Approaching God

This past Sunday I took my turn as chalice bearer at the church. I stood next to the priest during the eucharistic prayer and, after receiving the bread and wine myself, carried the cup of wine to the altar rail. I followed the priest around the arc of my church family, offering the chalice to each one saying, "the blood of Christ, the cup of salvation."

As I passed from person to person, I began to notice the variety of ways each one participated in the ritual of the sacrament. Some stood and some knelt. The bread was placed in open palms, raised to accept the body of Christ. Some brought their open palms to their mouths to eat the bread while others lifted the bread from one hand with the other and some held the bread, waiting for the cup I carried. As I offered the cup, some dipped the bread into the wine (intinction), some guided the chalice to their lips and drank deeply or with a sip. Some made eye contact with me, some gazed into the chalice.

We come with reverence to receive communion. And we approach God as the individuals that God created us to be. We accept the gift of Christ's body and blood and we offer our God-given gifts back to God... "all things come of Thee, o Lord; and of Thine own have we given Thee."

I am thankful that God loves me, individually, with all my quirks and failings and all my gifts.
Amen and amen.

A New Blog Link

Yes, we set up a great blog for the Dominican Republic Mission Trip. Then, when the Iowa team headed out, I was thinking it would be good to rename the DR blog to a blog we could use for all of the St. Anne's short term mission trips. After realizing that the email address would be significantly different from the blog title, I've started a completely new blog - St. Anne's On the Road. Hopefully, there will be many authors, loads of photos and an all-around view of what it's like to take St. Anne's out on the road!

And Today We Remember...

... Saints Mary and Martha of Bethany! Along with their brother Lazarus, these siblings were friends of Jesus and their home is mentioned several times in the Bible. I love stories of this family, they seem like such real people, people I might know today.

Of course, I usually put myself in the story as Martha of Bethany, not Mary. I grew up thinking that Mary was the good sister and that as a Martha, I needed to change so that I would be more like Mary. Now I think that there is value in both the meditative spirituality of Mary and the hospitable spirituality of Martha - I can take pride in being a Martha, instead of wishing I were a Mary.

My friend Mary and I laughed last night as we teased each other about being the Mary or Martha - the worshiper or the dishwasher. Each of us has traits that would align us with each of the sisters. The key is balance. Feeding the hungry and weary (and cleaning up the kitchen afterwards!) would be just a job without the foundation of faith that comes with taking time to sit at the feet of the Messiah and soak in the presence of the Divine.

So on that day, I guess Martha complained and maybe Mary felt guilty. I would bet that when all the dishes were washed and put away, and the guests had all gone to sleep, that the sisters mended their relationship. Mary said thanks for all Martha had done during the evening and Martha was grateful that Mary had listened so carefully to Jesus that she could fill Martha in on the latest adventures of the Saviour and the guys who traveled with him.

***Also today, NASA celebrates its 50th anniversary. Founded during the Eisenhower administration, I can't remember a time when NASA didn't exist. My growing up years are punctuated with space events. I wonder what the next 50 years will bring. Will my grandchildren watch as NASA sends a traveler to Mars? With a little luck, they'll get to see someone walk on the moon!

Blog Neglect!

Oh, dear. This poor blog is just crying for some care and feeding! In the time since my last entry I've been enjoying and recovering from the annual St. Anne's Dominican Republic mission trip. It was a fantastic week that deserves more serious blogging than it will get today; stay tuned. I've also been recovering from an nasty bug that lodged in my sinuses and drained to make some icky cough attacks. Happily, the cough is going away and I find that I've been neglecting my self-imposed writing responsibilities!

I have been thinking of my blog in the past couple weeks, though. Here are some recent observations from around town lately:

The crepe myrtles are in full bloom. In shades of pink and purple, they manage to look cool in the late summer heat.

Goldfinches are hitting the purple cone flower seed heads. They whiz around in little streaks of gold and black - such elegance.

I get a chuckle out of cars that go by with the bass playing so loudly that I sometimes think the gas mileage must improve with the depth of pitch but yesterday, I had to laugh out loud when a little car full of veiled Muslim women careened around a corner. The women in the car were bouncing to the beat and carrying on an animated conversation.

A phone call with 18-month-old Hannah the other day was punctuated by a the beeps that come from a toddler pushing buttons. Here's the funny part... when she pushed the buttons, she said, "On!" Oh, natively proficient technological kids!!

The goat cheese I bought at the farmer's market today is outstanding. And the sunflowers I bought look great up at the church.

St. Anne's in the DR!

Hey there! Check out the Dominican Republic trip blog. Sorry to be absent from here. See you soon.

Hello!

My family and friends have long teased me about my knowing someone wherever I go. It's become quite a joke. One of my favorite encounters was on the street in the Dominican Republic. I came face-to-face with a young man who was working as a private security guard. Neither of us could break eye contact. The answer came to each of us at the same instant... he had been the bell hop at the hotel where my church group spends the last couple days of our mission trip. "Marta!" he exclaimed. "Jose!" I replied. Much laughter followed and we spent a few minutes reconnecting.

Well, last night was another of those encounters. My daughters and I went to a restaurant a few miles from home for a casual dinner before we ran some errands. As I slid into the booth, I noticed a man looking at me but I couldn't place him. About the same time I became aware of a man rounding the corner and touching my daughter on the shoulder. Startled, we looked up to discover my brother Dave, in town for a quick series of meetings. The guy staring at me was a co-worker of Dave's who I had met before and to whom Dave had said, "That's my sister and my nieces, watch this!" Ironically, the restaurant is called "Famous Dave's."

It's these kinds of events that keep me in line... you just never know who you'll run into! :-)

Phone Calls

In the last week or so I've been anxious about answering the phone. It doesn't matter that I can look at the little screen (squinting, if I don't have my glasses on!) and see what number has connected with my number. Some of the anxiety is well placed, some anxiety has no basis for existence.

It probably started in February when my friend Gena and my Aunt Amy died. That news was unexpected and hard to assimilate. Since then I've had calls about a friend's cancer diagnosis, a beloved dog's final day, several car problems and some good news/bad news calls about people moving.

Balancing all this irrational fear about what people will say after "hello," are the happy calls. The call from 16-month-old Hannah who was playing with the phone and dialed Grammy. The message from my sister Kathy, calling just to say hi! The call announcing a wedding. The dreaded 11:00 at night call that woke me from my sound on-the-couch sleep which turned out to be Dominican friends singing Happy Birthday, complete with guitar!

I will keep answering my phone. I will keep hoping that it's all good news. I know that bad news will be relayed now and again. I will keep praying in the words of Julian of Norwich that "all shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of thing shall be well."



Courtesy of Satucket Software, here is a write-up about Julian from their Lectionary Site...

Julian of Norwich
Her book is a tender meditation on God's eternal and all-embracing love, as expressed to us in the Passion of Christ.

She describes seeing God holding a tiny thing in his hand, like a small brown nut, which seemed so fragile and insignificant that she wondered why it did not crumble before her eyes. She understood that the thing was the entire created universe, which is as nothing compared to its Creator, and she was told, "God made it, God loves it, God keeps it."

She was concerned that sometimes when we are faced wiith a difficult moral decision, it seems that no matter which way we decide, we will have acted from motives that are less then completely pure, so that neither decision is defensible. She finally wrote: "It is enough to be sure of the deed. Our courteous Lord will deign to redeem the motive."

A matter that greatly troubled her was the fate of those who through no fault of their own had never heard the Gospel. She never received a direct answer to her questions about them, except to be told that whatever God does is done in Love, and therefore "that all shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of thing shall be well."