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eli:

When I was in my teens, people thought I was an old man because I'd already started working for my funeral director neighbor. When my peers were out and about, I was "on call" and we didn't have pagers or cell phones. We had to call in every half hour from wherever we were and had to be able to be at the funeral home within five minutes of a call. So things haven't changed that much. I still get up early and put on a suit almost every day of the year.

I do look at the commitment differently now. I don't regret the commitment I made to people or my profession or the experience that I gained. But I am concerned with the fact that people of the age of my children refuse to be tied down like I was 24/7/52 wks. Service suffers and it makes the grieving family more difficult to deal with since they think that they are not receiving the kind of service they think they should.

I do find that I am less attached to "stuff" than I was at 15, 25, and 45. I had the experience of having to place an elderly relative in a nursing home and clean out the family homestead of 95 years worth of "stuff." I've resolved to spare my own children that job and regularly throw an extra sack of "stuff" into the garbage each week. So much of what we accumulate is stuff we never look at anyway. It would simplify our lives to get a dumpster and fill it up once in awhile. I guess the desire for simplicity is growing for me anyway.

I find that the Faith is more important to me, though I want to leave the polemics to those who are younger--one seems to be more sure of everything in the world when one is younger. I once thought I had to know everything that was possible to know about the Faith. Gave that unrealistic idea up long ago. Then I came here and had it proven to me. My prayer life has deepened and seems to have become richer. The phrases repeated so often from the prayerbook have become part of the pattern of my speech and spontaneous prayer. The often-read Desert Fathers book seems to come to mind on so many occasions, though for so long it seemed I was the "hard soil on the path" because it didn't seem to sink in.

Again it's like I tell the confirmation classes each year: I once thought if I gained enough years experience in dealing with death and bereaved families I'd be of more value. I no longer believe that and often doubt my own worth to them, though I have a drawer full of thank you notes from families. As I move closer to my own mortality, I hold only one thought. I want very much to hear "well done, good and faithful servant; enter into the joy of your Master." I find myself listening more to people and trying harder to empathize with them and their situations. I have learned something. It is desparately difficult to remain faithful; to persevere to the end. My father once told me that a man could count himself a success if he could stand before Christ, look Him in the eye, and say "I have not compromised Your Teaching." He added that no amount of anything else could compare--money, power, achievements, etc. I examine my life and my conscience and wonder if I could say the same.

Am I a good example to those around me? Do I draw others to Christ by my life and my example? Will He think so? His judgments are not ours. The Desert Fathers tell us we should flee the judgments of men and not listen to them. Where am I in all this?

I will say that I think that in some small way the Lord has polished a lot of rough edges off this hard-to-teach man. And maybe the reason I'm still here is to get some more hard edges filed off and some more purification done.

In Christ,

BOB

eli:

You've got a contradiction in terms. If you're a bit wiser, you're definitely NOT in the same spot.

Wisdom, IMHO, is not something one obtains for oneself. It seems to me that true wisdom is both a Divine gift and something that is recognized by others. There are a lot of people who think they are wise because they've got a lot of chronological years, but they're as dumb as a pile of rocks. Why? Because they are so closed that they cannot learn from someone else or listen to someone else's experience and grow from it. I get some of the best insights by teaching a segment about death and dying to the confirmation classes and listening to teenagers. And I mean listening, not trying to analyze what they've got to say and arguing with it internally as one processes their communication.

We have a saying in the Cursillo movement, of which I am privileged to be a member: "bloom where you are planted." In other words, be the light of Christ--reflect Him and His glory--where He has placed you. So many saints lead obscure lives on this earth and accomplished so much. So many great and powerful people are little more than a footnote in history books. Think about it. Thank God for where He has put you. Once I thought I wanted to be in the clergy and rise through the ranks. Today I thank God that He has put me where I am. I wouldn't trade places with a priest today, given what they are subjected to in the media. But I have modified my own vocation to being a friend to priests. I keep their confidences. They can come to my home anytime and vent all they want--and it's just like being in the confessional. What is spoken within the walls stays within the walls. I argue with none of them. Many hav entirely different approaches to the same things--some would call them more liberal than I or less conservative. The labels don't matter. Each one, like every other human being, is a one-of-a-kind original and I keep it in mind that God is a collector of all of us "originals." If He can cherish someone that has different opinions than I, so can I. After all, I might as well get some practice: that's what Heaven is all about--eternal reconciliation, love, and other-directedness. Beyond that, my spiritual father tells me I can get to people in far more situations than the clergy can. People see a collar and they put on their masks. Me? I've learned to discern what people are comfortable with and have learned to "shift gears" to meet their expectations. With some people, the buttoned down professional works; for others, I can ask if I can take off my coat and loosen my tie because it's hot and they loosen up with the tie. I can listen to their pain and even can be a sounding board when they want to vent about hurts that are church-related. I can't tell you how many people who tell me they want no clergy present at their family funeral are open to a "regular guy" who can talk plainly about his own pilgrimage and is not afraid to let people see some of his own wounds.

You've got guts, man, or you wouldn't be able to have the self confidence to suggest that you didn't.

If I continue to ramble, you'll be certain that I'm pre-Alzheimers.

BOB

You make many good points, and you can blame wisdom for that, but I tend to think there is more to it than that in your case

Contradiction is everywhere, but wisdom is probably the most contrastive:
isn't ironic that one becomes wiser with age as one has less chance/time to work by the acquired wisdom?
and how come that the wiser one becomes the better one understands that one understands nothing (understanding faith you said - a fine example)?

Not trying to be pessimistic, but wouldn't it be wiser not to know that much, to stay simple, to live in a little bottle and believe its the whole world and to feel complete about it?
and probably this is the contradiction of terms you pointed out in my words... and it's a true contradiction - how would you become wise to know that knowing less is many times knowing more, when you need to know more to become wise?

Sorry for being so philosophic, but I guess this is the path I chose to deal with it...

eli:

Would we then not be in danger of "burying our talent in the earth"?

In other words, by not learning and growing and learning and growing, are we not insulting our Creator Who has given us the hunger to learn and grow?


Who says one has less chance? People live to greater and great age it seems. My take is that God has His Hand in all our lives. If one lives today, it means that either He has something that He wants me to do that only I can do for Him in and through one of his brethren that will cross my path OR that this opportunity is coming at some future date that this day links to. In all of it, whatever gift I have or develop is His gift to be given BY ME to another. And that is where the value is; not in spreading it out over the whole world.


I think St. Gregory of Nyssa's "From Glory to Glory" answers this one. We continue to learn and grow as the Spirit leads us and as our own capacity allows both in this present pilgrimage and in the life to come. God reveals more and more of Himself to us as we walk along with Him. We will never know His Essence, but we will grow in our relationship with Him.

On a parallel note, the Desert Fathers have a story in which a monk is asked on his deathbed what is the greatest lesson he has learned in the monastic life. And he answers by saying essentially "to keep your mouth shut." Love that one. Better to keep your mouth shut sometimes and look like you know nothing than to open it and prove it.

Life is a contradiction in terms to the unbeliever. It makes no sense. That's why St. Anthony could pray and ask why the rich had so much and the poor had so little; and why the nasty types seemed to live so long and the good people die young; and on and on. The revelation that came to him was that these are the judgments of God and it is not for us to know why. At least not now.

I have a theory. Now theories are like sweat socks: everyone has at least two and most of them stink. But here's mine. Weh we get to the Kingdom, all these things will be made clear to us. All of the things that bothered us here will be made crystal clear. The point is that the Lord asks us to trust Him now.

Someone pointed out to me that a sense of transparency toward God allows Him to come in and make experiences and learning come together in new ways that often have profound meanings and implications. It takes humility and prayer and a complete faith in the One Who asks us to trust Him. I think it also takes a coming to the realization that my life is short; that I will never learn everything; that I need the gifts of others just as they need the gifts I ahve to offer. It takes being engaged and accepting and ever ready to examine oneself to see if I am off the mark. It takes a sense of always asking "what does the Church say?" And I don't mean the theologian of the moment or someone obscure source. What does the one the Lord has given me for my guidance say--my spiritual father, my bishop, the one I see as the Church's primate. I need to do the work that comes to me in my own situation and let the great things of the world to those to whom the great things are entrusted. I won't reconcile the Churches, but I can reconcile with someone who is perhaps now in a state where he hates me just because I am different than me.

BOB