Imaging and Imagining God

As you can tell from previous posts by Anne, Bea and Christina, life in the CDN is very full and very rich.  In our discernment, we are each learning more about ourselves - what makes us tick; why we are the way we are; how and why we react in the ways we do; what past behaviors no longer serve us.  This deeper self-awareness not only helps us in discernment of the call to religious life, it will help us in our future ministries and in life, in general.  Discerning deeply takes a lot of energy, a lot of emotion.  Our weekly Reflection Day has become a welcome oasis.  This is a day set aside for processing the activity of the week, our feelings, our struggles, our joys, our questions.  It also helps bring us in closer relationship to our God.  Recently, one of our Directors, Joye Gros OP, led a Reflection Day, using our image of God as the prayer and reflection theme.  I took a bike ride to a local park, people-watched, reflected, prayed, journaled and was led to this prayer poem.  It is meaningful to me; hopefully, it will be to you, too.  Thanks for reading it ... and blessings to you as you find God in the everyday!


                                                         God Is
               The man in the wheelchair at the Social Security office and
               the lady in the pretty yellow dress
               The young mother with two children in tow
               the little boy standing in the fountain
               with wide-open face of delight
                               the light shining in Rosa Maria’s eyes
               God is Poetry and Science and Art and Dance and Music
                               the very best in all that is
                              God is Passion
                                Times Infinity
               God is the unexpected check that arrives
                               in the midst of a struggle
                               to buy gas or milk
               God is the crying baby who starts to sleep
               through the night just when
               you are at your wit’s end
               God is the greeting card that arrives
       on a gray
                                       gloomy day
               God is laughter, a brook babbling, the roar of waves
               breaking on rocky ocean shores
                                          God is Love
                   Times Infinity
               God is falling leaves
               the breath that fills sails
               and keeps kites aloft
               God is in every drop of our blood
               in each beat of our heart
               in every tear we cry
               God is the hummingbird that whirred over
               my right shoulder
               the vein in a cicada’s wing
               God is a chorus of all that has voice
               the beauty of a Black Hills Pine
               and a mystic
               God is the suffering, the homeless
               the imprisoned, the joyful, the mute
               God is the biggest hug
                       the greatest ear
                              the most compassionate friend you will ever have
                    Times Infinity
               God is a good measure, tamped down, filled to overflowing
                       God is too big
                                              for me to know
                                   what God is.
               God is Mercy.
                               God is Love
                                      God is All Good
                                                      God is Just
                                      God Just Is
                       Times Infinity