Cenacle Journal
Posted in All Shall Be Well, Christmas, Epiphany, In God's Hand on Feb 9th, 2009
(This is a second reflection on the topic of stumbling into the Reign of God.) Two years ago, with the help of Sister Elizabeth, the county housing authority, and a number of generous people, Carol — the mentally ill homeless woman about whom I have written before — finally moved into her own apartment. One [...]
An old Jewish story goes something like this: A wise rabbi once asked his students, “How do you know when the night is over and the day has dawned? One answered, “When you can look at an animal in the distance and tell whether it is a sheep or a dog?” “No,” said the rabbi. [...]
Posted in Acceptance, Christmas, Grace on Dec 23rd, 2008
The poet U. A. Fanthorpe pictures the shepherds and the Magi – those familiar visitors to the infant Jesus – walking “haphazard by starlight straight/Into the kingdom of heaven”: This was the moment when Before Turned into After, and the future’s Uninvented timekeepers presented arms. This was the moment when nothing Happened. Only dull peace [...]
I returned from a retreat in Pensacola a few days before Christmas and opened my e-mail to find the gift of a poem sent by our Sister Margaret Byrne. The poem is “Messenger,”* by Mary Oliver. “My work,” she begins, “is loving the world”: Am I no longer young, and still not half-perfect? Let me [...]
When I was a child, I liked singing “The First Noel”: The first Noel the angel did say Was to certain poor shepherds in fields as they lay; In fields where they lay keeping their sheep, On a cold winter’s night that was so deep. But at that age I understood “to certain” as an [...]
Bad Behavior has blocked 85 access attempts in the last 7 days.