because there is always only more grace

We’ve had several days this week with back to back…to back to back, ice storms that made the outside world here in central Oklahoma actually stop moving. No school. No work (for many). Church events, and even sports events, canceled. Offices, including the Court House, closed because workers could not get there thanks to the layers and sheets of ice that came with each wave.

This kind of weather, paired with the icy cold temperatures, is never good for my body. In particular, it makes me very aware of every aching joint! And this pain tends to make me ornery, I confess. Yet in spite of the weather and what it does to my body, this week I have not felt confined, restricted, or claustrophobic – which is my usual M.O.

Instead, I found myself welcoming the time it gave me to just be still. In spite of feeling the aches of my body, I have enjoyed the quiet that this icy outside world brought to my inside world. I even stopped reading email and messages, much to others’ chagrin!

In truth, I started the week wondering how well I’m “doing” Lent so far. Then I read this great quote by St. Teresa of Avila, featured in my daughter’s regular column in our archdiocesan newspaper, the Sooner Catholic:

“We gain more in a single day by trials that come to us from God and our neighbor than we would in 10 years of penance and other exercises that we would take upon ourselves.” (you can read the whole column here).

As I pondered on St. Teresa’s words, I realized that I could give myself permission to stop analyzing, stop dissecting my own actions and intentions—something that always ends up in my loud inner critic taking over. I could stop making myself feel guilty for not keeping up with life, my inbox, or my Lenten resolutions.

That’s when it dawned on me. Even my guilt is still self-centered!

So what’s the alternative? Well, the other option is to simply notice and pay attention – without judging – to what’s going on inside me, physically, emotionally, spiritually. 

What am I feeling? How is God here, in this moment?

Am I really being lazy, or does my body just need rest?

How does this week – as it is – fit into my Lent journey?

What is God inviting me to,

 what do I hear Him saying?

I continue to hold all of you in my prayers, especially as we move forward (or simply continue) this holy season of Lent…

page from one of my old journals

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"There is always only more grace. 

And it’s always more than I expect… 

Praise him for the unexpected and the unlikely, for the daily and the difficult, and the graces in disguise. The more you count, the more gifts you will see. Do not disdain the small.”

~Ann Voskamp,

“One Thousand Gifts,”

within oneself... the Beloved

 “Within oneself, very clearly, is the best place to look [for the Beloved]… and it’s not necessary to go to heaven, nor any further than our own selves; for to do so is to tire the spirit and distract the soul, without gaining as much fruit.”

~Teresa of Ávila, Collected Works, vol I, 357

It has been way too long since I last posted—and I have so much to tell you about!

There’s a new book, a new baby, a landmark anniversary, an upcoming gathering, a new beginning… where do I begin?

After a string of several days of violent and downright scary storms here in Oklahoma, the past couple of days our weather has been lovely, with chilly nights and plenty of sunshine.

And I simply can’t get enough of being outside.

Sometimes I am in awe at how much nature affects me, how deeply it blesses and renews my spirit. It’s not about just recognizing the beauty in creation—and the hand of the Creator, but about the peace and grace I find just being in it.

I know, I know. Nature can also be fierce, unpredictable, combustible, extreme. Trust me. I know. I live in Oklahoma!

But no matter what I need, or what emotional state I’m in, or how much anxiety I’m fighting, or what feelings are bubbling from deep inside me, or how dry my prayer life seems… I look at the clouds in the sky, or listen to the concert put on by the birds in my backyard, or feel the wind come sweeping down the plains and across my face—and I breathe deeper.

God is here. The Beloved is within me… and I can rest in the Beloved.

I have so much to tell you! But that’s enough for now...

the big red sky

“There is a lot of science one can read up on about what makes a vivid, colorful sunset. In a simplistic nutshell, sunlight is “bent” as it passes through our atmosphere. Blue light is affected the most (shorter wave length), while red (longer wave length) is affected the least. The Rocky Mountains also absorb a lot of blue light, leaving us with the brilliant reds and yellows we see here in Oklahoma.”

~Randy C.Anderson, photographer

“The simple soul who each day makes a morning offering of ‘all the prayers, works, joys, and sufferings of this day’ – and who then acts upon it by accepting unquestioningly and responding lovingly to all the situations of the day as truly sent by God-has perceived with an almost childlike faith the profound truth about the will of God.”



~Walter J. Ciszek, SJ, He Leadeth Me

Thanks to our long, low horizons (as well as other scientific reasons beyond my pay grade), we are blessed with truly stunning sunsets in central Oklahoma.

I am often overwhelmed by the big sky’s brilliant colors at that magic hour, and have to stop whatever I’m doing, or even pull over if I’m driving, to simply watch the day’s final moments of light converting our flat horizon into a Monnet-like canvas of bright color.

If I don’t pay attention, however, the big bright sun makes it easy to focus merely on the western horizon—and miss the impressive color displays taking place as the light reflects on the opposite side of the sky!

The biggest, brightest colors are often hiding, like a surprise gift, on the other side of the celestial canvas.

It made me ponder about how much this reflects the reality of God’s hand in the details of my life. I get so focused on a particular moment or event, that I forget that God’s reality, attention, and mercy is much bigger, generous, brighter, and loving that anything I can conceive or imagine.

God paints the full horizon, not merely where my eyes seem to focus.

Wherever you are when you read this, may you enjoy sunshine and beauty this autumn day! Here in central Oklahoma, we are preparing for a massive weather system heading our way that will drop our temperature by 50 degrees!

Oklahoma weather and becoming Eucharist

Just two nights ago, my parents, two of my children and their spouses and all three of our grandchildren—all piled into a small double closet under the stairs as we took shelter from possible tornadoes nearby on yet another crazy Oklahoma stormy night.

Photographer: Carlos Weaver

courtesy of  Life Teen, Mesa, Arizona

When it comes to weather, May is always a nutty month in Central Oklahoma. We know all too well the rules and patterns of severe weather and tornadoes. But even around here, the past couple of weeks have been especially treacherous.

Once the anxious hours were behind us, I found myself pondering about this experience in light of our feast this weekend. We celebrate what once upon a time as a child we called Corpus Christi—and we now call the feast of the Holy Body and Blood of Christ. 

Someone asked me recently what difference does the Eucharist make in my daily life, how can it affect what we label as “real life”?  For me, it means everything.

It’s what my wise pastor calls the difference between taking communion and becoming communion. It is more than Christ being in us. We, in communion, are in Christ!

Fr. Boyer leads school children in a Eucharistic procession

Here’s how Fr. Thomas Boyer described it in his homily this weekend. We gather together as a Church so that every time we assemble around the altar, 

“we may become more and more the very Christ we consume, so that finally having been gathered in communion and grafted onto this vine, no one will be hungry, no one will go away thirsty from this well of divine life, and all creation where ever we are found will in glory reflect the creator whose life is our privilege to share and whose gifts bring the duty to give. The Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ is the Church in Communion from which no one should be sent away.”

 [To read his whole homily, go here] 

Our blood family came through the storms with nothing but stories to tell. But our Church family is hurting. Our friend Gary told me today that his mother, his brother, and his sister-in-law all lost their houses and are, literally, “starting from scratch.”

And our young friend Ken, one of those infamous storm-chasers, told me after Mass that he had just found out that his friend, afellow storm-chaser, died covering Friday night’s storms.

When one hurts, we all hurt. This is the Church in Communion.

Knowing the Way

Monarch butterflies are astonishing creatures. Every Spring, tens of millions of monarchs leave their Winter refuge deep in central Mexico to journey to the southern states in the U.S., where each butterfly proceeds to lay hundreds of eggs. That generation, and sometimes the following generation of monarchs, then continues trekking across North America through June—arriving as far north as Canada’s prairie provinces of Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba.

At the end of summer, the monarch butterflies turn around and flutter 3,000 miles south, back to Mexico’s Michoacán Forest for the Winter.

monarch sightings Fall 2012

This time of year, their journey takes them right through central Oklahoma. Even though the hot and dry summer has diminished the number of migrating monarchs this year, I have been delighted to watch the winged beauties dancing through and even roosting on the oak trees in our backyard this week.

I love the fact that scientists cannot explain their circular journey. They simply don’t know how these subsequent generations of monarchs can orient themselves and navigate each year towards a place they've never been before.

Pondering this miracle in nature, I can’t help but think of our wondrous God, “who made heaven and earth and sea and all that is in them”—a God who, like tending to the details of every single monarch, fills me with daily nourishment and gladness of heart.

monarchs traveling through Oklahoma 2012

By the way, if you want to become a “citizen scientist” and assist in the tracking of monarchs, drop by: http://www.learner.org/jnorth/monarch/