The Presence of Christ

 The Presence of Christ

“The earliest reference to the Resurrection is Saint Paul’s, and he makes no mention of an empty tomb at all. But the fact of the matter is that, in a way, it hardly matters how the body of Jesus came to be missing because, in the last analysis, what convinced the people that he had risen from the dead was not the absence of his corpse but his living presence. And so, it has been ever since.”—Frederick Buechner, initially published in The Faces of Jesus. 

We are resurrection people. I love to sing the hymn “Christ is Alive!” All our crosses are empty. I love that our tradition makes Easter not one day but a season of 50 days. Of course, we need more than fifty days to keep the resurrection in our hearts and minds, but it’s a start. 

I love the Alleluias. I need all this to store up for the dark times, to remember the story, and never forget it.

Buechner describes Easter as an event where the loving presence of Christ seems to explode all over the earth. Christ and his love are no longer present in one person.

After the resurrection, his love and presence are now all over the world in all of us. We have become his body. Christ and his loving presence are with all of us always. Never, ever forget this. He is with us now in the present time, the past, and the future, and throughout all eternity.

Josh Scott, in The Christian Century, April 7th, 2024, writes, “that the book of Acts paints a drastically different picture of the early community of Jesus followers. The resurrection of Jesus had such a dramatic and profound impact on them that they began to think differently about everything—even their possessions. Their newfound faith in the risen Jesus cultivated a spirit of generosity and compassion so incredible that it became unacceptable for anyone in the community to be in need.

 Luke doesn’t describe the community of the earliest followers of Jesus, listing doctrinal positions they agree on. He doesn’t describe them gathering in a room to argue the finer points of theology so they could agree and belong together. Instead, Acts says the apostles’ testimony to Jesus’ resurrection led to real, practical, life-changing action in the world so that ‘there was not a needy person among them.’

Perhaps this is what Easter is all about, not theory but practice. It’s the bursting into this world of a new creation that plays by different rules, where love calls us to work for the blossoming of every single person and of the whole creation.”

If you have difficulty comprehending all this, you are in good company. I don’t think anyone understands it, but we can see and believe the change in lives. So, if you have difficulty believing this, let others believe it for you. We are not called to understand but to live it, just as Christ did.

 Joanna    https://www.joannaseibert.com/

Mothers

Mothers

“On this Mother’s Day, we give thanks to God for the divine gift of motherhood in all its diverse forms. Let us pray for all the mothers among us today; for our own mothers, those living and those who have passed away;

 for the mothers who loved us and those who fell short of loving us fully; for all who hope to be mothers someday and for those whose hope to have children has been frustrated; for all mothers who have lost children; for all women and men who have mothered others in any way—

those who have been our substitute mothers and we who have done so for those in need; and for the earth that bore us and provides us with our sustenance. We pray this all in the name of God, our great and loving Mother. Amen.”—Leslie Nipps in Women’s Uncommon Prayers (Morehouse, 2000), p. 364.

many mothers

Sarah Kinney Gaventa wrote an excellent piece in GrowChristians.org called “Liturgical Trapdoors: Preparing for Mother’s Day” about how difficult secular holidays such as Mother’s Day and Father’s Day can be for some people and how the Church can compound their pain.

Having all the mothers stand up in church can be painful for those who are undergoing fertility procedures. People with unhappy childhoods may have difficulty comparing the love of a mother or father with the love of God.

So many people come to spiritual direction to grapple with these very issues.

Gaventa offers this more universal prayer for mothers from Women’s Uncommon Prayers as a start. We know the love of God through other people, but when a standard is presented for a specific role for mother or father, and ours does not fit, we can become even more wounded.

Gaventa suggests we talk more about the feminine aspects of God and Jesus. We can discuss God caring for us as a mother without criticizing those human mothers who have fallen short.

She also reminds us that Ann Jarvis, the woman who started the Mother’s Day movement during the Civil War, was a peace activist.

So, perhaps one way of honoring all mothers might be to suggest an outreach project for peace so that mothers would never again have to send their fathers, husbands, sons, and daughters to war.

Joanna joannaseibert.com. https://www.joannaseibert.com/

Connections, Travel

Sue Monk Kidd: Connections, Travel Near and Far

“Remember that little flame on the Easter candle. Cup your heart around it. Your darkness will become the light.”—Sue Monk Kidd, “A Journal Entry” in When the Heart Waits: Spiritual Direction for Life’s Sacred Questions (HarperOne, 1992).

joanna blue mosque

 I wish I could have Sue Monk Kidd’s book When the Heart Waits: Spiritual Direction for Life’s Sacred Questions with me and read it when meeting with other spiritual friends. I hope to remember her message about waiting. Many friends coming for direction live in the biblical tradition of waiting called the “night sea journey”: Jonah in the belly of the whale, Christ in the tomb, or Joseph in the well where there is only darkness.

 I hope to remember Kidd’s phrase when we have difficulty letting go: “Put on your courage suit” and cross the bridge of letting go.

I began this book on Maundy Thursday in the Chapel of Repose with the Reserved Sacrament. I ended it in Greece with my husband, my daughter, and her husband in the fourth week of Easter as we overlooked the Acropolis.

Kidd’s later books are about her trips to Greece, especially with her daughter, and becoming more connected to the feminine part of herself and God. My daughter and I wrote a book together as Kidd and her daughter did—so much serendipity.

Kidd ends her book by describing a drawing of a mother and child that came out of her true inner self, based on a sketch she made at Kanuga, the home of my spiritual direction class. Several years ago, on Mother’s Day, we dedicated a sculpture of a mother and child in the garden next to St. Luke’s chapel that my husband had commissioned.

More connections.

As you can see, Sue Monk Kidd gets my attention and connects to me. So today, as I relive journeys, I try to follow more of Kidd’s direction, stay in the moment, and feed my soul real food instead of junk food.

I am remembering past trips to ancient and nearer parts of the world we both visited with our daughter and granddaughters on land and sea, where we learned, surrounded by those we love and away from our busy world, to let go into the moment.

Retake a virtual trip in your mind to a country you once visited with loved ones, perhaps carrying a book by a favorite author. Maybe you traveled to England, Italy, China, Spain, Germany, Greece, Norway, France, South Africa, Canada, Mexico, or Israel.

I remember Buechner’s words in Wishful Thinking: “There are two ways of remembering. One is to make an excursion from the living present back into the dead past. The old sock remembers how things used to be when you and I were young, Maggie.

The other way is to summon the dead past back into the living present. The young widow remembers her husband, and he is there beside her. When Jesus said, ‘Do this in remembrance of me’ (1 Corinthians 11:24), he was not prescribing a periodic slug of nostalgia.”

            Give thanks for those you love who have traveled with you. Give thanks for writers who speak to your soul. Pray for that author, your family, and for people in that country to remain safe, especially the families of Ukraine and the Middle East.

Joanna joannaseibert.com. https://www.joannaseibert.com/