I'm that seed

This week was the Passionist institute here in Melbourne, where companions, religious and others wanting to enrich their understanding of the Passionist charism gather.

This year was a rather different experience for me personally, arriving late and leaving early due to music commitments, I was left with a rather reluctance to embrace the invitation to ‘come stay for a while’. 

Normally I adore attending these type of events, or even just going to Holy Cross to embrace my brothers and get to hear, see how everyone is going. While at times I sat over the weekend experiencing and watching how our relationships have grown, from one of not really knowing each other, to one of sharing joy and listening ear. It occurred to me, even in my tiredness and somewhat lack of understanding of the challenges before me, there is still Christ light shinning back at me… 

Bring to life the parable of the sower and parable of the mustard seed… 

I’m that seed, buried deep underground. My job is to sit and soak, to surrender and to learn to die to myself. New life will come out of me eventually, but for now its not time. It’s dark and often lonely and I have no idea when things will move forward or if I’m doing enough of what I should be doing. And what exactly is it that I’m suppose to be doing? I’m without a path to follow. I wish I could muster up all my strength to break out and grow already, but bloom and beauty don’t come through rushing. It takes abiding and staying put - two things I’m not too grand at… 

I’m a little uncomfortable in this season, I squirm and tantrum because I can’t be all that I used to be. I used to be on rosters to serve in the Church. I used to deliver richness to peoples door steps in the material aid required at the time. I used to have meetings to attend, events to plan and felt like productivity was a visibly fruitful way. In those used-to days, I felt more in control, someway more needed, more important. 

Its a facade that those days held more weight in God’s kingdom and my life. The lie is that being busy endlessly while not trying to burn myself out in service for others is less glorifying and meaningful. What seems clear on paper becomes fuzzy to my nearsighted heart and mind. 

I openly question God’s process and pout about His gracious, upside -down attitude towards time well spent. I fret over losing my place in the crowd where everyone else seems to be rushing ahead, making a difference and changing lives. I fear I’ll become like the Tin Man in the Wizard of Oz, rusty and stiff, forgotten in the middle of the forest. I’m afraid if I stay still for too long I’ll lose my abilities, my gifts from lack of use. Most of all, in the sacred, hushed part of my heart, a small sense of lost of self is present. 

Been a Christian is called to be counter cultural. Its true, look at our history, the church that has formed, it was no easy task, nor is it today. On top of that level, add in another layer of embracing a call to religious life in an age where the Church is under transformation through the grace of the Spirit and as too is religious life. It is not nor possibly ever will be the same as those days when it was common to have one member of a catholic family ‘join’ a religious order. 

The outcome of this has so many offspring, while at times I feel I can not see them, nor even sense where they will come up, yet faith keeps me still.

On the weekend it was mentioned in light, that we see in Genesis in the first twelve chapters when things go wrong, what does the Lord do? He goes and finds two retired people, to continue the response to the call. This is a large reminder that the mentality that the youth of the church, the young in the congregations are not the only way forward, rather they are just as important as everyone else - YOU the elders of the church. Still blooming, still sprouting away, in moments of exchange, in soil that might not be familiar to the youth yet still the bloom is evident and unreisisetable at times. 

Maybe that’s the point. A seed holds all of what it will become in its tiny form, but only through burial and death does it fully become what it was created to be. Just look at the blossoms around you, they stay lodged in the dirt, often sprouting between concrete or other obstacles man places in its way. The small crack allows light to creep in, soaking in what is needed, after the right amount of time spent in the covering of the seed, they are rebirth into something new, something pleasant, something truth-telling. So it will be with myself. I’ll become more fully who I’m intended, created to be, after a season of nourishment underground. It will be through surrender and death to self that I’ll be remade closer to the likeness of Christ.