I had done everything I knew how to do to draw as near to the heart of God as I could only to find myself out of gas on a lonely road, filled with bitterness and self-pity. To suppose that I had ended up in such a place by the grace of God required a significant leap of faith. If I could open my hands, then all that fell from them might flower on the way down. If I could let myself fall, then I too might land in a fertile place.
Don't surrender your loneliness
So quickly.
Let it cut more deep.
Let it ferment and season you
As few human
Or even divine ingredients can.
Something missing in my heart tonight
Has made my eyes so soft,
My voice
So tender,
My need of God
Absolutely
Clear.
I am the one whose praise
echoes on high...
I call forth tears,
the aroma of holy work.
I am the yearning for the good.
I saw that there was an ocean
of darkness and death,
But an infinite ocean of light
and love flowed over the ocean
of darkness.
If you are in the dark, it does not mean that you have failed and that you have taken some terrible misstep. For many years I thought my questions and my doubt and my sense of God's absence were all signs of my lack of faith, but now I know this is the way the life of the spirit goes.
The divine and flaming Word shines in the world in the silence of the soul and "moves" it. This movement is living faith and its light is hope or illumination, while all springs from the Divine Fire which is Love or union with God.
We naturally use our faith to strengthen our relationship with God, to focus our thoughts on what is good, to help us love our neighbor. I ask a lot from my faith. To me, it's not simply a place of comfort; it is a reference point from which I take the indecipherable events of my world and place them in a context that is holy, sacred, and dynamic. It won't make the world go away, but it does have the power to shape one into a person of deep sensitivity and true passion.
O faith, untainted and immortal,
Thou art a stream miraculous;
To heaven's home, Thou art the portal,
The dawn of future life for us.
O lamp of faith, within one burning,
Burn brighter, let none smother Thee,
Be Thou my guide as I am learning,
On paths of life, enlighten me.
Faith consists in believing when it is beyond the
power of reason to believe.
My faith was tested. I was my own guinea pig; the years in isolation due to illness were passed in prayer and study of all kinds–like Job on his dunghill. I was to learn that health is also having FAITH in the higher aspects of human nature. Health is having hope, because without hope there is no life. Health is love of our selves and others. In truth, love is the life blood of faith and hope and together they create a healthy body, mind, and spirit: the Trinity of our being.