Living Our Way into the Answer
Wow ! How long has it been? I just realized that I have not written on this blog for over a month ! Has it been because there has been nothing to write about??? Nah, that hasn't been the case. I have written many blogs in my head, during my daily walk, but I never ventured towards the computer. Why? I reread the previous blog about the Psalms, and then I remembered why I haven't written.
I guess I have been on a retreat of sorts. The parts of the previous 'Psalm blog' that spoke to me: "How do you deal with the problems that beset you?" "I went into the sanctuary of the Lord." and "Bare your heart and seek the healing ."
I guess that I have tried to let my opinions rest for a while. I have actually been listening to others talk. They have been talking about their families, their jobs, the economy and their health. They have talked about their joys, their struggles, and how God is involved in both. Someone let me know that she has borrowed the previous blog quote, "Living our way into the answer" as her credo for our new parish. I like that quote. So much that I realized that our banter on this blog is a good thing. Not meant to be negative as much as necessary sometimes to see the big picture. I had, what I thought was a very frank "heart to heart" conversation about our parish with someone. After the conversation, I looked into my rearview mirror to back my car out, and saw that I had had something on my cheek the whole time. I laughed later because, as soon as I saw it, I blurted " He is not my friend !!" I found it funny that I assumed that any real friend of mine would have said, "Karen, you have something on your face." I would have then looked and taken care of it, because that type of thing can be a distraction to good dialogue.
Our dialogue about our parish will never be successful unless we can be honest and frank with each other. Let's listen to the real concerns that the people have. The things that make them smile, and the things that make them wince. That's living our way into the answer?
posted by Karen @ 7:46 PM
5 comments
5 Comments:
This will probably fall into the “wince” category, but I promise to come up with one for the “smile” category later. My concern is that we allow people, to have power over us when God is the only power we should allow to have control over us. The "government" of the Roman Catholic Church is one of those "peoples". I understand that people want to believe that they can change the minds of the Roman Catholic government. And they have to decide if that is what they are being called to do. Yes, I said “government”; I try to reserve the word “Church” for the people who put the teachings of Christ first, before the successfulness of an institution. ("Church" of course includes some members of the “government”).
An earlier blog was about having chairs pulled out from under us. Our life experiences are different and I guess I've had the chair pulled out from me enough times that my perspective is that we all take ourselves too seriously sometimes, religious groups included. And when we do, we think WE are in power of big and little things. If the Roman Catholic Church truly wants to be "catholic", its government needs to not take itself too seriously. In my most respectful voice, I say to all, “Lighten up and think, would Jesus really back your position and rationale? Would he work for your cause? Would he say, “Come on, I have more important things for you to do.”
The Diocesan government spends money and time fighting people for buildings and properties that the Diocese made quite obvious they have no use for (except to add assets to their portfolio) and most recently the whole Father Leyland situation. Routine? Yeah, right. The latest on this story http://www.toledoblade.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070703/NEWS10/707030353
At the risk of sounding negative, one more, “yeah, right”...Did you read the ad in the bulletin for the Auditor/Parish Liaison for the Diocese? I'm sure people may dismiss me as cynical but when I read the “must have understanding of and commitment to the Catholic Church”(Catholic with a capital “C”)...let's just say I smirked and thought ...”Yeah, right, that means a commitment to do whatever the Bishop tells you is best in his opinion, whatever that happens to be, with first loyalty to the 'government'.”
A timely parallel from the secular world? The President's commuting of Scooter Libby's sentence. Libby was convicted of obstructing justice and kept silent. How does this relate? It sends a message that if I can keep my mouth shut, someone with “power” will “have my back”. I applaud those who take the sometimes rougher road knowing that ultimately “God has their back”.
How ironic,I just placed my head in my hand for a couple of moments and winced! As I wrote my comment to wearecalled and prepared to place it on the blog. I remembered that sometimes, if I preview what I wrote, the computer goes offline and I lose what I wrote. Nevertheless, I wanted to take another look at how what I wrote and, of course, my comment disappeared! I smiled afer quick wince! Point wearecalled? We can always smile after ours winces, and begin again. You are not wrong in pointing out problems to our parishioners, our staff and our diocese. Because we know there can be smiles after winces. And that's really what we are going for.
Ok, now that one comment made it through, let me ramble about some potential categories. Some of you have information about 'smiles', and some have 'winces' to tell. We can actually find great joy in both!
The categories that we have not discussed for the last couple of months include Charting Our Future (focus group meetings,leadership meetings and the surveys), First Communion, Salem's lawsuit, the Graduation Mass for Seniors, Bible school,the festivals, and our finances.
I am not going back in time to 'crab', but someone asked me a few nights ago how people could hear all these things. This is one way to get some info out.
The hard thing about writing online is that the tone you intend is up to the interpretation of the reader and I just want to say that I wasn't trying to sound nasty. Just trying to get a conversation going. Anyhow...I promised a smile didn't I? I heard that Bible School went well--over a hundred children each day! Someone mentioned to me that there seemed to be some newer and younger faces as teachers and helpers. (I'm sure they meant that veteran Bible School people looked good too!) Point being that how wonderful it is when efforts to spread the Kingdom of God on Earth attract like on Field of Dreams.
Winces and smiles.......smiles and winces........is there a politicaly correct order to put them in??? Nah........
Anyone who has ever seen the kids at Bible school,especially on the last day, could never not smile! Nicki, Tina, Elaine and the rest of the teaching staff and volunteers are just great! Correct me if I am wrong, cause I am at times, (really?) but I think that the whole thing was paid for through donations??? Materials, treats and the meal on the last day???
Thumbs up!!!
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