You Wouldn't Let Me In

I went to Mass today, a late Saturday afternoon Catholic church service.  During the sermon, the priest told a story which I found particularly instructive, and which is as follows. 

An especially devout woman prayed much every day.  After a long time of such persistent prayer, Jesus told her that because of her devotion, He would visit her the next day.

When she woke up, she eagerly began cleaning her home.  She was also spending much of the day cooking.  In the morning, the bell rang.  She answered the door.  A young child, upset, cried to her that he was lost and couldn't find his family.  He asked the woman to help him.  She replied that she was busy, so that she couldn't help him.

She returned to her cleaning and cooking.  In the afternoon, a middle-aged woman appeared at her door.  The woman outside the door shared that she and her family were poor and that they didn't know how they would be able to eat their next meal.  The woman in the house responded that she didn't have time to help her because she was occupied with her cooking and cleaning. 

The woman in the house recommenced her work.  When it was in the evening, an elderly man appeared at her door and asked for her help.  The woman explained that she couldn't assist him because she already had a lot to do.  The lady kept working and eventually turned in for the night.

During her dreams that night, she saw Jesus in a dream.  She noted, "You said You were going to come visit me."  Then she asked Him, "Why didn't You come visit me?"

Jesus replied, "I came to you three times, but you wouldn't let Me in." 

That's My Sister!

Today was an unusual day.  We had the first school-wide assembly of the year.  We're going to have one every trimester.  Given that the end of the trimester is rapidly approaching, we had the assembly today, since we didn't have much time left to have one.

We started off the assembly with a prayer.  As always, we invoked Saint John Baptist de la Salle, the French priest who did so much to further education in France 300 years ago, and who founded the tradition of Catholic schools to which we belong.  We implored him to pray for us, as we also did at the close of the assembly.

After the opening prayer, we had the students compete in several groups.  We quizzed them, including about facts they had learned in Social Studies, Math and Science classes.  They were excited to compete against each other. 

But before we got to the contest, we teachers handed out awards to the youths we teach in our particular 6th, 7th and 8th grade classes.  Students received certificates for excellence in Social Studies, Science, Math, Literature and Writing.  Students had also voted to decide which of them was the most supportive of his or her fellow students, which pupil motivated others well, and which student was the most organized, in addition to which children have taken other positive approaches at school.  We also recognized particular students for reading in class in a loud voice.

I was enjoying hearing students' names being called, and I was liking watching children walk up to receive their certificates.  Partly I was feeling satisfaction in seeing these young scholars get these awards because I know that some of them have expressed that they wanted to be academically successful, but some of them have seemed to doubt that they could excel in their studies.  After seeing them apply themselves to their work, I felt joyous over their achievement, their advancement, their betterment of themselves.  As I saw students stride up to receive their awards, my eyes grew watery as I repeatedly felt happy for them. 

Given that I was taking in the recognition of these students in this emotional context, I was primed to feel especially touched when one particular boy spontaneously shouted in excitement when his sister won an award.  When her name was called, he proudly cried, "That's my sister!" 

It was delightful to hear his unrestrained enthusiasm and show of affection and love for his sibling, partially since he was cheering her for her intelligence, her motivation, her application of herself and her academic accomplishments.  I do indeed literally pray that I am contributing to such intellectual growth and development in these youths.  I hope that I am helping these students to progress and learn.  I hope that I can be partly responsible for causing children to extemporaneously call out in praise of their siblings.  If I can, hearing such cheer will certainly serve as a reward. 

Willingness

In the last couple of weeks, the Director of Student Life approached me again to check in with me about coaching basketball this winter.  I'd barely gotten words out of my mouth when he said that they had more than enough people to coach, so that they didn't need me to coach.

I'd been wondering how I'd have enough energy to coach.  I'd attended some of the kids' late season fall soccer games, and, as a result, felt not prepared enough to teach on the days following the games.  Consequently, I'd wondered how I'd be able to coach.

Perhaps it wasn't about me actually coaching.  Maybe God only wanted me to truly be willing to do it.  Once I'd honestly said I'd coach, perhaps that was all He had been wanting of me.  Maybe sometimes God just wants to see that we are willing to do more than we think we can do. 

Teaching Immigrants And Feeling A Little Like One

I'm sitting here planning a lesson for the Seventh Grade Literature class I teach.  In Literature class, we're about to start reading a story about a Mexican boy and his father who sneak into the U.S.  All of the students in this Literature class are Mexican-American, so they were interested when we started talking about how we're going to be reading this story about immigration. 

As I was just sitting here planning this lesson, I thought of how, so often when I was a Peace Corps Volunteer in Morocco, Moroccan students would tell me that they wanted to come here to the U.S.  Now that I'm back here in the U.S., I find myself considering the desirability of living in the U.S. from a different vantage point, both for myself and when considering students I teach.  At least one of my current students arrived here in the U.S. a couple of years ago.  I used to teach children who wanted to come to the U.S.  Now I'm teaching students who have made it to the U.S.

As I write this blog entry, I am realizing that I am in somewhat analogous of a position to those of my students who have come here to the U.S.  While there are many significant differences between them and me, nevertheless, like them, I too used to live in another country; I longed to come to the U.S.--in my case, to return to the U.S.--to enjoy living here.  And now, like those of my current students who had wanted to come here from a foreign country, I too came here from a foreign country and am now enjoying the benefits of living here.  And like them, having lived in another country, I can appreciate the blessings of living in the U.S., having the perspective of what it's like to live elsewhere.  Having lived without what I have here in the U.S., now I am much more thankful to God for so many blessings. 

Your Words Have Power

In the Literature class I teach, I try to engage the students, in discussions about what happens in the stories we read, in ways which will challenge them and which will help them to engage in critical thinking.  I ask the students why characters in stories do what they do.  I ask them to explain characters' motivations.  I ask them to support their opinions with examples from the text.

At one point, as a way of both trying to encourage them, to inspire them, and to help explain to them why they need to cite instances in the story to substantiate their viewpoints, as an analogy I referenced how lawyers persuasively support their own cases.  A few days earlier, I had told them that I had been an attorney, so I reminded them that I used to be a lawyer.  I explained to them that in court, attorneys tell the judge how the attorneys think the case should turn out.  I told them that judges then say to lawyers, "Counsel, where's your evidence?"  I next said that just as judges ask lawyers where their evidence is, so too would I be asking them where their evidence is for believing why characters act the way they do.  During that same explication, I expressed to them a long-term view of them I hold.  I shared with them how I honestly believe that some of them truly are capable of becoming lawyers one day. 

A few weeks later, I was talking with an older sibling of one of my Literature students.  She told me that all of a sudden, her younger sister has started saying that she's going to become a lawyer!  I asked her when her younger sister started saying that she's going to be a lawyer.  She said that her younger sister started saying so within the last month, which meant since school has started.  Perhaps at least one student has been listening while I've been teaching... 

Teaching Highlights in September

Although I've already shared the most significant moments during my experience as an LV (Lasallian Volunteer) from September, I thought I'd share my otherwise most notable moments as an LV from September.  They are as follows.

I decided to do a project where my kids and I would collectively write a letter to a friend of mine who served with me as a PCV (Peace Corps Volunteer) in Morocco, and who's still serving there as a PCV.  As I was explaining how to write the letter, I explained to the kids why it's good to ask questions when writing a letter.  I explain that people often like being asked questions because it shows you think you have something to learn from them.  I added that it also can reflect humility. 

We wrote the letter to her.  We told her some things about where the school is in Chicago.  We shared with her some of the things the students are learning.  We asked her some questions about her life in Morocco.  A few days later, we got back a response from her.  With her letter, she helped me to teach the kids how to organize a letter, when to start new paragraphs in a letter, and how to start and end a letter.

At my request, she included some pictures of her and her husband in Morocco.  She attached a picture of herself on a hike.  She attached a couple of pictures of dishes of Moroccan food.  She included a photo of her husband with members of their host family.  The Moroccan girls had their heads covered with headscarves.  When the class was looking at this photo, I heard some of the students murmuring.

I explained, "The girls and the women in Morocco always have their heads covered."

"Why?" one girl asked.

"Their religion tells them to do that," I responded.

"That sucks," she said.

I replied, "Can you find a better way to express how you feel about that?"

"What do you mean?"

"Well, try starting your sentence with 'I,'" I suggested.

"I..." she began, and then trailed off.

I re-approached the question from a different starting point.  "Well, would you want to be expected to do that?"

"No."

Refusing to tell her the exact words to say, I asked, "So, what would your sentence sound like?"

"Oh," she said.  "I wouldn't want to have to do that."

"That sounds much better," I told her.

***

On another day, I enjoyed seeing that same girl use her time well.  During afternoon homeroom, students are writing down their homework for the day, and are otherwise getting ready to leave the school for the day.  After she had finished getting ready to leave for the day, other students were still preparing to leave.  As they were gathering their things, she started using the time to sweep up the classroom.  She hadn't been asked to do so, but just took the initiative to use her time well.

***

We read a couple of short stories in Literature Class in September.  In one of them, called "Seventh Grade" by Gary Soto, a boy in seventh grade pretends to speak French in front of everyone in French class to try to impress a girl he likes.  The French teacher knows he can't speak French.  Yet after class, the girl compliments him on his French as the teacher is standing there.  He hopes that the teacher won't expose him as a fraud, thinking that he'll do anything that the teacher wants, having learned his lesson not to bluff like he had done.  In the end, the teacher does not let the girl know.

We talked about the theme of the short story.  We discussed that one should be honest and that God always wants us to tell us the truth.  I added that even though you might not do something as well as you'd like, you should learn from your mistakes, and that next time you can do it better.  As I was saying those words in front of the class, feeling like I didn't know how to teach, that I was often making mistakes as I taught, I wondered, "For whom is this lesson being given?"  

My Own Words As My Guide

I wrote my last blog entry about being flexible.  I explained how one must be open to what one is asked to do, even if it is something about which one knows nothing.  I suggested that even if you're convinced that you're inexperienced, you should embrace what you're requested to do.

The very next day after I wrote that blog post, I was called out on my own words.  The Director of Student Life at school came to my desk in my classroom.  He told me that he would like me to think about co-coaching basketball this winter.

In my honest opinion, I am hardly the person best suited to this task, a conclusion with which, I am fairly certain, many people would agree.  However, I have been asked to co-coach basketball this year.  Therefore, I will be coaching basketball. 

Be Flexible

Last month I stayed at the Abbey of Gethsemani in Kentucky for the better part of a week.  The monks there are predominantly contemplative.  They pray the Divine Office, largely composed of the Psalms, which they chant in unison, seven times a day.  However, they also perform various kinds of work there at the monastery.  They have made cheese and fudge and fruitcake.  Some of them write spiritual texts.  Others plant and grow and pick fruits and vegetables on the grounds of the abbey.  Still others tend the grounds of the abbey.

During my stay at the abbey, I got to speak with a couple of the monks more than once.  One of them entered the abbey when he was relatively young, and he is now elderly.  He mentioned more than once to me that he had authored a booklet containing some of his spiritual musings.  Since he mentioned the booklet to me multiple times, I figured I should pick it up from the abbey bookstore.  Accordingly, I stopped into the bookstore and bought this monk's booklet.  In it he relates how he was asked to change jobs at the abbey.  I took his change of situation as a good example to follow, and as a way to help maintain perspective.  Things could be more challenging than they have been for me, and in additional ways than they already are.

I have a warm, encouraging, sympathetic, patient, accommodating and helpful principal as my boss now.  I have co-workers, both teachers and staff alike, who are pleasant, helpful and supportive.  I work in a calm, serene, sane workplace.

Given that I feel unversed in teaching a group of students with such a wide range of abilities, I have felt severely challenged in this work.  However, I chose this job, unlike the monk I noted above, who was being asked to take on a new position, who knew nothing about the kind of new work he was being asked to start doing.  Further, I am not making this career shift as an elderly person, unlike the monk I described above who changed jobs once he was aged.  He made those changes as an elderly person, being flexible despite his age, adapting to the new and unfamiliar demands made upon him.  I am not so challenged as he was.  As I consider him, I feel called to keep my situation in perspective.  I am reminded that my situation could be more challenging than it is.  And I take him as inspiration.  May we all accept what we are called to do as he did. 

I Must Trust

I received an envelope in the mail today.  I found it very appropriate that I received this particular envelope in the mail this week.  I find it apropos in light of the events I related in my last blog entry, covering my despair from trying to rely on myself, and the grace and the strength I received from God when I prayed to Him for help. 

I had addressed the envelope, as well as its contents, on an index card, to myself three months ago.  Having written the card so long ago, I had forgotten about it.

In June, I attended some workshops at the School of Applied Theology in Oakland, California.  In one workshop, Sue Mosteller, Henri Nouwen's literary executrix, discussed Nouwen's interpretation of Rembrandt's painting of the Return of the Prodigal Son.  In that particular workshop, Sue explained how Nouwen had become enthralled with the art of the trapeze.  She reviewed how one trapeze artist catches the other trapeze artist, who leaps.  She shared how Nouwen viewed the catching trapeze artist as the remarkable one in such interactions.  Nouwen viewed the trapeze catcher's catching as being analogous to God's catching us when we trust in Him.

At one of the workshops, the organizers directed us to write on an index card what we wanted to remember from the workshops.  They told us that they would mail the cards to us soon after each of us had begun our new ventures.  Thus, having just begun the school year a few weeks ago, I only just received the card I had written as a reminder to myself. 

On the index card, I wrote, "I want to remember that I must be trusting Him to catch me; trusting in Him as I take the leap, as I have trusted in Him when I have taken previous leaps, when He caught me then too." 

Why Did You Send Me Here?

This week was not without its challenges for me.  That's to be expected, but the predictability didn't lessen the difficulty.

Amongst the challenges I've faced, I've felt overwhelmed with contact with other people.  I am an introvert for sure.  As I've heard described fairly recently, introverts recharge themselves by being sure to spend adequate time in solitude, a tendency I definitely have.  Thus during this school year, I've felt overloaded with interactions with others, largely by spending so much time in the classroom and otherwise at school.

At one point this week, I was feeling unable to cope with so much contact with others.  Honestly I felt like I was not able to do this job because of the combination of multiple challenging factors.  It entails not only interacting so much with other people, but also teaching students with such a wide range of abilities, and also handling behavioral issues in the classroom, often all at the same time.  Feeling like I simply was not able to do this job, I prayed to God, asking Him, "Why did you send me here when you knew I wouldn't be able to do this job?  Why did you send me here knowing that I would fail?"  I was in the completely wrong mindset to be able to receive the answer.

Later, I was praying to God in a very matter-of-fact way.  Essentially, I was just talking to Him.  Feeling inadequate to do this job, I told Him, "If you want me to do this, you have to give me your grace and your strength.  I literally cannot do this without you."

And with that, I placed myself in a position to be able to receive the answer.  Simultaneously I had taken a posture which allowed me to receive the grace and the strength from God both to enable me to understand His answers to my questions that I had asked Him, as well as to enable me to succeed.  When I had asked God why He had sent me where He knew I would fail, I was trying to do it on my own.  When I stopped trying to do it on my own, when I acknowledged that I couldn't do it on my own, when I admitted that I needed His help, I became able to do it.  Thus, He sent me here, where He knew I couldn't do it on my own, so that I would have to rely on Him.

God wants us to ask Him for help.  He wants us to bother Him.  He wants us to ask Him for the strength we need to do the work that He calls us to do. 

Very soon after I prayed to God, telling Him that I needed the grace and the strength from Him to be able to do the work He has called me to do, He answered me.  I felt a peace settle in my being.  I can describe it somewhat as serenity.  I can also say I became stronger.  I was no longer anxious.  He had given me the grace and the strength I had requested.

Having been rescued by Him, the next morning I found a particular reading very appropriate.  In the morning, as I was gathered with the Brothers of the Christian Schools, with whom I live in faith-based community, at our daily weekday morning prayer session, we were reciting Psalms in unison as usual.  I found it apropos, in light of how God had answered my request so quickly and thoroughly, that we were reciting Psalm 30.  Psalm 30:1-3 reads:

I will exalt you, Lord,
for you lifted me out of the depths
and did not let my enemies gloat over me.
Lord my God, I called to you for help,
and you healed me.
You, Lord, brought me up from the realm of the dead;
you spared me from going down to the pit.

Just as the Psalmist wrote, God lifted me out of the depths.  He rescued me from the despair that comes from trying to do it alone.  I called to Him for help, and He did in fact heal me: he healed me from the angst I had been feeling from following the impossible, ill-advised, short-sighted strategy of trying to rely on myself.  He spared me from the extremely unfortunate consequences which would have befallen me had I persisted in that ridiculous, foolish approach.

Glory be to God.  He delivers me.  He gives me the grace and the strength I need to be able to do the work that He calls me to do.  This is what Jesus meant when He said, "Ask and you shall receive."*  If we ask Him, God will give us what we need to be able to do the work which He calls us to do.  

* Matthew 7:7

First Few Weeks Of Teaching, Or, Ask And You Shall Receive

I've been teaching 7th Grade for two and a half weeks now.  I've had a tumultuous start to the school year.  I've faced difficulties in various ways.  In this particular classroom, there are huge gaps in reading and writing skills, familiarity with vocabulary, ability to focus, and in many other areas.  Although there are many other challenges, I'll leave it at that for now.

Amidst all of these difficulties, I've repeatedly felt ill-equipped for this venture.  I've been most concerned at reaching those of the students who are struggling to learn, especially in the context of trying to reach them while I'm simultaneously trying to teach more gifted students.  I've been facing these challenges in the context of suspecting that I am better suited to other types of educational work.  Upon expressing this suspicion to one of the Brothers of the Christian Schools with whom I live, he reminded me, as a way of helping me to see the need to do the work I am called to do right now, "Christ is in those children."  That is to say, he was echoing, paraphrasing and summarizing a dialogue which, at Matthew 25:34-40, Jesus said that He will have with certain people after they die.  Jesus will say,

'Come, you who are blessed by my Father.  Inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.  For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, a stranger and you welcomed me, naked and you clothed me, ill and you cared for me, in prison and you visited me.'

Then the righteous will answer him and say, 'Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink?  When did we see you a stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you?   When did we see you ill or in prison, and visit you?'

And the king will say to them in reply, 'Amen, I say to you, whatever you did for one of these least brothers of mine, you did for me.'

I have long tried to keep these Scripture verses prominent in my mind.  I have tried to let these verses guide what I do, who I choose to help, and how I choose to help them.  It has long been very important to me to aid poor persons, and to do so as well as I can.  Thus when this Brother reminded me that Christ is in these children, I was distraught at the probability that I would not be teaching all of these students as well as they need to be instructed.

Often I hear justice described as persons being accorded their human rights, being given what they need to develop to their full potential.  I've long regarded education as a human right; I've long considered it crucial to someone reaching his or her full potential.

Always justice is defined as all persons receiving their due.  Everyone, regardless of their social standing and economic status, are entitled to what they require to grow.  Impoverished persons must get what they need. 

Thus, being reminded that Christ is in these children, whilst simultaneously knowing that they must receive the best education they can get, and while also feeling ill-equipped to reach all of them, I was extremely distressed.  I was so upset that I thought that I wouldn't wish such angst upon my worst enemy.  At times when I was praying, I was weeping into my own lap, begging God for forgiveness for how I would not be educating these children the way they deserve to be taught.

I prayed repeatedly and persistently.  However, I was not praying obediently and openly; I was not praying for what I needed to do the duty set before me.   Rather, I was praying narrow-mindedly, seeking an escape.  I was seeking to relinquish the reins which had been handed to me.  And I was repeating these petitions, rejecting my duty, in sets of three, over and over.

On a following day, once I was back at the school, at one point I was sitting at the back of the classroom while one of the other teachers taught a lesson.  As I sat looking over the children, into my mind came the phrase, "Take care of my sheep."  The children are God's sheep, to be instructed in His ways.  I realized that I was being told to care for them and nourish them so that they will be brought up in ways such that they will come to live lives which will be pleasing to Him.  I took it as a response to the insistent prayers I had recently sent up to God.

Later that day, after we had eaten lunch, the students were exercising in the gym right after lunch, as they always do.  As I walked along the side of the basketball court, looking out at the children exercising, kicking soccer balls, punching volleyballs into the air, and throwing basketballs at the baskets, again I was instructed.  Into my mind again came the phrase, "Take care of my sheep."

This time the phrase hit me with a poignancy which I had not felt the first time because I had not been aware of the full extent of its meaning.  I had not realized how I was being rehabilitated, because I had not realized how I had fallen.

Once I heard the phrase the second time, in its repetition, I recognized its rehabilitative effect upon me because the repetition echoed its repetitive use in Scripture.  To draw back and provide a fuller, more appropriate context, first let us revisit the night when Jesus was betrayed and handed over to the authorities who tried Him and sentenced Him to be crucified. 

Jesus had explained to Saint Peter relatively early that night that he would betray Him.  As is recounted at Matthew 26:34-35, Jesus said to him, "Truly, I tell you, this very night, before the rooster crows, you will deny me three times."  Peter said to him, "Even if I must die with you, I will not deny you!"  

Later that night, after Jesus had been arrested, Peter had followed Jesus to the building where the council was meeting where He was being tried.  As is described at Matthew 26:69-75,

Peter was sitting outside in the courtyard. And a servant girl came up to him and said, “You also were with Jesus the Galilean."  But he denied it before them all, saying, "I do not know what you mean."  And when he went out to the entrance, another servant girl saw him, and she said to the bystanders, "This man was with Jesus of Nazareth."  And again he denied it with an oath: "I do not know the man."  After a little while the bystanders came up and said to Peter, "Certainly you too are one of them, for your accent betrays you."  Then he began to invoke a curse on himself and to swear, "I do not know the man."  And immediately the rooster crowed.  And Peter remembered the saying of Jesus, "Before the rooster crows, you will deny me three times."  And he went out and wept bitterly.

Countless times, in thinking about how Saint Peter had denied Jesus, I thought, "This is all well and good, but, quite simply put, I will never deny Christ.  It just will never happen.  I am never going to do that." 

However, I have not yet fully related all of the Scripture passages which will give the full context for how I felt when I heard the repetitive reply to my insistently disobedient prayers.  I felt distress at hearing the repetitive answer not because the above Scripture passages reminded me of the similarity of my denial of Christ with Saint Peter's denial of Christ.  Rather, I felt dismayed because the repetitive reply to my persistently disobedient prayers echoed another Scripture passage; in being reminded of this next Scripture passage, I was made aware that I had denied Christ.  

After Jesus was crucified, and after he then rose from the dead, He appeared to His disciples.  At one point he met them on a beach.  They ate together.  As is related at John 21:15-17:

When they had finished breakfast, Jesus said to Simon Peter, "Simon, son of John, do you love me more than these?"  He said to him, "Yes, Lord; you know that I love you."  He said to him, "Feed my lambs."  He said to him a second time, "Simon, son of John, do you love me?"  He said to him, "Yes, Lord; you know that I love you."  He said to him, "Tend my sheep."  He said to him the third time, "Simon, son of John, do you love me?"  Peter was grieved because he said to him the third time, "Do you love me?" and he said to him, "Lord, you know everything; you know that I love you."  Jesus said to him, "Feed my sheep."  

In asking Peter three times if he loved Him, Jesus was rehabilitating him.  In effect, Jesus was freeing Peter of having denied Him three times.  

Thus, in hearing the words, "Take care of my sheep" the second time, I became aware that I was in need of being rehabilitated.  I became aware that in how I had asked to be freed of these, my present, duties toward these children in whom Jesus Christ is present, I had been denying Jesus.  Jesus had even forewarned me that I would deny Him, and still I insisted that I would not.  He had given me the Scripture passage in which He had told Peter that Peter would deny Him, and in which Peter insisted that he would not deny Him.  Through these Scripture passages, He had already predicted that I would deny Him, and I too had insisted that I would not deny Him.  And I had indeed denied Him by seeking to be free of these, my present duties.  

Thus, when I was there in the gym, when I heard in my head the words "Take care of my sheep" the second time that day, I was reminded of how Peter wept bitterly when he realized he had denied Jesus three times.  My eyes began to well up.  I thought, "I cannot weep here and now.  That would be inappropriate.  I cannot think about this right now."  

You might be able to predict what happened next.  The Lord is faithful to those who love Him, and will come to those who faithfully seek Him, and will take care of them.  Next I heard in my head again the words, "Take care of my sheep."  Again my eyes began to well up.  Again I thought, " I cannot cry here and now.  I cannot think about this right now." 

Later, speaking further with that same Brother, the one who had reminded me that Jesus is in these children, he addressed my concerns.  Responding to how I felt ill-equipped, he noted that Saint Peter was charged with being The Rock upon which Christ built His Church, yet Peter was merely a fisherman.  Saint Peter could have seen himself as being unqualified to do what Christ had called him to do, yet he accepted the vocation to which God had called him.

That same Brother also noted that he could see Jesus laughing.  The Brother suggested that perhaps Jesus was saying about me, "Here he is asking for forgiveness, when he's doing the very thing that I have been calling him to do!"  At that I laughed.  Perhaps I was laughing at my own stubbornness, at my insistence upon perceiving myself at being unable. 

Some time ago I read that the duty to God is contained in the present moment.  I have been trying to live my life in a way which reflects that truth.  I have been attempting to internalize that sentiment, such that hopefully my life provides an example of following one's present duty.

In the midst of trying to accept and perform my present duty, I have felt overwhelmed by all that I am being called to do.  On certain school days, I have felt overloaded.  Feeling unable to process everything that has been required of me, I have felt at times that I have been shutting down.  Conversely, at other times, I have felt pressed beyond my limits.  Consequently, this past Friday, I felt that I was on the path to going thermonuclear, in terms of responding to problematic scenarios in ways which would not reflect magnanimous patience, but which would rather be reflective of having too short of a fuse.  In such tendencies resurfacing in me as of late, I am reminded that I have wished to write here that I do not wish to deceive anyone.  Therefore, I will put it bluntly: I am no saint.  The events of the last month bear such witness, full of evidence showing unfortunate tendencies in me, showing me up as the weak creature that I am. 

Exhausted and drained, feeling like I had no resources with which to enable me to respond to situations appropriately, yesterday I went to noontime Mass downtown at St. Peter's in the Loop.  After Mass, I entered the confession booth.  My voice a gravelly, monotone drawl, I related to the priest how I had regressed, how I had started reacting to challenges in ways I thought I had shed years ago.  I definitely appreciated how he was sympathetic; he shared how he understood such challenges, given how he too used to teach.  He directed me to pray for the grace and the strength from God to empower me to do His will, to do this work which He has called me to do.

I left the Church and made my way to Wrigley Field, where I bought a ticket to watch the Cubs play the Braves from the upper deck.  I'd arrived at the park so early that I took a walk.  I got a slice of deep dish pizza at a restaurant I'd patronized on a visit to Chicago 6 years ago.  Then I went to a cafe and got a cupcake and a glass of milk.  Feeling ill-equipped for the challenges I face, I wept as I sat there in that cafe and ate my cupcake.  I headed back to the stadium.  While I purposely went to the game in an attempt to do something fun, I didn't have as much fun as I felt I could have had; I was preoccupied with the challenges facing me.

At one point in the last few days, I thought of "The Serenity Prayer," as it is often called.  For those of you who don't know it, in that prayer, one implores God, "God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference."  I believe that an angel or a saint or the Holy Spirit shared with me that because I am teaching middle schoolers, they are going to misbehave.  Being human beings, and more specifically, being early adolescents, they simply are going to misbehave.  Here is simply stated a fact.  However, at the same time, I can--indeed, I must--deal with such misbehavior.  God grant me the serenity to accept their nature, and the courage to help them, and the wisdom to know when each is called for.

Such was one helpful train of thought I recently have had.  This morning, however, I received inordinately helpful guidance, direction which illuminates and steers me simultaneously in multiple ways, overlapping with a synchronicity which seems brilliant, yet is also beautifully, strikingly exquisite in its simplicity.

This morning as always, upon waking I read the Bible.  I chose to read Matthew 5 for its particular emphasis on encouragement in the face of adversity.  Initially I had thought it would be most helpful since, at the beginning of that chapter, the Beatitudes offer such strengthening counsel.  Yet I received enlightening guidance once I reached the end of the chapter.  At Matthew 5:43-48, Jesus explains,

You have heard that it was said, 'You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.'  But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven.  For He makes His sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust.  For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have?  Do not even the tax collectors do the same?  And if you greet only your brothers, what more are you doing than others?  Do not even the Gentiles do the same?  You therefore must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.

Right after I read these words, I thought, "Another similar statement could be, 'If you only do what you want to do, what credit is that to you?  For even the worst of sinners do that!  Murderers and thieves do only what they want to do."  And then the necessary following implication sprung into my head, "You must do more than that.  You must do the will of your Father, who is in heaven.  And usually that requires doing what you do not wish to do."  

Next I realized that this line of thinking applies not only to what I am called to do presently, in my current duties.  I realized that it also applies to what I am being called to do after this current year.  In attempting to discern what I'll do after this current year, I've been reading a book entitled "Discerning the Will of God: An Ignatian Guide to Christian Decision Making" by a priest named Father Timothy Gallagher.  In it, Father Gallagher describes how one must be willing to do whatever God is calling one to do, even if it might not be what one initially envisions for oneself.  Indeed, most likely God is calling each of us to a vocation which we don't at first foresee.  When I read this portion of the book, I despaired, and essentially thought that I might as well give up on trying to discern what God wants me to do after this year, since, I felt, I didn't have the requisite mindset to be able to discern His will.  I was too resistant to my life looking too different from how I'd been imagining it.  I hadn't been willing to do whatever He truly wants me to do--even if it is a vocation I might not have been wanting to undertake.  He calls us to be productive in ways we might not choose if left to our own devices. 

Next I thought that essentially God has been asking me, both in my current duties, as well as in my discernment for what will come after this year, "Can you please be productive, even though you don't want to be?"   At the school where I am teaching, when a student is not behaving properly, we ask the student, "Can you please be productive, even though you don't want to be?"  

At the school, I've been finding myself unable to cope with these childrens' inability to focus.  Yet given my inability to focus on what God wants me to do, now, and into the future, how can I lose my patience with these children?  How can I refuse to see past their transgressions, when I simultaneously, and thus quite impossibly, ask God to forgive my sins?  This I know would not happen, as Jesus tells us, right after instructing us to say the Lord's Prayer, he tells us, at Matthew 6:14-15, "For if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you, but if you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses."  

Suddenly it all became clear to me.  I saw that amongst my duties, I must ask these children to be productive.  In following my instructions, and in following my request to do what they might not want at first to do, they will provide to me the example I need.  They will teach me how to follow God's instructions.  They will teach me to also be productive even though at first I might not have wanted to do so.  

Do not think that teaching is the most important thing that I have come to do.  I am to ask these students simple questions.  Most important among the things I have come to do is to cultivate, and, I do humbly pray, prepare fertile ground in their minds, hearts and souls.  There the Holy Spirit will do the most important teaching.  I am not fit to untie the sandal strap on Him who will do the most important work here.  

I have come not only to teach.  I have come also to be taught.  I aspire that in all humility, I may be fertile ground, Lord, for what you have to teach me, and for how you are to shape me.  Lord, let it be done to me not as I will, but as You will.  I am the servant of the Lord.  Let it be done to me as You say.  Amen. 

First Day Of School

Today was the first day of school at the Catholic middle school where I'm teaching on the south side of Chicago.  At times last week I was so anxious about this coming school year that I literally wouldn't have wished such feelings on my worst enemy.  With the goals of not having a cerebral hemorrhage and not having a heart attack, last Friday night I prayed in earnest and consequently, I tremendously calmed down.

Thus, all things considered, I was relatively calm today.  I woke up at 5:15 a.m. and read the Bible for an hour as usual.  Later I wheeled the garbage bins out to the curb, since that's one of the tasks assigned to me here in the faith-based community in which I'm living with some of the Brothers of the Christian Schools.   Next I sat down to a bowl of cereal in the kitchen.  At 7:00 a.m., the Brothers and I gathered for morning prayer, as we do every weekday.

After morning prayer, I gathered my things and headed for the door.  As I walked through the living room, my fellow community members wished me well on my first day.  I walked out the door.  I stood on the stoop and I realized I didn't have the keys to the car.  I turned around and headed back into the house.

As I entered the living room, one of those same community members asked me, "How was it?"

I replied, "I figured out that I'm not going anywhere without the keys to the car!"  I headed back upstairs to my room, retrieved the car keys, and I was on my way.  I had an uneventful 15-minute drive on surface streets from the house to the school.

Arriving at the school, I had a fairly mellow entrance into the classroom.  The other teachers and I had spent all of last week preparing our classrooms and reviewing school procedures, so we were ready for today.

At 8:20, the kids stopped exercising in the gym, as they lined up in preparation to head upstairs for school.  We walked the students upstairs and into the classrooms.

I'm teaching 7th Grade.  One of my fellow teachers, Mark, will be teaching Math, Social Studies, and Religion.  Another of my fellow teachers, Alison, will be teaching Science.  I'll be teaching Literature as well as Writing.  The entire 7th Grade, which is composed of 30 students, roughly equal numbers of boys and girls, is seated in one classroom. 

Once we got the 7th graders seated in the classroom, we began our day.  For the most part we reviewed procedures with them today.  We also helped them to get to know us in easygoing fun ways.  First Mark, Alison and I introduced ourselves.

After some brief announcements, I reminded the students the format of morning prayer together.  Almost all of the 7th graders attended this school last year, so they have been very familiar with morning prayer at the school.  As in all Lasallian gatherings, a prayer session begins with the prayer leader beginning, "Let us remember..." and the rest of those present completing the sentence by praying aloud, "...that we are in the holy presence of God."

Next a prayer, or prayers, of various lengths are said, usually out loud.  I noted to the students that those prayers in the middle of the prayer session could be the same as the ones said the preceding day, or they could be different ones.  I added that the important thing was that whatever one prays, it should be heartfelt and prayed with sincerity, since Jesus reminded us of the importance to pray earnestly.

After those prayers, the prayer leader begins, "Saint John Baptist de la Salle..." and the others present ask that saint, "Pray for us."  At this school, next the prayer leader begins, "San Miguel..." and the others implore that saint, "Pray for us."  Finally the prayer leader begins, "Live, Jesus, in our hearts..." and the other persons pray aloud, "Forever," finishing the prayer session. 

After our morning prayer, we had the students play a game to get to know us better.  We gave them sheets with grids on them.  Each square contained a fact about one of us.  However, the students had to determine, or to guess, which of us each fact described.  We gave them 20 minutes to work in groups collaborating to decide who they thought each fact described.  As I was circulating around the room, greatly enjoying watching the students trying to ascertain which of us teachers was the subject of each square, more than once I thought of saying to the other various adults in the room, "I think I might be enjoying this activity more than they are!"  I was anonymously described on the sheets as one who has "eaten goat" (which I did when I was a Peace Corps Volunteer in Morocco), as one who has been to Iceland, as one who has worked in a McDonald's, as one who used to collect postage stamps, and as one who is the youngest of three children. 

Then Mark reviewed with the kids the system of "classroom economy."  We're continuing a system which has been used in years past at the school through which kids, by behaving well, can earn classroom currency, which they can then redeem for various benefits, including getting to listen to music while reading, or getting to eat at certain times when they normally wouldn't be eating.

Next Alison reviewed classroom procedures with the students.  First she had them read the policies.  Then she had them gather in groups and work together to determine the right answer to questions as she quizzed them.  I enjoyed seeing her transform what otherwise probably would have been a dry, boring activity for the kids into one which energized them with the motivation of competing against each other, and had them scrambling to find the right answer. 

Soon after that, we had the kids taking reading tests to gauge their reading level, and to check to see if their reading level had changed over the summer.  When the kids weren't taking the reading tests, I was helping them find books to read in the school library based on their reading levels from last school year.  I recommended the book "Tuesdays With Morrie" to a couple of kids, and both of them decided to read that book.  I'm excited to be placed at this school because the kids read for well over an hour during each school day.  

At the end of the morning, Mark ran a session on how we can build community in the classroom.  He directed the students to answer a number of questions on paper about how they would like to be treated, how they imagine we as teachers would like to be treated, and about the importance of rules, and about which specific rules are important to follow.  I was most pleased to see that students had written that an important rule is to treat others as you would like done unto you, as Jesus directs us to do.  I'm also thrilled to be teaching at this school since it instills these true Christian ethics in students. 

In the early afternoon, the school day came to an end.  The first day of a trimester at our school is always a half day.  Thus, the students headed home in time for lunch.  I'm further grateful to be teaching at this school since 98% of the students qualify for the government's free and reduced cost lunch.  I'm happy to be trying to help teach impoverished children, to be trying to help poor folks, as Jesus taught us to do.

I'm glad to be trying to live my faith in my everyday life, including in my work.  I'm grateful for this opportunity for so many reasons.  I cherish the opportunity to serve, especially to serve those who don't have a lot.  I feel such fulfillment in helping people who are struggling.  As I help others, especially those who are disadvantaged, I feel such joy inside myself.  I'm so thankful that I'm helping impoverished children in a classroom.  It looks like it's going to be a wonderful school year. 

Memento Mori

Since I started living here in Chicago last month, I've been enjoying going to church.  One of the times I attended Catholic Mass earlier this month, the priest told a story during his sermon. 

A man went to a monastery on a retreat.  He went there for some quiet contemplative time, since he was trying to decide whether to become a priest or a psychologist.  Everyday, he would go for a stroll on the grounds of the monastery.  When he went on his walks, he would always pass a monk who would say to him, "Memento Mori."  Finally, when the week was over, the time came for the man to leave the monastery.  Soon before he was going to depart from the monastery, the man again crossed paths with the monk.

"Well?" inquired the monk.  "What did you decide?"

The man replied, "I have decided that I am going to become a psychologist."

"So?" asked the monk.  "What now?" 

"Well, I am going to go to graduate school."

"And then what?"

"Then I will get a job as a psychologist.  And I am going to fall in love and get married."

"Then what?"

"Then we will have kids."

"Then what?"

"My children will start attending school."

"Then what?"

"Eventually, my children will attend college."

"Then what?"

"By then, I suppose I will retire."

"Then what?"

"Well, since I will be retired, I will get to travel to some places I've never been." 

"Then what?"

"Well, by then, I suppose that my children will be having their own children, so I will enjoy spending time with my grandchildren."

"Then what?"

The man thought for a moment.  "I suppose that soon after that, I will die."

"Then what?"

The man looked a bit concerned.  "Well, then I will go before God, and I hope that He will be pleased with how I have lived my life."

The monk explained, "This is why I kept saying to you, 'Memento Mori,'" meaning 'Remember death,' or 'Think about what will happen when you die.'"  

No Greater Aspiration In My Life

On the day when Lasallian Volunteer (LV) Orientation ended, we all had a free night to do as we pleased.  Most, if not all, of us LVs headed into Chicago for the evening.  One of the LV staff members had arranged an opportunity in Chicago for those of us LVs who were interested to participate in trapeze activities.  I joined her so I could try trapeze!

I signed up to do trapeze because of some elucidation on trapeze which I had heard a couple of months earlier.  I heard this insight when I had attended a three-day workshop on the Catholic writer Henri Nouwen's interpretation of Rembrandt's painting of the Return of the Prodigal Son.  Nouwen's literary executrix, Sue Mosteller, who also lived at L'Arche Daybreak, the faith-based community in which Nouwen had lived, presented the workshop.  Since she had lived in the same community as Nouwen for years while he was there, she got to know him, his musings and his writings fairly well.

During the workshop, Sue shared how Nouwen became mesmerized by trapeze, the art of swinging through the air, leaping forward and being caught by someone else also swinging through the air.  He concluded that the people who leap toward each other and who catch each other symbolize us and God in our relationship with each other.  Sue explained how Nouwen concluded that the truly remarkable party in the trapeze is not the one who leaps, but rather the one who catches, since the one who catches is analogous to God.  She said that just as one person leaps in the trapeze act, trusting the catcher, we too must make leaps of faith, trusting in God.

When I heard Sue's explication of Nouwen's trapeze philosophy, she delivered words which had a profoundly transformative effect on me.  Up until the workshop, in my life I had still been clinging to personal property which I no longer needed.  I hadn't felt able to bring myself to sell the car I owned, even though I had just been living abroad while in the Peace Corps in Morocco for two years, and thus hadn't been driving it for those years.  I hadn't given it up although after my return from Morocco, I'd been staying with family and friends who either had their own cars they were letting me use and/or who lived in areas with great public transportation.  I'd felt that I couldn't let go of it despite how I knew that as an LV, I'd be living in a community where I knew I'd have access to cars I could drive.  In short, even though my life already was one in which I didn't need a car, indeed although my life had changed years earlier into a life in which I didn't need a car, I still wasn't accepting that reality.  I was living in fear, fear that I couldn't sell the car since I might end up needing it at an undetermined--and increasingly unlikely--point in the future.  I wasn't acknowledging the need to get rid of it and trust in God to take care of my needs.  Yet when I heard Sue explain that, like the one who leaps in the trapeze act, we must take the leap of faith and trust in God, my spirit shifted.  I realized that I had to sell the car and trust that God would satisfy my transportation needs.

Having been inspired by Nouwen's conception of the trapeze as a metaphor for our relationship with God and how we must trust in Him, I was interested in actually trying trapeze.  Having only conceptualized trapeze as a spiritual metaphor, I wanted to try it so I would be able to turn it over as a spiritual analogy in my mind in the context of actually having tried it.  I knew that by physically swinging through the air and feeling the associated physiological sensations and the emotional effects produced in me by leaping, swinging, and reaching from the trapeze bar, I would be able to consider it from first-hand knowledge. 

Thus I signed up to try trapeze.  The folks running the trapeze spot were quite pleasant.  That helped!  It also helped a little bit that the trapeze folks operate in a park close to the shore of Lake Michigan, a beautiful outdoor location. 

Once we had gotten harnesses attached to us, and gotten the latches on the ends of ropes clicked into the harnesses on us, each of us took turns climbing to the top of the trapeze platform.  Generally I am unbothered by heights.  But under certain conditions I start to get a little nervous.  In this case, we were climbing one of those metal ladders which extends to potentially double its length.  Thus I wasn't worried about it coming apart, but it just didn't stay exactly still as I stepped on it.  So I climbed a bit slowly up to the trapeze platform, which I finally reached.

The fellow on the platform told me not to worry, that the ladder was firmly bolted into both the deck on the ground and into the trapeze platform.  That eased my mind, as did the net which more than adequately lay under all of the space in which I would be swinging.  Still, I was a little apprehensive standing up on the trapeze platform, perhaps 25 feet above the ground.  He assured me that I would be fine if I followed his instructions, which I did.  He took off the ropes which had secured me when I had been climbing, and attached new ones which would secure me after I leaped from the platform.  He told me to use my left hand to hold onto a metal frame on the platform.  Then he told me to step forward and put all ten toes just slightly over the edge of the platform!  He had me grab the trapeze bar with my right hand as I continued holding with my left hand onto the metal frame on the platform.  Then he was holding onto me and leaning backward.  Despite this secure arrangement, I found it difficult to ignore my instincts, which were kicking in and setting alarms off in my head as he told me to lean forward and grab the rest of the trapeze bar with my left hand.  Eventually I did so.  Then he told me to take, as he put it, a little bunny leap off of the platform.

I took a little leap and voila, I was flying through the air!  As each of us hung from the platform bar, the staff gave us instructions on what to do.  They tell someone hanging from the bar by their hands to swing their knees up to the bar when they're at the end of their swing because that's when someone is the lightest.  Thus it's easiest to get your knees up and over the bar at that very moment.  I tend to lag a bit with verbal instructions; that is, it takes me a little while to process what people say to me.  Thus, it proved a little difficult for me to get my knees above the trapeze bar.  Although I'm a bit slow when I listen, I did get it, and I got my knees over the bar.  When I swung back to the other end, they had me let go of the bar, so that I was then hanging from the bar upside down by my knees!  Then they told me to stretch out my arms toward Lake Michigan.  Now, I don't know about you, but when I'm upside down, I'm rather disoriented.  I was putting out my arms in front of me, but they wanted me to thrust my arms in back of me.  They tried a different way of phrasing it: they told me to put my arms toward the net.  That did it!  I was reaching out my arms just as I was supposed to do!  On the way back, when I swung to the end, they had me grab the bar with my hands.  At the other end, they had me swing my knees down, then they had me let go, and down to the net I fell.

We each got to practice this routine a few times.  That helped!  It helps to practice being upside down, getting one's knees over a trapeze bar, and swinging from one knees, when one has never done it! 

Last we got to try leaping and getting caught by a catcher who was also swinging from a trapeze bar.  Here, though, I wasn't just jumping off the trapeze platform whenever I wanted.  The catcher was swinging on his own trapeze bar, on the far side of the net.  Once I was in position on the platform, he'd shout, "Ready!"  That word was my cue to bend my knees and be ready to jump.  Then he'd shout, "Hup!"  That word was the cue to jump.  Since he precisely timed his shout, it was crucial immediately to jump.  One can't hesitate, or else one will be late in arriving at the spot where the catcher can catch you.

Once he had shouted, "Hup!" I jumped right away!  Reaching the far end, knees up and over the bar.  Back at the end next to the platform, hands down.  Then one has to reach out...  I put out my arms...  Yet I was disoriented, as happens to me when I'm hanging upside down by my knees from a trapeze bar!  Yet without anyone yelling any correction to me, I self-corrected and stretched my arms out wide...  but because I had initially reached in the wrong direction, I had thrown off my momentum.  When I then tried to reach toward the catcher, and when we reached the point when we were closest to each other, we were too far apart from each other for him to catch me.  Later I saw a picture of the catcher and me reaching toward each other.  Perhaps our hands were a foot apart.

Despite not being caught, I was pleased that when I dropped from the bar, at least I successfully did a back flip on my way down to the net.  Again, it is critical to let go when one is at the end of one's swing.  Then one is the lightest.  Thus when one lets go at that moment, one is best positioned to do a back flip. 

One must know what one is doing to be able to do trapeze well.  The LV staff member who arranged the trapeze opportunity for us is quite skilled at trapeze.  We saw her complete some talented feats up in the air, including propping herself up so that she was sitting with her legs wide open on the trapeze bar!

However, not only is she skilled at actually flying trapeze, but she is also skilled at taking analogous leaps.  In some fitting symbolism, she has since moved on from working for Lasallian Volunteers.  She left her familiar job at Lasallian Volunteers, taking the leap to take a new job, which also entails moving to a new city, to try something new.   

We are called to make leaps of faith in our lives, in the choices we make.  We are called to give up things in our lives which have proven to be obsolete or which otherwise hold us back, whether they be possessions, or opinions, or unhealthy emotions such as anger, greed, sluggishness or pride.  We are drawn to let go of the ego which controls us, to forget about an insult someone has made against us.  We are asked to make the leap of faith to give someone the benefit of the doubt, to figure that perhaps he or she truly was in the right, and to forgive him or her during a disagreement.  We are invited to make such leaps into unknown territory which makes us vulnerable and uncomfortable and unsettled, because in doing so we stand to improve ourselves, to evolve into more advanced, caring, understanding, loving, compassionate, kind human beings, drawing closer to the ideal which Jesus set for us.  Once we finally do make such leaps, we will feel far better than we do clinging to our fear, which would have us remain standing on the platform for days, weeks, months or years, which would control us to our own detriment, both directly to ourselves and indirectly to ourselves through the unfortunate effects our fear has on our relationships with others.  Once we take the leap to love our neighbor, we will also love ourselves and God more.  

As far as I am concerned, I do sincerely hope that I am as good at taking leaps as God wants me to be.  I have no aspiration greater than this in my life. 

Orientation Part Three: Gratitude For Blessings

At Lasallian Volunteer (LV) Orientation at Lewis University during the last ten days of July, as LVs we had sessions on numerous topics.  Staff reviewed with us the organization's policies and procedures, with which we must comply as LVs.  One of the Brothers of the Christian Schools educated us about the life, work and times of Saint John Baptist de la Salle, who founded the order of the Brothers of the Christian Schools, the order which in turn founded the staff organization named Lasallian Volunteers, which administers the LV program.  Later we were reminded of the many types of work which the Brothers perform in dozens of countries on five continents.  We went to multiple sessions during which we were trained in the tasks we will be doing as LVs, whether it be teaching, tutoring, working in campus ministry, doing social work, or serving in other ways.  Facilitators led us through discussions about social justice and about various kinds of diversity.  The presenter of one session spoke with us about becoming familiar with the neighborhoods in which we'll be living as LVs.  We received tips about beginning to live in community with others, in the intentionally faith-based community houses where we'll be living as LVs.  Insofar as we'll be living in community which is faith-based, we also received guidance on how to lead prayer sessions, a responsibility which generally all of us will have at multiple points during our service as LVs.

Since Lasallian Volunteers is a Catholic organization, and since it was founded by the Brothers, which is a Catholic order, and since it is affiliated with Catholic schools, the priest at Lewis University facilitated a session during which he fielded questions about the Catholic Mass.  While many LVs are Catholic, some are Protestant Christians.  Others might not identify with any particular denomination of Christianity.  Thus not all LVs are familiar with the Catholic Mass from having attended Mass for years.

By the end of the session during which the priest was answering questions about Mass, I was wondering if some LVs were not enthusiastic about attending Mass despite their Christian heritage.  Although we had already gone at least a few minutes longer than scheduled, and although we were thus overdue to head to the campus cafeteria for lunch, I raised my hand.  Acknowledging the time, I succinctly said that, as many of my fellow LVs already knew, at the end of last year, I finished living in an overwhelmingly Muslim country for two years: I had been living in Morocco in the Peace Corps.  I added that while I was living there, often I wasn't able to attend Mass, and consequently greatly missed spiritual community with other Christians.  I explained that when I returned to the U.S. and attended Mass, I felt so comforted by the spiritual community I felt by the other people singing around me in church that I began to cry out of gratitude for what I hadn't had, and for which I was now so grateful.  I pointed out that so often, we think nothing of singing in church, yet it can be profoundly supportive to others.  I suggested that they meditate upon these thoughts. 

The next day, late in the afternoon on Saturday, the priest said Mass for us in the chapel on campus there at Lewis University.  During communion, the hymn being sung was an adaptation of the Prayer of Peace, which is widely attributed to St. Francis, and which in this case was set to music.  For those of you who think you might not know it, the original prayer reads:

Lord, make me an instrument of your peace,

Where there is hatred, let me sow love;

Where there is injury, pardon;

Where there is doubt, faith;

Where there is despair, hope;

Where there is darkness, light;

Where there is sadness, joy.

O Divine Master,

grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled, as to console;

to be understood, as to understand;

to be loved, as to love.

For it is in giving that we receive.

It is in pardoning that we are pardoned,

and it is in dying that we are born to Eternal Life.

I have appreciated this prayer for quite some time.  I find its message to be profoundly important, actually crucial, for spiritual development.

As I've noted, since living in Morocco, where I often did not enjoy spiritual community with other Christians, I have very much appreciated hearing other Christians sing when I go to church now.  Thus I certainly appreciated my fellow LVs as they sang the hymn version of the Prayer of Peace.

Yet not only hearing fellow Christians, but more specifically my fellow LVs, with whom I share a passion for helping not just poor persons, but impoverished youths, sing this hymn therefore affected me on additional levels.  Yet, knowing that they also share with me the aspiration to the ideals expressed in the hymn, goals which are demanding, in service of others, I was further comforted by this additional level of spiritual community with them.

They were singing the hymn softly and sweetly, a soft, comforting melody.  In their gentle, soothing tone, they auditorily aspired to the humility, modesty and care which the hymn expresses.  Knowing that I was surrounded by others who value this approach of serving others in life at one's own expense, I began to weep, in gratitude for the treasure, privilege and honor of being in their company.  Having sojourned alone many days in the past, I have so cherished the fellowship and support of those who share my values and ideals, as I did especially at that moment.  I saw my fellow LVs in that moment even more vividly than I had before, as the blessings which they truly are to me and to others.  I am blessed.  Thank you, God. 

Orientation Part Two: Racism, Injustice, Poverty, And Personal Choices

After the day at Lasallian Volunteer (LV) Orientation when we all went to Covenant Harbor as I described in my last blog entry, next we were back at Lewis University in Illinois, where we had sessions on numerous topics.  We had one period where the leader asked us to talk about our motivations for joining the LV program and about our views on social justice. 

During that session, as the facilitator made differing statements about various topics, each time he made one of these statements, he asked us to get into one of four groups, the first group if we strongly agreed with the statement, the second if we agreed with the statement, the third if we disagreed with the statement, and the fourth if we strongly disagreed with the statement.  I must say I was interested to see where my fellow LVs stood in the room as the session facilitator made each statement.

The presenter said, "My main reason for joining the LV program is to grow spiritually."  I stood in the quarter of the room to indicate that I strongly agreed that the statement applied to me.  I joined the LV program to help myself discern the type of work I want to do, to help me see if I would like to teach full-time.  But moreso I joined the LV program to see how I feel about living in faith-based community.  And even more than living in community, I joined the LV program to grow spiritually, from serving others in the work I am going to do, and also, I feel even moreso, by living in faith-based community.  While living in community, I hope to learn primarily about myself, what I need to improve in myself, and what weaknesses I have which I must accept in myself.  While living in community, I also would like to learn about others, about the other members of the community, and how I can support them.  Yet truly by living in community, I hope that in gaining this knowledge, and in applying it, in trying to be more kind and compassionate to others around me, I hope to grow spiritually.  I see community as a means to an end, not simply an end in itself.

Next the facilitator said, "My main reason for joining the LV program is to live in faith-based community."  Since I believe that community is a means to the end of spiritual growth, I only moved one group over, so that I was in the category to show that I agreed with the statement.

Later the presenter read the statement, "Racism is the primary cause of suffering and injustice in the United States."  Here the population of LVs was mostly in the middle of the room.  I was in the group which disagreed with the statement.  A friend of mine, who strongly disagreed with the statement, started explaining that he believes that not racism, but prejudice, is the main cause of suffering and injustice in the U.S.  He went on to say that racism is only one way in which prejudice is manifested.  He added that sexism has been the cause of much suffering and injustice in the U.S.A. as well.  He opined that racism, sexism and other forms of discrimination have the same root, which he termed prejudice.  Once he had explained his viewpoint, I moved into his quadrant of the room.  Although I would've phrased my thoughts on it a bit differently, I agreed with the basic thrust of his point.  I would've stated that hatred is the primary cause of racism and sexism and other forms of suffering and injustice anywhere.

During that session, I did not add my thoughts to the discussion, since the presenter was moving the conversation along.  Here online, I am relatively unconstrained by time.  Thus I can state that not only do I believe that hatred is the primary cause of suffering and justice, but also that conversely, love is the root of well-being and justice.

And I believe that we can best achieve justice by loving as best as we can.  Indeed, I follow and try to emulate Jesus as a Christian since no one else has lived a life of love as well as Jesus did.  In addition to living without sin, He laid down His life, allowing Himself to be crucified such that He died on the cross for all of us.  Since Jesus is so important to me, indeed since He is my Savior, I note that I follow Him specifically as a Christian because Christians believe that He died on the cross and triumphed over death in His resurrection, which Muslims do not believe.  I honor the full extent of the sacrifice Jesus made and the example He set.  As Jesus Himself said, at John 15:13, "There is no greater love than to lay down one's life for others."  And He did so of His own free will.  As we read at John 10:18, He noted that He laid down His life of His own accord, and that He could have taken it up again if He had chosen to do so.

Had I expressed these thoughts, including these on the pivotal role of free will, during this session at Orientation, they could have dovetailed into the presenter's next statement, when he said, "The majority of people living in poverty are poor because of bad personal choices."  All of the LVs in the room moved to the side of the room to indicate that they either disagreed or strongly disagreed with the statement.  Indeed, with around 50 of us LVs in the room, I wasn't sure that all of us could fit into one quarter of the room, so I'm not sure whether or not everyone strongly disagreed with the statement, or whether some of us strongly disagreed with it and others just disagreed with it.

After we had been discussing this statement for a little while, I raised my hand and noted that nearly all of the people, if not everyone, in the room had chosen at some point, whether in the past, present or continuing into the future, to be financially poor.  Of course, the vast majority of us in the room were LVs.  Aside from the LVs in the room, LV staff were also in the room.  Most LV staff members used to be LVs themselves, and thus used to live on the modest stipend LVs receive. 

I further noted that plenty of people (which would include monks, nuns, priests, social justice activists, pro bono lawyers, and Peace Corps volunteers, among many others) would view that voluntary decision to be monetarily poor as a good personal choice.  I wanted to be sure that not everyone in the room was looking at financial poverty as a bad thing!  I found it appropriate to point out that many find it laudable to be purposefully financially poor by reminding everyone in the room that probably all of them chose financial poverty at some point in their lives.  Granted, I am fully aware that the vast majority of impoverished people in the world are not monetarily poor by choice.  Nevertheless, I wanted to illustrate that the question could be viewed from a different perspective. 

Soon thereafter, again trying to look at the question from a different perspective, I asked the session facilitator if he had intended for the statement to apply to financial poverty.  He indicated that one did not necessarily have to interpret the statement as dealing with poverty in a monetary sense.  As soon as he had said that, I began moving my way through the crowd which had gathered on the one side of the room.  I walked over to the other side of the room, where I now stood alone.  I explained that if the statement is taken as applying to spiritual poverty, then I strongly disagreed with it.  All of us, every last one of us, who is spiritually poor is in that condition because we have made poor personal choices.  (And I quickly point out that many of us, including myself, are spiritually poor.  We are trying to crawl out of the darkness which comes along with the bad choices we have made; we are trying to return to The Light, which is from God above.) 

We all have free will.  All of us know the difference between right and wrong.  Each of us has a conscience.  It is only us who do spiritual damage to ourselves.  Others might be able to physically injure us or financially harm us.  How we choose to respond to events in our lives determines our spiritual state of health.  As Jesus noted, nothing from outside us can hurt us.  As He also explained at Mark 7:15-23, it is what is within us which hurts us; the poor personal choices we make are what hurt us, since ultimately we can only be responsible for our own choices.  We cannot be responsible for what is done to us, but we can, and indeed are, whether we like it or not, responsible for how we respond to events in our lives. 

Since we are responsible for the choices we make, we are also more specifically responsible for how we respond to others in need.  And when we help others who need our assistance, we not only help them, but we also create spiritual wealth for ourselves. 

What kind of wealth do we want to amass?  At what expense?  When we accumulate spiritual wealth, often we put assisting others over earning money for ourselves.  Do we help others, perhaps at the expense of our bank account?  Do we help our own bank account, perhaps at the expense of our souls?  As Jesus noted at Matthew 6:21, where your treasure is, there also will your heart be. 

Do we help someone else in need, or do we pass by that person?  The LV program was founded to provide volunteering opportunities for helping disadvantaged youths, clearly a decision to help those in need.  By helping others in need, and in doing so rather than pursuing material wealth, one redefines wealth.  True wealth, wealth that will last for eternity, is spiritual wealth. 

We can only be responsible for our own choices, including the ones we make about the types of wealth we accumulate.  Thus our choices truly define us; they determine our eternal destiny.  Make yours reflect the best values you can. 

Orientation Part One: Tackling Challenges With Others And By Oneself

In the last ten days of July, I was at Lasallian Volunteer (LV) Orientation.  Before Orientation, I had only met a couple of other LVs besides Whitney and Megan, who also live in Chicago.  I was glad to finally meet all of the other LVs. 

On our first full day of Orientation, we headed north to Covenant Harbor, a Christian camp and retreat center located on the shore of Lake Geneva, Wisconsin, where we spent the day.  At Covenant Harbor, they have ziplining, ropes courses and other challenging physical activities, sometimes which require participants to strategize with each other to be able to reach the goals.  Thus, we went to Covenant Harbor, among other reasons, to help us to learn to work as a team. 

Once we arrived at Covenant Harbor, in the morning, all of us LVs were split into teams.  Each team headed off on its own with a staff member from Covenant Harbor, who directed us on which activities to do and who also supervised us while we were doing them.  At first on my team, we spent time learning each others' names.  Then the staff member asked us what our ground rules would be while we were working together on the activities.  We noted that we wanted to continue working on learning each others' names.  We established that everyone had to listen to all suggestions which were made.  We said that we also wanted to make sure that we all were having fun!

Having set the ground rules for our group, we set off to begin the activities.  We finished some of the activities; others we didn't successfully complete.  One of them involved balancing the group of the dozen of us on what essentially was an oversized see saw, so that neither end of the see saw touched the ground.  This task we completed fairly quickly, without much difficulty.

At another point, we were brought to three wooden platforms, each of them only slightly above the ground.  The first platform was one yard square.  The second platform was slightly smaller than the first.  The third platform was a bit smaller than the second.  The first platform was about ten feet from the second platform.  On another side of the second platform, the third platform was ten feet away.  We had to get onto the first platform all at the same time.  We were given two wooden boards, each about six feet long, about five inches wide, and about two inches deep.  We had to bridge our way from one platform to the next without our bodies or either of the boards touching the ground.  If our bodies or either platform touched the ground, we had to start over from the beginning.  We were given 15 minutes to complete the task.  It was a bit crowded on each platform, so we had to coordinate our movements very carefully and deliberately.  Nevertheless, we finished in less than 15 minutes!

After these team-building exercises, we took a break for lunch.  The LV staff had arranged lunch for us, which we ate at picnic tables on the lakeshore, a break which was a welcome respite from some difficult activities! 

After lunch, we were told that we had spent the morning coming together as individuals and working together as a group.  We were next told that in the afternoon, we would be watching in groups while we cheered on individuals taking on physical feats.  It was at this point that we were introduced to the high ropes course.  On the ropes course, there are several tall round poles, about the width of telephone poles, and which are perhaps one and a half times the height of telephone poles, and which have spikes in them for climbing on them, just as telephone poles have.  In between the poles, at their tops, were strung ropes.  Alternatively, between two poles there was a wooden beam, perhaps four inches wide.

Staff securely tightened harnesses around us, and securely attached the latches at the ends of the ropes into the harnesses around us.  The ropes attached to us ran up to pulleys overhead.  From there the ropes ran down to staff members on the ground.  Thus when someone is ready to come down, they can be let down slowly since the rope is fed through a pulley, by which one can adjust the speed the rope is being used.  Once we had been secured with the harnesses and the ropes, we started climbing up the telephone poles to tackle some physical challenges at some higher elevations. 

Between the tops of two particular poles was strung a rope, perhaps twenty feet off of the ground.  Hanging from that horizontal rope were a half dozen ropes, each of them tied to a tire.  Once one had reached the top of the pole, one stepped onto the first tire, then made one's way to the next tire, and the next, all the way to the other pole, then turned around and headed back. 

More than challenges such as that one, what I really wanted to do on the ropes course was to take the Leap Of Faith, which entails leaping off of a platform and catching a metal bar, ideally with two hands.  I had been waiting to do it, since the staff members hadn't yet opened it to us, since they had been staffing other stations on the course.  Finally they said that they would start letting people try to take the Leap Of Faith.  I made my way over to that station.  I got the special harness put on me.  We got the latches on the ends of the ropes clicked into the harness which was already on me.

Then I began climbing the pole, trying not to think about how high I was going up off of the ground.  Finally I reached the small platform, perhaps two feet long by two feet wide, which was probably between 20 to 30 feet off the ground.  I slowly stood up on the platform and as I looked down, I began to think that I was quite high above the ground.  I rather nervously and thus gingerly made my way to the edge of the platform.  I looked from the edge of the platform at a horizontal metal bar hanging about five feet away from the platform.  I thought of Indiana Jones, near the end of the film "Indiana Jones And The Last Crusade," as he looks across a deep and wide chasm, and mumbles out loud, "This is insane!  Nobody can jump this!"  From somewhere below which seemed far away, but which was much closer than it seemed, I heard some of my fellow LVs shouting cheers of encouragement to me.  Something shifted in my spirit.  I stopped worrying, and instead, in a more focused way, I started preparing to leap with enough energy to hopefully help me to reach the bar.  I squinted at the bar and bent my knees a few times in a row.  Then I leaped off of the platform.  I caught the bar with two hands.  My fellow LVs were cheering on the ground as I swung from the bar by my hands.

Once the cheers had subsided, the staff member directed me to let go of the bar.  To do so was to defy everything that my instincts were telling me.  I was hanging from a metal bar 25 feet above the ground.  My animal instincts told me that if I let go, I would fall to the ground.  The staff member repeated that I had to let go of the bar.  I let go of the bar, and of course I did not fall.  I was hanging in mid-air, at first staying a constant height above the ground, kept in place by the rope which was tied to me and which was slung through the pulley above me.  Before I let go of the metal bar, had I resorted to logic, I would have reasoned that I was secured by a rope, made taut over the pulley, and further secured at the ground, and thus did not need to worry about falling.  Since I had let go of the bar, the staff member slowly let me down by the rope down to the ground.

After taking the Leap Of Faith, I tackled another challenge on the ropes course.  I climbed to the top of one of the poles.  From there started a walkway of sorts.  Between that pole and another pole stretched two horizontal ropes which were analogous to hand railings which one held as one walked on wooden slats hanging from those hand railings.  However, this path was made a bit tricky because the wooden slats were not tied to each other.  Therefore, they could, and often did, swing away from LVs who were trying to walk on them.  I managed to walk slowly on the slats from one pole to the other, then slowly turned around and walked back to the first pole.

Aside from taking the Leap Of Faith, I also had really been wanting to zipline.  When you zipline, you're secured to a cable which is horizontally suspended about 20 feet above the ground.  When you're about to start ziplining away from the ziplining tower, the cable stretches horizontally away from you for a few hundred feet.  When you step off of a platform, you whisk away down the cable.  So I made my way over to the zipline.  I found out that in this location, you have to climb to the top of the ziplining tower.  Secured with a harness and ropes latched to me, I set off up the tower, a square tower with three flat walls with things like rocks sticking out of the wall every couple of feet in every direction, which one either grabs or on which one steps to climb the wall.  I'd done rock climbing while similarly secured years earlier.  Yet this time when I got about halfway up the climbing tower, I ran out of strength.  Fortunately the height wasn't bothering me, perhaps partly because the climbing wall was in front of me, and thus I wasn't looking at the ground, but primarily at the wall in front of me.  In the end, I ascended the upper half of the climbing tower largely because the staff member holding the rope on the ground helped by pulling on the rope, feeding it through the pulley at the top of the tower.  I was glad to be at the top of the tower, about 30 to 40 feet off the ground.

At the top of the tower, there were a few other LVs already up there who were in line to zipline.  When it got to be my turn, the staff member hooked me into the apparatus which connected to the cable.  He instructed me not to dive or do anything drastic; he told me to merely step off.  I stepped off of the tower.  I first thought, rather than traveling horizontally across the cable, "Um... I'm falling... toward the ground..."  Since I had been standing, and thus had stepped off of the tower, I did plunge a bit toward the ground.  If I had been sitting on the tower, I would've merely leaned forward and fallen off of the tower, which I think may have been a more gentle start, in which case I believe I would've had a smoother trajectory, and thus would've felt a bit more assured that all was well.  Nevertheless, soon my trajectory smoothed out, and I was more horizontally zooming through the forest clearing toward the other end of the zipline path.  Once I got going horizontally, I enjoyed ziplining: it was a fun ride!

My fellow LVs and I enjoyed our time at Covenant Harbor.  We got to know each other better, we worked together as teams, and we had fun all at the same time!