Jesus for healing. The story unfolds with Jesus taking the blind man by the hand and leading him beyond the village. "He put spit on the man’s eyes, laid hands on him and asked, ‘Do you see anything?’" The man responded that he saw people, but they looked like trees walking. So Jesus had to lay his hands on the man’s eyes once again and the man recovered his sight with 20/20 vision!

This is a great story of how we come through the process of discernment. The spirit often invites us to leave our comfort zones so that in our discomfort we can be freed from our illusions and our grasping of certainty to notice how we feel within, so that we can learn to trust God’s grace and light. In this "hand-holding experience," we step aside from the "village of the familiar," letting go of voices, attitudes, ways of living and knowing, and walk with trust with the God of Mystery. Much like the man in the story, we are never alone. God is present with us as we encounter new events, circumstances, relationships, and experiences that are part of our search for what God desires of us. Discernment is a process that cannot be forced. There is no "drive-thru" for discernment; there is no app for quick and easy answers; and there are no flashing lights with bells and whistles pointing to the right path! Often we find clarity and peace a little at a time – we get "blurry-clear" insights and begin to notice more and more God’s purpose for us with each step on our journey. We are invited to notice signs in our everyday lives that God seems to put in our path to point to the way that will give us peace and joy. This movement is often slow, so as to allow God to gently take us by the hand and to touch our hearts again and again, so that our seeing becomes a vision of how we are being called to a new way of being and becoming.



How is this video like the process of discernment?

Picture an iceberg. The bulk of its power lies below the surface. The part of the iceberg that sunk the Titanic, for example, was not the 10 percent above the water; it was the 90 percent below the surface that did the damage. For human beings, it is also often true that the 90 percent below the surface -our unconscious beliefs, attitudes and habits - sinks our fondest hopes and dreams. (Robert White) Discernment involves discovering that 90% - your talents, dreams, hopes, desires - and the best place for you to be empowered to make a difference in the lives of others. Consider CSA!!!

A long loving look at what is - discernment.

There was a small boy who when walking down the street one day found a bright copper penny. He was so excited that he found money and it didn’t cost him anything. This experience led him to spend the rest of his days walking with his head down, eyes wide open, looking for treasure.

During his lifetime he found 296 pennies, 48 nickels, 19 dimes, 16 quarters, 2 half dollars and one crinkled dollar bill. For a total of $13.96.

He got money for nothing. Except that he missed the breathless beauty of 31,369 sunsets, the colorful splendor of 157 rainbows, the fiery beauty of hundreds of maples nipped by autumn’s frost. He never saw white clouds drifting across blue skies, shifting into various wondrous formations. Birds flying, sun shining, and the smiles of a thousand passing people are not a part of his memory. (author unknown)

Days before his murder Archbishop Romero told a reporter, "You can tell the people that if they succeed in killing me, that I forgive and bless those who do it. Hopefully, they will realize they are wasting their time. A bishop will die, but the church of God, which is the people, will never perish."
http://onlineministries.creighton.edu/CollaborativeMinistry/romero.html

Remembering Archbishop Oscar Romero