Eight years ago Denise and I exchanged our vows at Beckwith Chapel surrounded by the love and the prayers of so many friends and our family. Today we find ourselves in the midst of caring for our Dads as they walk the long road towards healing.
Did we know that on this day eight years ago we would move from Florida to Colorado to Georgia as we answered God’s call to serve? Did we know that we would walk through the Valley of the Shadows with so many people, including our parents?
Did we know on that day what was in store for us? In a word, no. We exchanged our vows with hope, love, and faith, promising to live each day fully as the day that the Lord has made.
Thomas Merton offers this beautiful reflection on love in his book, Love and Living: Love is our true destiny. We do not find the meaning of life by ourselves alone – we find it with another.
I have found this destiny with Denise who is as we promised in our vows to be my partner, my friend, my lover, my wife. Happy Anniversary, my love ❤️❤️
Our Vows:
Michael/Denise, remembering that you are a gift from God, I promise to be your partner, your friend, your lover, your wife/husband.
I promise to be an attentive listener, a partner in God’s call on our lives, and your companion on this journey of faith and life.
I promise to pray with you and for you, to be compassionate and truthful, to weep with you and to laugh with you, to support and encourage you, to appreciate you, and to nurture your gifts.
I promise to faithfully walk with you, hand in hand, wherever life leads us, and no matter what, to celebrate each day as the day which the Lord has made.
Verse of the day
For you shall go out in joy, and be led back in peace; the mountains and the hills before you shall burst into song, and all the trees of the field shall clap their hands.
– Isaiah 55:12
Voice of the day
All shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of things shall be well.
– Julian of Norwich
Prayer of the day Open our eyes to behold thy gracious hand in all thy works; that, rejoicing in thy whole creation, we may learn to serve thee with gladness; for the sake of him through whom all things were made, thy Son Jesus Christ our Lord.
– The Book of Common Prayer
“We have grasped the mystery of the atom and rejected the Sermon on the Mount. Ours is a world of nuclear giants and ethical infants. We know more about war than we do about peace, more about killing than we do about living.”—Omar Bradley
“I claim that human mind or human society is not divided into watertight compartments called social, political and religious. All act and react upon one another.”—Mohandas K. Gandhi
As we drove from Florence back to Austin today, a song came on as we listened to iTunes. The song Dona Nobis Pacem came on. It was a lovely rendition by Velma Frye from her album, “Seven Sacred Pauses.” Here is a link to the song: Dona Nobis Pacem
I am so very thankful to my friend Julie Prescott Burgess who introduced me to this phrase from the Requiem Mass. It is translated as: Grant Us Peace.
As the journey with our Dads continues, that is my prayer for them and for us. Dona Nobis Pacem, Grant Us Peace.
“The more honest you are, the more open, the less fear you will have, because there’s no anxiety about being exposed or revealed to others. So, I think that the more honest you are, the more self-confident you will be.”—The 14th Dalai Lama, Tenzin Gyatso
Before I began yesterday’s journey from Austin, Minnesota to Florence, Alabama I stopped by the cemetery for a quick visit with Mom. As I wrote in yesterday’s “Lauds in a Graveyard,” four deer along with Sister Moon visited Mom and me.
As I left the cemetery, I put on the album “Point Vierge: Thomas Merton’s Journey in Song” by Alana Levandoski with James Finley narrating. James had been a novice at Our Lady of Gethsemani when Thomas Merton was the Novice Master.
This album had been recommended to me by my dear Sister, Cheryl Anne Maris a while back. I had listened to snippets of it but had never listened to it all the way through. It became my Morning, Midday, and Evening Prayer on the journey from Minnesota to Alabama.
The combination of Alana’s singing and music along with James’s readings from Merton and his own reflections was a true gift and companion to me as I made the trip. I cannot tell you how many times I have read Merton’s “The General Dance” from his book, New Seeds of Contemplation. Yesterday as James Finley read from it and Alana Levandoski sang it hit me in a new and powerful way.
Perhaps it is because we are in such a challenging time when it comes to our Dads. Perhaps it is because we are both exhausted by the continual politicization of the Pandemic and the sad rise in cases and deaths among the unvaccinated. Perhaps it is because my heart is breaking for the people of Afghanistan and wondering what good the last 20 years of war had done.
Alana and James invited me into a reflection on the Cosmic Dance and through them I heard Merton himself inviting me to join him in the General Dance. I didn’t know how much I needed that invitation until the tears began to flow.
This invitation truly hit me in an amazing way: What is serious to men is often very trivial in the sight of God. What in God might appear to us as “play” is perhaps what He Himself takes most seriously… if we could let go of our own obsession with what we think is the meaning of it all, we might be able to hear His call and follow him in his mysterious, cosmic dance… we are invited to forget ourselves on purpose, cast our awful solemnity to the winds and join him in the General dance. (Kindle version, p. 302, 303)
Perhaps if more of us set aside our egos, our vanity, our need to be right at any cost, and the callous disregard for others, this world might be a better place. Will you join with me dear reader, as I accept Merton’s invitation?
“As you come to know the seriousness of our situation—the war, the racism, the poverty in the world—you come to realize it is not going to be changed just by words or demonstrations. It’s a question of risking your life. It’s a question of living your life in a drastically different way.”—Dorothy Day
Verse of the day
Bear one another’s burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ.
– Galatians 6:2
Voice of the day
There is no phenomenon in the universe that does not intimately concern us, from a pebble resting at the bottom of the ocean, to the movement of a galaxy millions of light years away.
– Thich Nhat Hanh, The Sun of My Heart(2020)
Prayer of the day
Teach us to discover the worth of each thing, to be filled with awe and contemplation, to recognize that we are profoundly united with every creature as we journey towards your infinite light.
– Pope Francis, “A prayer for our earth”
Verse of the day
By faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to set out for a place that he was to receive as an inheritance; and he set out, not knowing where he was going.
– Hebrews 11:8
Voice of the day
We should like to skip / The intermediate stages. / We are impatient of being on / The way to something unknown, / Something new, / And yet it is the law of all progress / That it is made by passing through / Some stages of instability — / And that it may take a very long time.
– Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, S.J.
Prayer of the day
May today there be peace within.
May you trust God that you are exactly where you are meant to be.
May you not forget the infinite possibilities that are born of faith.
– Minnie Louise Haskins
