Dear Ones,

Several times this week, I have come across this meme on Facebook. I have even re-posted it myself, because it speaks to part of the theology about living fully that I practice in this one life of which we are certain. It’s from writer and illustrator Mari Andrew:

 

I am drawn to these words and the way they are written on a simple gray sheet of paper. The handwriting is so tender, a unique combination of capital and lower-case letter, approximations of cursive, a plan not made, as the words crowd at the bottom of the page. So tender and human, the letters and words mirroring the sentiments of the language. Joy and sorrow woven fine.

 

We all learn how important it is to count our blessings, to remain cheerful and grateful for the goodness of our lives. Nothing wrong with that, joy and gratitude good food and good company in our daily journeys. I find trouble, though, in counting the blessings as a way to discount or erase or to even feel a bit of guilt about in the midst of the raging sorrows of life, in our individual lives and in our collective human life.

 

I’ve been making a practice, sometimes well and sometimes poorly, of holding the joy and sorrow on an equal plane, without one becoming more important, without one held above the other. It’s a constant see-saw, seeking the balance in the middle, constant motion, because I have been taught to live swim around in the depths of despair or to push off from sadness to fly in happiness, even in false happiness. Perhaps you, too, have learned to live this way, seeking one more than the other. But may we together acknowledge the personal pain in our lives—including hideous invasion and destruction, ongoing oppression, climate destruction—and embrace the joy—of new friendships and new babies, birdsong, the consistency of the rising sun each morning. And may we together share the joys that makes us wary that we might lose it, share the sorrows that call us to compassion and goodness, ever mindful that we tell a lie about our lives when we don’t give attention to both. May this you remember, as you remember also, that you are loved, you are worthy, you are welcome, and you are needed. May you feel it so, and may it be so.